The Learning Crisis

I was introduced to the world of books by my father and nurtured by my English teacher, both kept me supplied with enough books big and small, modern and classics. Drowning in their fictional world, late night sojourns with super heroes and supernatural beings completed my days. Growing up surrounded by virtual friends, as I started working they transformed into management and self-help books in the quest to stay ahead in the rat race. Books were interspersed with other trade publications and in recent times by electronic newsletters.

At the turn of the century and thereafter there has been overabundance of management books on colored oceans, climbing mountains, being different and creating strategic differentiators; I remember meeting many luminary authors in conferences which had a mandatory fixture with one such thought leader. As a young professional I enjoyed these interactions and managed to get autographed versions of their publications. Reading voraciously my collection of knowledge started outgrowing the space in my office.

The story tellers and theorists with their postulations evoked interest in some; rest found good slumber value in the books distributed in the conference. Having read some of their books before meeting them I had a few questions; at times to validate my assumptions and many times to clarify a point or two. There were also occasions where my frame of reference did not agree with the writings resulting in good discussions over drinks. Those with good oratory skills enthralled us, for the rest their message was lost in articulation.

Everyone loves to go on company offsite meetings and sponsored conferences, especially to exotic locations with no agenda, devoid of presentations they have to attend or make. Most people love the fun elements, skits, karaoke, and when alcohol is involved. As a good manager, I too indulged my teams which required everyone to attend with only medical emergencies being accepted and excused. There was always excitement about the event and the agenda; there was also trepidation in equal measure with majority of the team members.

Talking to friends and peers I realized that my situation was unique and none of the others had found such behavior. We compared notes, went through respective agendas and offsites structures; there was no evident difference in what they did to what I did. We discussed locations, team profiles, traveling arrangements, accommodation, and day end activities; there was no material difference that could have pointed to my teams’ variant behavior. I sensed it was not the obvious so I popped the question to my team.

I did not know how to react to the revelation, to me it was unimaginable, but it was their reality. They loved everything that we did starting with preparation, planning, fun and games, what have you; the part they hated is when prior to the offsite a book was given to every team member to read which would be the theme of the outing. They were okay with the books being given post the offsite as giveaways as most of them did not read them, but when they were expected to read before the journey, it gave them sleepless nights.

I discovered that even my CIO friends wondered why I insisted that my team spend precious time in reading these “management” books. Do they serve a purpose beyond the hours being occupied ? How does it help understand new technology trends or implement the next system ? As it is, there is paucity of time, where do we fit it in our priorities and urgencies which keep everyone busy ? Their ignorance was appalling and comparable to kids in my team. I also realized that the few who loved books stood out in their ability to engage their enterprises.

With information overload and explosion of news, views and innovative ideas, unfortunately many professionals have deprioritized reading as an investment over other pursuits. The resultant learning crisis is scary to say the least creating educated but ignorant people whose ability to connect across paradigms is challenged. The electronic media pushes information at our faces, we need to embrace it to survive. If you did not change with online retailing of books and then their electronic versions, it is time now before you are made irrelevant in the new digital world.

CIO is a verb, not a noun

I heard the buzz from a friend that this company was again looking for a CIO; my immediate response was “again, why”? It’s a large company with dominant market share in some segments and had implemented some good IT systems in the past. The then CIO had a hurried exit reasons for which were speculated by everyone. Then in the last 5 years they had as many CIOs. And they had hired a CIO less than a year back after a longish search who I thought had settled down into the role.

The company has had challenges with their IT systems which worked in a combination of the legacy and the new generation ERP type systems. Almost a decade back they hired a business CIO who helped them renew their systems and set the roadmap for them to gain benefit from IT. Under his leadership the various business units adapted the new technology solutions globally and set the path for the next wave. Suddenly the CIO exited leaving behind what appeared to be a dissatisfied business team.

They floated a need for a CIO with specific technology expertise to rescue their IT and hired such individuals who claimed to be experts in the said solutions. They came and did fix parts of what was deemed broken and when the situation did not improve for the company, they were replaced by others. Each time there was a solution sought based on what appeared to be internal diagnostic for the ailment and the cure was applied. Each time there was no significant change in the situation.

The last hire came with strong credentials having been on business and technology sides of the table and a clear and consistent record of deliverables. While he was no star, the companies he worked with had benefited from IT. He was a team player and a good deputy for some visible CIOs. Thus he was expected to be able to recoup the losses and forge ahead. He came onboard and reviewed the situation and did put in a governance process that satisfied the management of intended outcomes.

