Intuitive, empathetic, analytical, courageous, and communicative are just a few of the words that come to mind when discussing the skillsets, a modern CIO needs to succeed. Former global CIO at Deloitte, Larry Quinlan says he developed these skills over the course of his 35-year career where he was responsible for all assets of technology for over 10 thousand IT professionals in 175 different countries, creating value through inspired strategic leadership. Larry currently sits on several public and private equity boards. At our recent CIO Summit Larry shared how to be a successful transformational leader and what it takes to achieve those goals.
Finding Salvation by Embracing Digital Transformation
These days, there are fewer and fewer business initiatives that don’t have technology at the center of the discussion. Organizations are accelerating digital transformation processes for long term growth and profitability. The CIO is at the heart of these transformations. According to Larry the biggest shift in technology leadership is in the transformational relationship of the CIO role and salvation lies in embracing transformation. “Very often we see the CIO in a silo and someone else is doing the digital transformation of the organization, it’s here that it becomes important to embrace the digital transformation that really deals with how we change the competitive nature and create a competitive advantage within the organization that a CIO has truly become involved in, presenting to the board on numerous occasions, sitting in the executive committee, that’s the future of the role.”
Selling Transformation to the Board
Showing the business what’s possible and how to achieve its goals through technology has become the cornerstone of the CIO role today. It requires establishing your position as a business leader. Selling the transformation includes embracing technology while aligning it with company strategy. It demands bold leadership for organizational acceleration. Larry shared his thoughts by saying “the stakes are too high for the CIO role; we can’t afford too many no votes. Craft a vision for the organization that is compelling, The CIO is the salesperson in acceptance and adoption, but we also must sense what is right, we can’t afford to sell something that is not the right vision which means we have to have collaboration skills. Be bold enough to act, be sensitive enough to know what is going to work and what is not going to work and combine those two things to create a compelling plan that can get sold and delivered.”
Be a Bold Leader
If the CIO doesn’t take the lead in digital transformations most of the time organizations end up with a mixed bag of policies and technologies that don’t integrate. The CIO must pull it all together. The days of a CIO writing every line of code have passed, there must be some democracy in the process and a framework that allows lines of business to create assets. Larry says this is crucial and it starts with caring, “you have to create an environment where your people understand that you care for them and I know that may seem like a strange place to start for a technology leader but fundamentally people don’t really care where you want to go unless they understand what your passions are, who you are and what you are trying to accomplish.” Larry also says CIOs must take responsibility for the big projects and create underlying frameworks to create assets on top of those frameworks deployed in ways that are scalable for the organization.
Creating the Culture
As mentioned, creating a transformational culture starts with showing teams you care and creating the operating model for success, but it also requires changing mindsets and the IT v. Business mentality. A team of people with a common purpose, operating under a common technology model and using a common framework to create differentiated assets. It also demands leading people who don’t report directly to you. “If the CIO is going to get anything done, it must include influencing people that are not in our direct control. The items that tend to be in the CIO’s direct control are more infrastructure centered, but as you venture out and begin to think about transforming the enterprise, the enterprise doesn’t belong to the CIO, so if you are going to transform something that doesn’t actually belong to you, then by its very definition, transformation of that requires influencing others who don’t report directly to you, it comes back to trust and authority. I believe CIO’s and lines of business need to work together. The CIO can’t solely be responsible for the transformation, it comes down to creating trust and giving up some power.”
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