Paul Zikopoulos

Vice President, Skills Vitality and Enablement

Paul is an award-winning professional writer & speaker who’s been consulted on the topic of AI & Big Data by the popular TV show “60 Minutes.” He’s also been invited to participate in data discussions with NATO generals who are charged with shaping the future of its operational command & control strategy, where data has been identified as its most critical component. Paul’s been named to dozens of global “Experts to Follow” & “Thought Leader” lists, including Analytics Insight’s “Top 100 AI & Big Data Influencers” and CIO Look magazine’s “The 10 Most Intelligent Leaders in Data Science and Analytics”

‘. Paul’s written 22 books (including “AI Value Creators”,

, “The AI Ladder”, “Cloud without Compromise”.

and 3 ‘for Dummies’ titles) and over 360 articles during his accidental 30-year career as a data nerd.

At IBM, Paul leads from the front, helping to shape the strategic direction in a ‘tech years are like dog years’ world for the IBM Technology Unit’s (IBM’s software & hardware divisions) sales, tech sales, and partner ecosystem learning journeys and upskilling programs.

You’ll find Paul taking a very active role around Women in Technology (he’s a seated advisory board member for Switch, formerly known as Women 2.0) who he became involved with after one of his viral tweets was mentioned on the TV show, “The View.” He’s the only (and first) male to ever win IBM Canada’s “Women in Technology Ally of the Year” award and is always at the forefront of general workplace inclusivity.

In addition, Paul is a seated “Coding for Veterans” board member and sits on the world recognized “Masters of Management Analytics & AI” program board at Canada’s prestigious Queen’s University.

Paul’s always keeping with his grass roots — a newbie with no computer courses before coming to IBM. He knows on his dumbest days, he’s never as dumb as he feels, and on his smartest days, he’s never as smart as he feels either. Ultimately, Paul is trying to figure out the world according to his daughter Chloë — who competitively rides a horse he creatively show-named “Better than a Boyfriend”. Follow him on Twitter at: @BigData_paulz.


All Sessions by Paul Zikopoulos

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Day 1: Nov 18, 2025

9:30 am

INDUSTRY EXPERT: DATA INTEGRATION

Fueling Reliable AI – Unlocking the Power of your Enterprise Data

AI is only as reliable as the data that powers it. Many organizations struggle to unlock structured and unstructured data due to silos, quality issues, and limited access. CDAOs are overcoming these barriers by preparing enterprise data at scale and combining retrieval approaches to improve accuracy, trust, and scalability for agentic AI. Walk away with a guide for:

  • Preparing enterprise data for agentic AI applications
  • Combining retrieval approaches to improve AI reliability
  • Real-world strategies for scaling trusted AI across teams

Day 2: Nov 19, 2025