He held meetings with his team and the business leaders getting into the details of every initiative and action taken. The new governance expected every decision to be endorsed by him before any steps were taken. The team ran with it for a few months and then started getting restless when they had no freedom to do anything. The endless stream of meetings resulted in no outcomes or movement. Soon they started leaving, starting with the brightest and then the professionals who wanted action.

The exit of the teams’ star performer raised a few alarm bells with the management but they let the CIO determine how to run the function. Time passed away and management meetings started getting hot for the CIO who was expected to deliver. Soon other team members started departing out of frustration leaving behind a challenged operation even for business as usual. Vendors who had supported the new CIO for a while in anticipation of a change in mindset were equally disillusioned with status quo.

The CIO was worried and afraid to move ahead with his risk profile being quite low. He had thrived under the shadow of his earlier CIOs who took initiative while he and his team delivered the projects and executed them. Now with direct accountability he failed to get the team together and deliver what he could have. The confidence crisis was beginning to hurt him real bad and he was blind to this fact. That is when the company decided to find an alternative who would take them forward.

Inaction or the low risk profile created a situation from which the CIO found it difficult to extricate himself. He could have taken charge and changed the perceptions of the past short-term CIOs who had different problems in their stint. The IT team supported him, his individual demons and fears anchored him. For the CIO, the “I” does not stand for “inaction”; get started, you have everything to lose and everything to gain. 

2012 to 2013, old wine in new bottle

In November 2011 I wrote about predictions for the CIO. Because I did not want to stop at 10, the post had 11 predictions. This year I did not create a list of predictions or a wish list for Santa CEO/CFO to fulfil. I also gave it a decent amount of time coming to end of February thus 16 months have elapsed; now looking at the list, its efficacy and applicability to the current year and beyond, I realize that the world at large for the CIO has changed but not changed. So here’s the list and current scenario.

1.     CIOs globally will continue to be challenged on operating budgets. Capital investments will become relatively easier; operating expenses will need to be controlled very tightly.

Talking to many CIOs and CFOs in the last two months, this remains reality almost in its permanency

2.     BITA (Business IT Alignment) will fall off the priority list for many as it will no longer be an issue. Business will acknowledge IT contribution and will work with IT to plan business goals. There will be no separate IT goals.

This shift was also acknowledged this year by the premier IT research company and validated by CIOs

3.     Attrition will not be the problem, retention will be; with economic and political uncertainty, staff will hang on to their respective jobs. CIOs will have to take some hard decisions.

This trend is beginning to become a worry for a few CIOs; in the last 6 months there were many IT staff that were hit and were looking for opportunities.

4.     Clouds will be the first choice for deploying apps for the mobile workforce. The rest will continue to access applications behind the firewall. Hybrid clouds will remain experimental as CIOs figure out that it really does not save money. CIOs will no longer build data centres.

Reality is quite close to this; I have yet to see core apps moving off. ROI has eluded everyone thus far

5.     Lead by Consumerization, mobile devices will be out of IT control (for good) and the personal device will find a way to get inside; resisting CIOs will have to provide equivalent additional device, which eventually the Business will turn down. Managing multiple screens will become a pain for the Executive who will challenge IT to make it simpler. The phone as a corporate device will thus be replaced by the tablet over the next 2 years.

Tablets are making inroads especially with Win 8 stability curve round the corner. Everyone has 2-3 devices today with one of them rarely used but toted along nonetheless

6.     CIOs will or be forced to challenge the cost of sustaining big ERP (licenses, support, etc.) as it keeps growing; alternate support vendors will gain market share. Usage will shift out from the office to using marketplace supplied micro-apps thereby challenging the existence of big ERP in 5 years.

Now this is one that I was really hoping would begin to help the CIO. So far no luck though

7.     Social media fatigue will set in and even marketing teams will be asked to create ROI for expenses and investments on such initiatives. CIOs will need to manage expectations around social analytics while Consultants will thrive with maturity models and make loads of money.

Consultants did make money; the declining interest is evident though attention is shifting to another hyped technology below.

8.     The CIO will continue to be tasked with managing information security with the CISO reporting into him/her. A few cloud bursts (cloud security breaches) will make matters worse before things settle down over 2013 and beyond.

Well, security breaches are becoming business as usual; uptime has been a bigger headache. So the CISO continues to live in the shadow of the CIO

9.     Big Data will remain high on hype with vendors pushing and CIOs scratching their heads if it really gives the benefits promised.

