The fragile bridge of corporate relationships

The CIO had spent almost 5 years in the position thriving and surviving all the uncertainties of business and change in management. He had done well to build a reputation with business leaders with his can do attitude and ideas helped them win in their playing field. Technology vendors loved him for the fact that he was willing to experiment and deploy emerging solutions with calculated risks that brought them further business. He took on additional business responsibilities which added to his experience of a score of years. Then suddenly he quit !

Everyone wondered what happened, some guessed what had happened, confidantes knew the reason behind the presumably sudden move. It was cooking for a while within; his outwardly calm disposition did not raise any suspicion of the turmoil within. For a large part of the year prior to taking the drastic step, he continued to live with a façade which eventually impacted his persona. Something snapped inside, his professional pride hurt he found it difficult to continue. As soon as he had an option, he hastily exited inconsiderate of the adverse impact.

A difference of opinion, perceived gap in skills, and real lack of experience for a favorite project of a Board member left him in no man’s land despite industry experts willingness to back him. The project was thus separated from IT and a new peer position was on-boarded. As time passed by he found himself being marginalized in some of the discussions falling off the radar with attention largely focused on the favorite project. He continued to toil until the proposed change of reporting relationship (to his peer) became the proverbial last straw and he quit !

A post-mortem would throw up many advice on what he could have done to rescue the situation and bring himself back into relevance; that anyway belongs to lessons provided from the stands when the game is on. The cardinal mistake he made was to leave in a huff with scant regard to the impact his exit had on ongoing activities, tasks, and outcomes. Pleas to reconsider his decision and later to extend his notice period were ignored with ego prominently dictating the actions. With a small step the bridge built over the years was broken.

He took up the new assignment that had triggered his bold step only to find out that culturally he was unable to fit into the new organization; unable to accept the ethos, he left within weeks without notice. These steps did not go unnoticed in the industry and quietly seeped across through the network; while no one raised the question, peers were nice to him in a diffident way with warmth of the past missing. His requests for connects towards new openings and opportunities were accepted though none made any progress towards materialization.

Young professionals today tactically make career moves based on their need for gratification, personal gain and opportunities in the market. In the build phase of their foundations they flutter around before they find their bearings and settle down. In the mid-career stage relationships are built that help climb the corporate ladder and build credibility on the task and people axis. The persona thus created aids move to level of leadership from just managing people thereby connecting the dots and strengthening the bonds that can last a lifetime.

Courting period with an enterprise starts with best behavior; why does the exit need to be the worst ? If there is any bitterness towards the culture, environment, incident, team, people, anything that makes the blood pressure rise, let go as from the next day onwards they are not going to be part of daily life. It is unfortunate that some companies also behave like jilted lovers when someone senior decides to pursue alternative opportunities. The market quickly comes to terms and discounts reference checks with such companies.

The struggle of the protagonist with a few bad decisions impacted his ability to find an opportunity; when alternatives are plenty, prospective companies are not amenable to forego such indiscretions. What if he does not fit in here culturally ? What if there is really something wrong with him as a person ? Will he bad mouth us when he leaves ? There are many what-ifs that deter an opportunity. Bridges are expected to withstand a lot of stress and natural elements; bridges of relationships too require strength from within and resilience to survive incidents and external factors.

Take care !

Role of the CEO, Part 2

Sometime back I was party to a great discussion between CIOs on how to ensure that their boss the CEO is an ally rather than an adversary or a bystander. The CIOs were pragmatic in not expecting the CEO to become tech savvy or understand why server sizing or database tuning is a complex task or engage in a discussion on the merits of NL SAS on the SAN box. The discussion focused on how the CIO should approach the CEO; s/he is a customer as well as the final decision maker and that can make things complicated.

Today most companies have the CIO directly connected to the CEO with IT becoming an integral part of running the company’s operations. CIOs played different roles during the economic uncertainty some gaining in prominence and others falling behind a bit. Measurement criteria changed for some CXOs and market dynamics transformed roles and expectations. The CEO under pressure to deliver growth and whatever expectations the Board and shareholders set for the management in turn raised the performance bar.

The CEO as a consumer of information started demanding ad-hoc and complex analysis of historical information and future trends that sometimes challenged imagination. Doing more with less never went away, the constantly shrinking budget and stratospheric expectations created a precarious situation for the IT team and the CIO. Challenging the CEO on his need and at the same time ensuring that one experience does not influence the other decision created a tightrope like situation.

Customer is always right is a maxim has always been professed until one company decided that the customer does not know what s/he wants; so let’s tell the customer what she would need and s/he would happily embrace it. We all have been at the receiving end of this for a while now; only recently the sheen has been wearing off. But can the CEO be convinced using such a simplistic premise ? Every leader intuitively knows what they need to succeed, the CEO is no exception.

So can the CIO be the confidante to the CEO and give him/her the inputs s/he needs in various scenarios and business situations ? Should the CIO even attempt to get to that position ? What will be the acceptance of the CIO in such a role by other CXOs ? Will the CIO be able to live up to the demands and pressures of being a shadow to the CEO ? Is the CIO being too ambitious in his/her reach ? And how many will be able to get there and stay there ?

