Saturday, October 1, 2016

The Spotlight on Digital CIOs Oct. 2016

Modern CIOs have many personas and face great challenges.


Modern CIOs have many personas and face great challenges. It is not sufficient to only keep the light on. Regardless of which industry or the nature of organization you are in, being a digital leader will need to master the art of creating unique, differentiating value from piles of commoditized technologies, but more specifically, what are the digital-savvy CIOs doing to run IT as a value creator and innovation engine? Here is the monthly spotlight of the CIO.       

  The Spotlight of Digital CIOs  Oct. 2016



  • CIOs as “Chief Innovation Officer”: Taking a Systematic Approach to Run an Innovative IT: Doing more with innovation is the mantra for any forward-looking organizations. Though every executive should make their voice heard on this front, have an opportunity and responsibility to participate in the innovation dialog and to come up with innovative ideas, CIOs generally have greater opportunities to stand out, and take leadership in driving innovation across their companies. Because most of the functions can make process innovation within their division, IT, on the other hand, has much more of an opportunity to enable incremental top-line and bottom-line value across the business, not just within IT, but across the functional border because IT is in the unique position to oversee business processes underneath, also foresee the latest technological trend, capture information-based business insight to either delight customers or catalyze business growth. In practice, how to take a systematic approach to run an innovative IT?  
  • Raising the Profile of Digital CIOs? Contemporary digital CIOs wear multiple hats, play different roles with multiple personas. There is a distinct difference between a great CIO and an average CIO in terms of identifying and implementing competitive advantages and being a great leader. What are modern CIOs’ digital profiles, and how can they improve leadership effectiveness and shift their role from transactional managers to transformational leaders?


  • The CIO’s Situational Leadership for IT Digital Transformation Many IT organizations are on the inflection point for digital transformation, to transform from a cost center to a growth engine, from a back office function to a digital brain front yard, and from a help desk to an innovation hub. CIOs are wearing multiple hats, practice situational leadership to bridge the industrial age with the Digital Era, to focus on information management, process optimization, business innovation, and overall organizational maturity. Many think IT is shifting from a static function which is often controlling or even lagging behind the changes to a people-centric changing organization. Here are a couple of leadership and management roles CIOs need to balance well for improving IT efficiency, effectiveness, and agility.

  • Digital CIOs as “Thinkingaire”: How to Master Multidimensional Digital Thinking Effortlessly: Due to the changing nature of IT with overwhelming information and fast growing digital technologies, IT becomes overcomplex with high velocity. The CIO is not a static management role, but a dynamic leadership role. Digital CIOs must wear multiple hats to play situational leadership, and the CIO’s responsibilities can be quite varied even with the same title or position. In order to lead effectively with broader vision and comprehensive strategy at the age of digital with "VUCA" characteristics, CIOs need to be the “Thinkingaire” who can master multidimensional digital thinking, and lead digital transformation effortlessly?

  • CIOs as Change Agent: Three Focal Point in Change Management: Business Change Management is managing everything that is necessary to get people to adopt new ways of working such as stakeholder management, communications, process or organizational change, business readiness or technical change management, etc. More than two-thirds of Change Management effort fails to achieve the expectation. How to get ahead of change curves, what are the focal point to frame the right problems to solve, make change tangible rather than fluffy?

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