What differentiates effective CIOs from ineffective ones?

The answer has changed dramatically in the last decade or so. Ten years ago, technical expertise was the critical variable. Today, it’s how a CIO can do things differently, achieve business goals and gain competitive advantage.

“CIOs must go far beyond managing business requests, and in many cases actually take the lead in redefining the business. They need to be a part of the business problem, else however good they maybe, they cannot drive change within the organisation,” says Rajendra Deshpande, CTO, Intelenet Global Services.

This change of mindset is in direct response to a turbulent, hypercompetitive business market, in which organisations increasingly turn to technology and process innovation for help.

AGENTS OF A NEW ORDER
Leading research firms across the globe have indicated a new class of CIOs who are committed to being enterprise change agents. But, what does it take for a CIO to take the lead in change?

“First and foremost, this requires that CIOs deeply understand business far beyond the day-to-day operations,” says Deshpande.

The CIO must be conversant with the strategic goals of the business and look at alternative ways to meet these goals. Armed with this knowledge, the CIO can partner with the operating managers to create more powerful ways to do business.

Deshpande adds that in partnering with the business units to drive change, the CIO must engage at all three levels that include the senior management, operating management, and project management. This is what he and his team have been doing on a consistent basis within Intelenet.

Many of his team members are regularly participating in business strategy meetings. They understand the business pain areas and come up with ideas and solutions to overcome them. “In fact, a few members in my development team are from other business units,” says Deshpande.

While it is important that CIOs exhibit leadership authenticity as a change-agent role, they pretty well understand that transformation success will not be realised without commensurate leadership from key business executives.

Many CIOs opine that for organisations to be agile, they need to have a strong technology framework and transparency across the board. This will eliminate all obstacles and make it easier to drive both IT and business change. At the minimum, it is necessary for the IT function to have transparent planning and prioritisation processes in place, and have a concrete track record for delivering on commitments.

“IT needs to keep its house in order. I don't expect other parts of the business to get smarter about IT if the IT organisation isn't already smart about the business,” says Meenakshi Agrawal, Vice President - IT, Mumbai International Airport Pvt. Ltd.

According to Agrawal, a change management strategy should introduce initiatives to everyone affected by them, and should also establish any new roles or expectations to team members, so that they are in sync with the what is being expected out of them. Also, for many CIOs merely identifying new value opportunities is not enough. The business-minded CIO concurrently needs to assess the attitude toward change of the respective business units. This has two key components attached to it. One is to know the strength of the current business processes and the other is to understand how willing and able the business units are to make the changes necessary to reap the full potential of IT. The CIO can then engage various business units in joint programs of change management, with the ultimate deployment going much more smoothly.

“In such a scenario, there is less resistance, and much fuller use of the new capabilities,” says Agrawal.

Rajendra Deshpande
Chief Technology Officer, Intelenet Global Services.

BREAKING BARRIERS
A majority of CIOs cite three primary obstacles to transformational success: an internal culture resistant to change, organisational politics, and the existence of too many conflicting priorities.

For some, relative immaturity of business processes and the people aspects of change management act as significant hurdles.

“In accepting this challenge, CIOs must proceed with caution, and understand the risks inherent in major transformation. However, they must also embrace the opportunity, since it provides them with a means to highlight the value of IT to an organisation and contribute to breakthrough business performance,” says Agrawal.

At GE Capital India three key parameters drive change: speed, people and effective communication.

“The market dynamics change at a rapid speed. However, the speed at which CIOs can react to the change in terms of their internal infrastructure like operations or IT or sales force, will determine how effective their business is in the market place,” says Raghvendra Vaidya, CIO, GE Capital India.

In terms of the acceptance of solutions, GE Capital follows a well defined set of processes that are in place to make change effective. “CIOs need to build a culture of change management for the people to accept change more openly,” says Vaidya.

There is no doubt that today's CIO has opportunities far beyond the hopes and dreams that existed ten years ago. However, the key to success rests actively in engaging the business, partnering with business peers in the company to drive change. More than ever before, the CIO's effectiveness will determine the destiny of the company.