Who will lead the next generation?

So in looking for a potential successor does a CIO think immediately of the No. 2 or of some ideal profile of talents that is just that little bit out of synch with that familiar and trusty deputy? Equally important, does the corporate board or C-suite have some checklist of ideal attributes in mind or on paper that does no favours for the incumbent next in line? We have often debated the role of the CIO in ComputerScope and no doubt will continue to do so as TechPro. The salient point is that CIOs debate it too. So do their boards.

“It is a standard paradigm and paradox in business and the professions that the mark of success is that you no longer practise what you have become expert at. ICT is no exception and in fact the more technology-based the business the more true it becomes”

There is no definitive, prescriptive, best practice checklist, not least because the demands of a CIO in different sectors will be very different. After just nine months the Irish Government is currently in search of a successor to its first CIO and the ideal profile (if not the official one) will be very different from one for a vacancy in a supermarket multiple or a medical devices company or — they haven’t gone away you know — a bank. That element of variety or ambiguity, whichever way you choose to look at it, in the understanding of the role of a CIO is significant in many ways. There is that element of sectoral differences and preferences. But there is also the key point that in many organisations the CIO role is actually shaped over time by the person and his or her successors. ‘We need somebody like Máire/Seán who really understands the business’ becomes the brief rather than any formal job description or list of qualifications.

 

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So back to the CIO with responsibility for promoting or recruiting a successor, deputy or a particularly promising rising star. Do you look in the mirror or the manual? Or somewhere else? Would you have a checklist at all — technical qualifications or proficiency, domain knowledge, leadership or team working ability, personality? It might be naughty to suggest that senior management like a CIO would be motivated or guided by anything other than objective guidelines. But there has to be a distinct suspicion that many if not most internal senior appointments in any organisation are actually motivated by current comfort and fit. It is normal human behaviour, a club and your face fits. (When your face doesn’t fit it becomes a cabal!)

OK, so that is a common reality, so what? To be a bit naughty again, maybe at a certain level the technical track record and the business and domain knowledge become less relevant, almost neutral. The candidate has to have both, the balance may be on either side and still valid for the role, so the criteria shift to other elements. What sort of factors, then? Well, one of the few unanimously agreed constituent parts of the CIO role is the ‘political’ one, persuading and encouraging and being a credible leader. TechPro has dealt with and known quite a few CIOs, in Ireland and to a lesser extent the inner island and the USA. Allowing for different national cultural styles they have been universally personable and likeable.

Does that mean that personality is an important characteristic for appointment or indeed success as a CIO? Yes, unequivocally. All that consultants’ preaching about aligning the ICT and the business is true but dares not address the magic ingredient, personal chemistry. It is too vague, too elusive to define and does not fit neatly on the HR profile. But aligning the perennial enthusiasm of the sales and marketing guys with the professional pessimism of the accountants and the results-driven CEO demands it. There are as many varieties as there are personalities, of course, which thoroughly confuses the issue. We Irish are genuinely good in this area and at senior levels in international organisations, perhaps particularly in English-speaking cultures. At home there is inevitably the normal quotient of in-house bitching but we actually have a friendly and informal business culture that offers a CIO a better platform for change than others.

That makes talent development and succession planning a little easier for the CIO, it can be suggested. Yes, technical competence and business and domain knowledge (or clear indication that mastery will arrive) are pillar requirements. But what is added is what counts, the rounded personality combined with leadership potential. A CIO is always an all-rounder, with interests and knowledge and enthusiasms above and beyond the technology. A key part of the job is looking around the world and the markets and trying to understand and plan for the changes that are happening and coming.

So looking in the mirror is not a bad thing when trying to develop people and teams. Most of us are inclined to be critical of that mirror image, in truth. Something like but also something different, maybe better in some respects, with a different balance of features — that is a legitimate aspiration. Does any such approach throw the HR manual out the window? Not really. Good judgment of people and situations is fundamental in any senior management position. Informed by experience it is at least as good as the more formal methods of candidate assessment. Especially committees.