A CIO flooded with operations will rarely have the opportunity, this requires the CIO to first create a strong team which frees him/her to engage with CXOs on what matters. The CIO also needs to imbibe all the soft skills that help him/her form lasting relationships and manage expectations. Finally the CIO needs a support ecosystem to consistently deliver to promise. Only then can the CIO can expect to even begin taking the baby steps required to engage the CEO in a way that brings the two together.

Coming back to the CEO as a customer, every consumer of information starts with a broad idea which takes shape with discovery of various facets as the solution evolves; this is what we in IT call iterative development or scope creep. It takes a huge amount of effort along with loads of credibility to challenge and engage constructively without getting beaten up. Having said that I believe that CIOs should explore this uncharted territory; if done well it takes the relationship to the next level which is a great place to be.

The Role of the CEO

The relationship between the CIO and the CFO has been discussed with adversarial undercurrents as the general perception about the CFO portrays a beanie counter. This is analogous to the CIO remaining the EDP Manager, but the prototype has stayed stuck; in a similar vein where the belief continues that the CIO has not evolved and is still the Chief Technician who fixes Boardroom projectors and the Boss’s email.

Recent time, with the resurgence of social media, has seen the emergence of another debate about the CMO cornering a large proportion of the IT budget. This news which could be based on some data points in a survey in a small geography for a sub-segment of a domain, the conclusions depict the CMO usurping the CIO chair; a real stretch of imagination, but which has a group of CIOs vehemently opposing this purported trend. Some discussion groups even want the CIOs to confront their respective CMOs and assert their power over the IT budget.

So when I had an opportunity to partake in a CEO get together, I was looking forward to clarifying a few assumptions and doubts. If you are wondering what this has got to do with the CFO and the CMO, well along with the CIO, they all typically report to the CEO who is expected to mediate in case there is a conflict within his team. The above presumed conflicts will sooner or later end up for arbitration or follow the general trend where the CIO backs off.

I love interacting with CEOs (including my own CEO); they are the better barometer of IT progress and use within their company than the CIO is. As the primary leader of the enterprise, s/he sets the behavioural norms and culture of the company. Their belief system percolates down the spine of the company influencing processes, process discipline, technology deployment and use, risk behaviour and finally the cohesiveness of the Executive Committee that runs the company.

Since I knew most of their CIOs it was easy to create correlations: big manufacturing CEO used social media extensively, his CIO is well known for success; mid pharma CEO who thought of IT as a cost centre had high attrition in IT; diversified group young digital native CEO had the CIO soaring high from success to success. You get the trend; the CEO is the lead indicator of how the job of the CIO is likely to be in a company and where s/he will stand in case of a conflict with other CXOs.

If you benchmark companies with CIO reporting to CEO versus other CXOs, the comparison set clearly demonstrates the ones with the CEO fare better even when the CEO is not necessarily IT friendly. In the control group which ranges from 30-80% (CIOs reporting to CEO) depending on the geography and industry, the next differentiating factor is the CEOs appreciation, tolerance, averseness or indifference to IT. It is evident that the CIO directly or indirectly influences the success of the CIO.

Should the CIO be insecure about the span of control, budget, or technology disruptions ? Most CIOs aren’t but the hype created by various factions would make you believe that the CIO is shivering with fear uncertainty and doubt (FUD factor) on his/her future. Reality being diametrically opposite, I believe that CIOs should stop reacting to rumours and instead start proactive communication on the contributions to different parts of the enterprise in making the CMO or the CFO successful. Let them be at the receiving end for a change !

IT enabling the CXO

A close friend narrated this incident about a CEO who asked the IT organization for three laptops. The first one for use in the office, second during travel, and the third to be used at his residence! It was one of those unchallengeable CEO mandates. My friend thought of this incident as a compliance issue or misuse of power vested with the position. To me, it was interesting that the CEO even thought of such an arrangement without realizing the improbability of how it will aid his work.

Every organization endeavors to define and execute policy with minimal exceptions. These are discussed, debated and agreed upon by the management — signed off too, in a few cases. Everything works well until the first exception request. Such requests typically come from a high performer or a CXO who states constraints within the defined boundaries. Thus begins the dilemma which is normally taken as an acceptable deviation to aid the CXO/high performer, as no one wants to leave any room for doubt when it comes to performance.

The IT organization struggles to maintain normalcy, since the precedent is taken as the new norm. After a while, only two choices remain — change the rulebook or try to save face by diligently documenting each exception. The third alternative is really not an option, since it means that you have to take a tough stance and deny the request. Is there a way out of such a predicament, especially when you consider that powers vested with the CIO are not absolute and can be overridden by the “business requirement”?

Coming back to the story of the “three laptop” CEO, I asked my friend about how the CEO proposed to use this distributed computing to his advantage? Did he not realize that he was misusing his executive powers which may be challenged by the Board of Directors or may set an avoidable example for other CXOs to emulate? I was advised that the CEO was creating value, and by virtue of this, the Board may allow such small indiscretions and look the other way.

In such cases, I believe the relationship and openness existing between the CIO and CEO will play an important role (where healthy discussion and debate exists), as does a possibility of influencing the decision. CIOs should work diligently to build and sustain this relationship to remain relevant and successful within an enterprise.

What about you? Would you acquiesce to such a request?