A: This is a question that I have been asked many times over the last twenty some years and one that in many ways has not changed in all that time. Trends in technology have come and gone, we have entered a digital age and as a result seen the demand for more and faster change. Consumers now have all of the power in the value chain and businesses that don’t realise this, are as quickly forgotten as our last holiday. Reporting lines have changed to reflect the changing emphasis on technology in most sectors. Every survey I read these days reports that more tech leaders now report to CEO’s and sit at the exec table. Having said that, those same surveys will also note that some 35-40% of them still report directly to their CFO.
Whatever the reporting line of the CIO/CTO/CDO etc. it is clear to me that to be a tech leader, you must first be a great business leader. When I have been asked “what makes an IT leader a CIO”, I have often used the CFO as an example. After all, the CFO is a great business leader but they do not “do the accounts”. In the same way, a CIO helps to lead the businesses but they do not “do the IT”. Technology and the people and process that underpin it, are simply the levers a CIO pulls to deliver the results the business requires for its customers.
There are several key indicators that should define and can be used to help select a CIO.
- Commercial Acumen: CIO’s are responsible for the design and delivery of a technology environments that support the business. They should be capable of articulating a clear investment strategy; one that delivers tangible ROI and follows the simple mantra “People Process Technology”, after all there are no IT Projects.
- Speak the same language: My first measure of a CIO candidate is often the terms in which they communicate their successes. When asked about their business how do they respond? If the discussion leans towards customer experience, innovation, operational efficiency or shareholder value, chances are you are talking to a CIO. If the subjects tend towards the technical and abstract, the chances are, you are not.
- Leadership: If a CIO does not “do IT”, then what do they do? Like all good business ‘leaders’ the CIO should do just that… lead. They should be capable of helping the business to create its overall strategy. They should then create the Vision for IT and empower their teams to create a technology strategy to deliver on it. Often this will run counter to what has gone before and will require cultural changes throughout the business. Showing strong leadership during these types of transitions, incidentally, is what often leads to the CIO becoming the COO.
- Agility & Innovation: The days of boom and bust monolithic technology investments are over. Consumer driven demand has created an economy where every industry must now be more ‘agile’. Sometimes this is simply interpreted as the need for agile development methodologies. However, the CIO must support a much wider degree of agility across the business. They must provide an environment where innovation becomes part of the culture, rather than just a team and change management is the norm. After all, if change becomes the constant and the next tech trend could disrupt your business, then ‘change management’ is the key to survival.