Flowing from social media, the mushrooming industry is riding the hype curve while everyone is wondering if it is a key looking for a lock

10. Custom development of solutions will wane with ocean of micro-apps promising to enable business processes as effectively. At the same time appliances will replace generic hardware.

Custom solutions are slowing down though the micro-app has not replaced it as yet. Appliances are yet to get the required attention

11. Many CIOs and research analysts will not agree many with the above points.

When I published this list, many did disagree and some acknowledged it. This year I think I will stick to this for now.

P.S. This post appears to have some issues when opened in Internet Explorer; so please take the trouble to view in other browsers. If anyone knows how to solve this, send me a comment

Predictions for 2012

Like the sun goes down in the west every day, the earth goes round the sun, people make New Year resolutions and the IT industry makes predictions for the coming year. These lists offer hot technologies, CIO priorities, business priorities, technologies that will not last the year, ad infinitum. So what kind of list am I going to create?

Every CIO already knows his/her current priorities, for the next year, and over the next 3 years (broadly) that fits in somewhere in the organization long-term strategy. These are dependent on many factors, some are (though not limited to) industry, size of the organization, geopolitical situation, global market dynamics, consumer sentiment, organization dynamics, profitability of the company … The broad collation of priorities through research conducted is generic enough to statistically fit over 80% of the CIOs globally and is available free or paid depending on whose list it is. So I will not pursue this line.

Different matrixes once again based on widespread research and opinions will tout waves, quadrants, hype curves, scatter charts, bubble charts and so on about disruptive technologies that would matter in the future. Stay with the bleeding edge or lose competitive advantage is the mantra. Some remain emerging technologies for decades like a solution searching for a problem to solve, while many remain niche or never get out of the lab to be adopted in mainstream business. I do not believe I understand enough about these esoteric technologies to offer predictions.

Having been a CIO or equivalent for more than decade and half across 7 different industries, I think I do understand the CIO travails and tribulations. To me every industry brought new opportunities for learning as well as new paradigms on how existing or new technology can be used. Every slowdown or black swan provided a platform to introspect on successes and lack of some. The next decade and half will bring disruptions unimaginable today. So here is my list for 2012 and beyond; can’t predict that all of these will be applicable to everyone, but statistically over the year you will find some connect.

1. CIOs globally will continue to be challenged on operating budgets. Capital investments will become relatively easier; operating expenses will need to be controlled very tightly.
2. BITA (Business IT Alignment) will fall off the priority list for many as it will no longer be an issue. Business will acknowledge IT contribution and will work with IT to plan business goals. There will be no separate IT goals.
3. Attrition will not be the problem, retention will be; with economic and political uncertainty, staff will hang on to their respective jobs. CIOs will have to take some hard decisions.
4. Clouds will be the first choice for deploying apps for the mobile workforce. The rest will continue to access applications behind the firewall. Hybrid clouds will remain experimental as CIOs figure out that it really does not save money. CIOs will no longer build data centers.
5. Lead by Consumerization, mobile devices will be out of IT control (for good) and the personal device will find a way to get inside; resisting CIOs will have to provide equivalent additional device, which eventually the Business will turn down. Managing multiple screens will become a pain for the Executive who will challenge IT to make it simpler. The phone as a corporate device will thus be replaced by the tablet over the next 2 years.
6. CIOs will or be forced to challenge the cost of sustaining big ERP (licenses, support, etc.) as it keeps growing; alternate support vendors will gain market share. Usage will shift out from the office to using marketplace supplied micro-apps thereby challenging the existence of big ERP in 5 years.
7. Social media fatigue will set in and even marketing teams will be asked to create ROI for expenses and investments on such initiatives. CIOs will need to manage expectations around social analytics while Consultants will thrive with maturity models and make loads of money.
8. The CIO will continue to be tasked with managing information security with the CISO reporting into him/her. A few cloud bursts (cloud security breaches) will make matters worse before things settle down over 2013 and beyond.
9. Big Data will remain high on hype with vendors pushing and CIOs scratching their heads if it really gives the benefits promised.
10. Custom development of solutions will wane with ocean of micro-apps promising to enable business processes as effectively. At the same time appliances will replace generic hardware.
11. Many CIOs and research analysts will not agree many with the above points.

I could have gone on and on but will stop now. I thought 11 is good for now; why 11 and not 10 ? According to Hindu scriptures it is an auspicious number and if you don’t believe in such things, then I would ask why 10 ? I know Moses had something to do with it !