How CIOs Can Change the Game of any Company

The Optima Kart

The findings are sobering: almost half of CEOs view their CIOs as out of step with the business and about the same percentage think IT should be a commodity service, purchased as needed. We tackled this thorny issue in a webinar sponsored by the Harvard Business Review, Dell, and CIO.com called “Change the Conversation, Change the Game.” It was an enlightening conversation with business strategy guru Gary Hamel, Newport News Shipbuilding’s CIO Leni Kaufman, and Walgreens’ CIO Tim Theriault, with HBR editor Angelia Herrin moderating. The entire webinar is worth watching for its many golden nuggets, but here are a few key takeaways on what CIOs need to be doing differently to meet this brave new world in which IT can no longer afford to be just a service provider.

Don’t talk IT. Talk business.

As Leni Kaufman noted: “I think often people come into a conference room, they come into a meeting, and then they talk IT. Well, don’t talk IT. Talk business. Talk about the goals of the company, the growth plan, the projection it’s on, how you’re going to improve profitability, talk about what the government is funding, what’s happening with sequestration. Be part of that conversation, and then you become part of what is on the CEO’s mind. You have to do the job that you’re there to do, but really make it much bigger, much broader than that.”

Talent management is critically important.

“You need to make sure that your people, in your next line of the reporting structure, are absolutely top talent that can carry the agenda forward,” said Tim Theriault. “I want to spend more of my time on continuous improvement and innovation. So the good news is it represents more opportunity for others — people who want to be CIOs someday. I get to focus on the things that really align to the CEO, but at the same time I have to make sure IT agenda is being carried out exceptionally well. You absolutely are still responsible. So your reliance on talent management is critically important.”

Be a compassionate contrarian.

“What does it mean to be a leader in this kind of environment today?,” asked Gary Hamel. “Beyond all the technical skills and so on, for me there are three things that are really critical. One is, you have to be a contrarian in your heart. You have to be able to look at what everybody else takes for granted and say, is there another way of doing this? Number two, you have to have a lot of courage today. You have to be able to look beyond what everybody else takes as best practice. And I think the third and most important thing is, if you really want to be a change leader, is you have to have compassion. People have to believe that you are not fighting your corner. This is not about IT; it’s not even just about the business. It’s about working from the customer backwards. And when people understand that that’s who I’m here for, and that’s my ultimate reference point, and how do I improve the quality of life, people will give you enormous amount of runway to try things, to take risks, to experiment. I think that that contrarian heart and that compassionate spirit, that courage, those are huge multipliers for anybody today who’s trying to be a leader in this chaotic world we’re in.

My view is that the CIO facing three dilemmas. One, I need to help the CEO figure out how to reorganize the company — not that he’s going to specifically ask you that, but what are the technology capabilities and potentialities that can be used to create management innovation? Sometimes when you think innovation, you think products and services, but the reality is management innovation. The other piece of it is, how am I going to use technology to create the true value proposition, because we have been so good at the efficiency gain that drew all of us into commoditization. Everything is a commodity now. Because we have been so good at this, at efficiency, now we have to move efficacy. How are we going to do that? How are we going to integrate information into our products and services? And for the entire time by the way we do have to keep the lights on. How can the CIO do all of these things at once? The answer is you can’t. You’ve got to start prioritizing. The CIO needs to step up and become the mentor to the organization, because you should understand how the business operates. You also understand the potentials and threat of the technologies, and you can act as the mentor in the C-suite on the change that’s coming at us. Because it’s coming, and it’s whether you’re going to change catastrophically, or whether you’re going to transform. It’s really the choice you’re facing.