a new concept forward, take the time to explain the why. If it's a technique you had prior success with, tell the story: explain why it worked and what results were obtained. This could take less than 10 minutes and make all the difference in the world.
In building and executing your plan, it is essential that you establish and communicate expectations, trust, and values.
Set Expectations
If you're currently in the market for a new CIO role, you mustn't overpromise during your interview. Even if you were wildly successful in your previous position, it's going to take time to succeed in your new role. Setting expectations too high is a rookie mistake that will be hard to overcome. Straight talk about what it takes to turn around a struggling IT Department will improve your chances of getting and succeeding in the role. If they're expecting the impossible, it's time to move on to the next interview.
If you're a sitting CIO who needs to reset expectations, be embarrassingly overt. Create a new program, give it a name, give it a logo, document it in a strategy, and take it on a roadshow. It is possible to get a second chance in the same job.
To establish a winning leadership approach, you need to become customer-obsessed. Reframe the focus on your stakeholders. How does this help my external customers? How does this help my business partners? How does this help my employees?
When considering your relationships with your boss, your board, and your peers, adjust your communication style to them. Instead of lamenting that they won't take the time to learn your terminology, make it your job to speak in theirs. It's not about meeting them halfway; it's meeting them where they are.
As for your team, you need to trust them. Tech people are smart. Treat them that way. Take the time to share the why. Teach them about the business. Make sure they understand the mission, the goals, the long-range plans, and the current results. Go over the numbers with your entire team. Discuss sales results and budget variances. Are these considered a secret in your company? Is SOX used as an excuse to not share this information? If so, then explain that it's a secret. Go over the policy. Explain the risks of insider trading and freeze windows. Explain the corporate policy regarding confidentiality. Remember, you're the leader, and your example will be followed.
Ask your team their opinions about the corporate goals and the plans to achieve them. Let the team shape the solution. Get their buy-in, and they will knock your socks off. We've all been part of a high-performing team in our careers. Teams that have a clear vision, trust, and few roadblocks perform at exceptionally high levels. And let's be honest: Do you think a network engineer who has to record the time they spent in a fire drill is going to spend their personal time thinking of a more reliable way to route traffic in your network?
Build Trust
Trusting your team is critical and a core part of being successful. However, to be trusted, they must be trustworthy. If you have team members with integrity issues, they need to go. If you have team members who are undermining the new plan, they need to go.
If your boss doesn't trust you, you're going to have to move more slowly and bring them along on the journey. You could be new, your boss could be new, or you could have prior missteps that broke trust. Regardless of the reason, lack of trust has to be remedied before you can move forward.
When your team trusts you, they will take the leap of faith with you. Would you rather have someone perform a task because you told them to, or because they're totally bought in and aligned with how they can personally help achieve success? I can assure you, the latter produces much better results.
Share Your Values
Become a philosopher, not a task manager. Talk about your beliefs and values. For example, I believe that people are adults and should be trusted. I believe that the most important role of an IT Department is to “keep the lights on.” I believe that the people closest to the work will make the most accurate estimates. Stick to a few core beliefs and values, and repeat them obsessively.
I value teamwork. I value education. I value honest feedback. These are some of my beliefs and values. Yours might be different, and that's fine. Your values will be driven by your knowledge, experience, and goals. Whatever they are, be sure to share them with your organization.
When everyone trusts each other and shares the same values and expectations, you have a firm foundation in place for everything else you do. The Laudato Hierarchy of IT Needs builds further on that foundation, as you'll see in the next chapter.
5 The Laudato Hierarchy of IT Needs
Most people believe that the only thing IT does is implement software to reduce costs or increase sales. When I say “most people,” I don't just mean grandmothers and schoolteachers; I mean CEOs, CFOs, and even CIOs.
Listen to the questions you'll get in an interview:
Tell me about a project that was successful.
Tell me about a project that failed.
What's your direct experience with XYZ software?
Here's what they should be asking:
How do you measure system uptime?
How should IT measure customer satisfaction?
What strategies did you use to reduce IT costs?
What's the process to determine what projects IT works on?
How important is culture to IT productivity?
How do you cultivate and nurture innovation?
While creating value is the lifeblood of an IT Department, it is only possible when a solid foundation is in place.
Back in school, we all learned about Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs.5 Maslow postulated that in order to achieve love, belonging, esteem, and self-actualization, you first need to satisfy your basic physiological needs — eating, drinking, sleeping — and then your safety needs. If these basic needs aren't met, you will never reach your full potential.
For an IT Department to reach its full potential, I devised a similar model, the Laudato Hierarchy of IT Needs, shown in Figure 5.1.
Figure 5.1 Laudato Hierarchy of IT Needs
© 2017 Andrew Laudato All Rights Reserved Hierarchy of IT Needs
You can't fall in love while you're being chased by a bear, and you can't deliver value to your company if your systems are crashing, and your costs are out of control. The most important task for any IT Department is building, maintaining, and supporting a secure and reliable foundation.
We'll call this keeping the lights on, or KTLO for short. If you think KTLO is someone else's job or something that gets in the way of innovation, you're going to be in trouble. If you think you'll get a seat at the table when the emails aren't emailing and the financial reports are wrong, you're sorely mistaken.
Imagine trying to add a sun deck to your house while your kitchen is on fire. You're happily nailing down the floorboards while your spouse and children are inside screaming. It's not a good look. Obviously, the urgent will outweigh the important, and rightly so. If you're dreaming of having a glass of wine outdoors while the sun sets, you need to get your house in order first. Put out the fire, and then start working on your deck.
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