Too often Chief Information Officers are focusing on technology. This is reinforced by industry magazines and consultancies that make money from technology. But if all we focus on is technology all we are going to get is technology. Organizations do not invest to get technology. They invest in order to bring about change that produces value. With that in mind I would like to suggest CIOs should focus on something other than technology. I suggest that you focus on furniture.
The first piece of furniture that most CIOs look to is the “seat at the table”. They expect that when they get around a table with their senior colleagues that they will have a say in the decision-making and be able to influence the organization. Too often they are disappointed. In many cases even though they are at the table they are not treated as an equal. They are still seen as the plumber not a strategic partner. Secondly they often find that the decisions are not made at that table. Decisions are made elsewhere and then brought to the table for dissemination.
If you really want to influence your organization then focus on different furniture. More than the seat at the table, it is the guest chair in your colleagues’ offices that matters. Spending time in their offices talking about their challenges and learning to speak their language is of vital importance for the CIO. It is here that you can truly get the feel of what is happening in the organization and what is driving those in control. By learning to speak in terms that make sense to them rather than talking about technology, the CIO can establish themselves as a credible organizational leader rather than just the plumber.
The key to exploiting the chair is to focus on value. Business value, as understood by the people who fund the organization, is the common language between all the disparate parts of the organization. If you can communicate to your colleagues in those terms then you can influence the organization.
As we advocate in our book The Value Imperative: Harvesting Value From Your IT Initiatives, for the CIO to be a leader of the entire organization, they must speak the language of value understood by the whole organization. It is that language that is learned and used in those visitors chairs.