Gauging the New CIO Performance
Victoria, Canada - February 20, 2006
As the talent pool for stellar IT executives continues to shrink and the demand for high-performing chief information officers becomes unrelenting, newly appointed CIOs must make a positive impact swiftly to prove their worthiness and tenure.
In monitoring IT executive leadership trends, there are conclusive patterns emerging that predict the future effectiveness of newly appointed heads of IT. The first 120 days on the job is a critical indicator of how the newly selected IT executive will function in his role as a business and IT leader.
XMG has identified the following top five attributes of successful CIOs that have demonstrated survival instincts and eventually, leadership effectiveness beyond the probationary period:
- Is outwardly focused on steadily driving business value to the company. The competent CIO will spend considerable time understanding the drivers of what makes the IT organization valuable to the company by listening and level setting expectations accordingly. After all, the value of IT is defined by the customers, not the IT organization.
- Assesses the general health of the IT organization. This includes assessing the following needfuls:
- Objectively evaluating how well IT is aligned with the business objectives and making drastic steps to rein it back to alignment;
- Understanding the purpose and performance of projects currently in the IT organization's portfolio and making an informed decision to continue or discontinue the initiatives;
- Broadly evaluating the effectiveness of the human capital management program in place by foremost recognizing and instituting that people (not technology) will continue to be the most important asset;
- Understanding the value and relationship of current suppliers and ‘partners' to one's business.
- Calculating the financial performance and contribution of IT to the business. For example, how much of the IT budget is spent on business units that generate ‘x'% of revenue? This includes re-balancing the portfolio of IT projects during the IT executive's probationary period.
- Is inwardly focused in building IT excellence. This includes identifying key areas in IT that are under-performing, consistently problematic, or simply do not meet stakeholder expectations.
- Endeavors to understand the culture of the IT organization. This includes conducting a benchmark of the culture of the IT organization through a quick and straightforward survey coupled with several candid discussions with employees and customers. Adopting XMG'sKSAV Framework as a basis to drive my point further, the IT organization's knowledge, skills, attitudes, and values are measured. Successful CIOs put more emphasis on assessing the IT organization's attitudes and values.
- Development of interim measures through prescriptive action plans. New and effective CIOs are savvy to recognize that many of the benefits of IT and IT services are long term. By the end of 100 days, effective CIOs will intentionally document and skillfully launch the implementation of quick-hit initiatives that will benefit the business for the next 120 days.
"With a short window of 120 days, the task of setting the agenda, gaining corporate confidence, and making a positive impact is not an easy one. However, gone are the days of honeymoon periods spanning several months or years to meet corporate expectations. Compounding the CIO challenge is that non-IT executives are becoming technology-savvy to decide IT's value. Is it possible to survive the orientation period, gain tenure, develop a positive career path, and demonstrate that one can build a strong business value program with IT? Although somewhat simplistic, those that have passed with flying colors had one piece of advice in common: “Continually seek advice from the industry experts and let staff, end-users, and suppliers help you by listening to them… and I mean, really listen.”
Article written by Lauro Vives
for XMGize column of Computerworld
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