IO and the Various Dynamic Roles that He Plays

The role of the CIO has undergone a transformation making it an even more integral component of todays seamless and transcendental world of information management. Over the past twenty-five years, the role of the CIO has witnessed a metamorphosis from that of being transaction focused to that of enabling the creation of a connected and agile enterprise. It has closely tracked the changes in IT over the past twenty-five years, and if the correlation is anything to be stood by; the role of the CIO is far from over. IT has itself transformed from being only about data processing to connecting the enterprise to bandwidth and speed, and finally to providing all encompassing IT services. The role of the CIO has acclimatized to this changing form of IT, by focusing on simplifying complex tasks through the use of computers during the period of data processing, to re-engineering business processes during the era of enterprise connectivity to managing the ever expanding needs of the users in todays realm of IT services.

The future promises to be ever more challenging. IT will become embedded in businesses; users will become more IT aware and literate, new technologies and applications will create opportunities for new business models, the mobile may become the computing device of the future. IT as a whole is moving towards being a more virtual enterprise. With ever-growing challenges, the expectations from a CIO are also rising.

Complexity will also increase because of multiplicity of systems and applications, challenges of business continuity, newer solutions, shorter life cycles, increasing number of assets, security threat, paucity of skilled resources, and the changing rules of the game.

As IT evolves, the implications for the CIO are clear. The CIO has to enable IT to function more productively and effectively. He must also be prepared to embrace disruptive new technologies that will shape the new economic terrain while finding new ways to manage the complexities of previous systems accumulated over the years. Besides the evolution of IT, as markets come out of recession, the role of the CIO will also encompass many economic considerations such as balancing investments and costs, developing new revenue through IT-driven strategic change, and helping organizations gain strategic value through enhanced decision support.

The CIO must expand his realm of operationsestablish a more multi-faceted role that shall envelop actions such as performing enterprise assessment of all functions relative to best practices, knowing the cost drivers, and working towards a cost reducing model for the business. In addition, he must also familiarize himself with the vendor of the company, and leverage relationships that add to the knowledge and value of the enterprise. Most importantly, he must anticipate how new technologies will redefine what customers will value tomorrow and educate other executives accordingly.

The Three Hats of the CIO

In order to succeed in this new world of IT, a CIO must be able to wear three different hats and manoeuver among these three hats. The three hats represent the CIOs triangle of responsibility.

Operational Management

This hat is about maintaining balance between investments and costs in keeping-the-lights-on activities and in finding new ways to manage the complexity of many systems accumulated over the years.

This hat encompasses the various activities for keeping the lights onproviding 100% up time of all systemshardware and software through maintenance activities and application support, understanding and managing expectations of the users, ensuring that disaster recovery plans are in place, building strong security policy, and ensuring adherence to the same and above all, delivering at lower costs and driving productivity.

To perform this role, the CIO must be equipped with the basic skills of technology integration, project management, organizational management, and risk management along with the broad universe of knowledge on various technologies and how they work together. Further, he should trust his direct reports but constantly monitor to make sure that all critical tasks are being done. He has to have a low tolerance for operational risks, and maintain grace under pressure.

Sourcing Management

This hat helps the CIO in his efforts on sourcing management and allows him to focus on adoption of generic, standard and externally provided technology, and also to help him reduce focus on deployment of new internally owned infrastructure.

The sourcing management hat involves activities, such as finding innovative ways of managing the assets and improving the net productivity of the business, renting services rather than owning assets and applications, outsourcing work to people who can do it better, selecting vendors, setting up SLAs and governance structures, and managing vendors.

The CIO must possess the skills of vendor management, intercompany culture and politics assessment, cost analysis and RoI assessment. Along with this basic skill-set, he must also have knowledge of the business and commercial capabilities, to manage external and internal relationships and vendor capabilities and qualities. He must be able to delegate tasks, but be accountable. He must keep a flexible mind- set, remembering the fact that vendors interests may not match his own.

Strategic and Business Alignment

Todays CIO has to deliver strategic value for his organization through enhanced decision support by using emerging analytics technology, and capitalizing on new products and service opportunities faster through IT supported changes. This hat is critical for achieving this.

The third hat concentrates on translating board room requirements into solutions, providing technology driven solutions, leveraging technology as a game changer, developing an IT strategy to align it to specific business needs, and driving an IT-led business transformation.

The basic skill-set required by the CIO in order to successfully perform this role includes strategic modeling, simulation, and optimization capabilities. He should also posses the knowledge of external customers, markets, competitors, and what drives the business success. He should combine optimism and skepticism, and be willing to take the risks that lead to learning and growth.

Most CIOs are naturally fit for one or two of these hats, and so they tend to dwell there. To successfully manage a large scale organization, it is crucial that the CIO has the ability and the skills to manage all three hats. In an ideal state, the focus on each hat should be equal, however, in a realistic situation, the principal focus of attention by the CIO will shift based on business needs and environmental factors. Situational CIOs need to be able to understand the relative importance of each focus area in both, the current environment and the anticipated environment and move quickly among the three roles. They should be swiftly able to focus on two or more areas simultaneously when required. This requires mental agility and an ability to maintain the context while switching between the roles.

Achieving this will not happen by chance. CIOs and the aspiring CIOs need to prepare themselves by taking stock of their capabilities, identifying gaps, and skilling themselves for the future.

Adapted from the PwC publicationThe Situational CIO by Salil Agrawal, who leads the Delivering Deal Value practice at PwC, India
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