Christian Reilly, Vice President and CTO at Citrix, sits down with Keith Townsend & Lisa Martin at Citrix Synergy 2019 in Atlanta, GA. #theCUBE #CitrixSynergy @SiliconANGLE theCUBE @Citrix https://siliconangle.com/2019/06/03/meet-the-new-boss-smart-work-tech-gives-employees-the-power-citrixsynergy-guestoftheweek/ Meet the new boss: Smarter tech gives power to employees What will work look like in the smart, connected, internet-enabled future? New technology supporting edge computing, from 5G networks to machine learning, means employees can ditch the cubicle and work remotely. It could also make workers so efficient they could whittle their work week down to four days. Advancing tech will give employees a bigger say in how work is done. They’ll be able to remove tasks from bulky boxes and slip them into faster, sleeker vessels with the help of software applications. In these boxes, or units, within which we work today, there’s a lot of unnecessary, time-consuming stuff, according to Christian Reilly (pictured), vice president and chief technology officer of Citrix Systems Inc. Look at all the applications people use at work. There are the crucial tasks they complete within them, and then there’s other tasks that just get in the way. “We talk to lots of customers about the notion of how much application [they] really use.” Reilly said. Enterprise applications delivered through traditional technologies are often riddlingly complex, while what they do is surprisingly simple. What if people could take what is useful from these apps and get rid of what is not? They’d make big gains in efficiency and save time. In fact, it would be a step toward transforming the way people work entirely, Reilly pointed out. “The bigger play is, how do we take work and break it down into atomic units?” he asked. It doesn’t stop with applications. Citrix also asks why people use applications in the first place, and can it help them accomplish their goals faster with technologies like data analytics, artificial intelligence, automation and micro applications. That is the direction Citrix is heading toward with the latest additions to its “intelligent experience” workspace. Reilly spoke with Lisa Martin (@LisaMartinTV), host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s mobile livestreaming studio, and guest host Keith Townsend (@CTOAdvisor), during the Citrix Synergy event in Atlanta, Georgia. They discussed the latest technologies that are transforming the way people work (see the full interview with transcript here). (* Disclosure below.) This week, theCUBE spotlights Reilly in our Guest of the Week feature. The market for future-ready work tools The shift toward remote working is opening up the market for advanced employee-experience tech. Researchers at Buffer Inc. predict that by 2020, over 50% of employees will work remotely. Unfortunately, “we still have not figured everything out to make this work,” Amir Salihefendic, chief executive officer of Doist Ltd., told Buffer. “For example, many entirely remote teams still use real-time chat such as Slack for communication — in the process removing all the good parts of being a remote company.” Doist builds productivity tools, including Twist, a Slack alternative geared toward teams spread across time zones. A number of other companies have jumped on the future-of-work trend. AI, machine learning and automation have been a boon to technology products. They’ve made everything from software for data scientists to consumer apps smarter and more powerful. Employees increasingly want these technologies built into their work tools. They could subtract a lot of grunt work from their daily lives and shift brain power to more creative, high-yield tasks. Sounds great — but are workers trained and ready to use these technologies? An Accenture PLC study found that almost a quarter (23%) of executives cited worker resistance as a top challenge to implementing intelligent technologies. Automation Anywhere Inc. recently released a free Community Edition of its robotics process automation platform. It combines RPA, AI and analytics on a platform that is easy for anyone to use, Kashif Mahbub, vice president of marketing at Automation Anywhere, told theCUBE in April. “The vision that we are driving towards is automation for all,” he said. “You don’t have to be somebody who is proficient at coding. You don’t have to be somebody who is doing just one part of the business. Anybody in the business should be able to pick up the software and start using it.” The Community Edition allows just about anyone — business users, students, etc. — to sign up and start developing their own software robots, according to Mahbub. ... (* Disclosure: TheCUBE is a paid media partner for Citrix Synergy 2019. Neither Citrix Systems Inc., the sponsor for theCUBE’s event coverage, nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)