Project delivered on time and budget but missed the mark on functionality
During the first week of a new job, we had a planned fire drill. While in the stairwell, I overheard two of my new developers discussing the proper way to record the time spent in the fire drill. When I inquired, it turned out that the team was required to account for every minute of their time. When I asked why, several answers were given: (1) it is necessary for Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX); (2) it's required for accounting; and (3) it's necessary for resource planning. None of these answers are accurate, and all of them are frustrating. There are no SOX rules that say you need to document the time salaried employees spend on a fire drill. There are no accounting rules that say you need to document the time salaried employees spend in a fire drill. Micromanaging time is the surest way to destroy productivity. Yes, you must track the time internal employees spend on capital projects. But time tracking should not be extended to lunch breaks, social activities, and fire drills.
As the rules become stricter, the team slows down, and morale dwindles. When a team is not empowered, discretionary effort is gone. The mentality becomes, “If you treat us like babies, we'll act like babies.”
When morale drops, people will leave. In any economy, top IT talent is highly sought after, and they can find jobs outside of your company. When morale is low, top talent departs, and the downward spiral continues. As IT delivers less and less, more pressure is put on the CIO, and the screws are tightened another turn.
In an act of desperation, the CIO will cut corners. Usually, the first thing to go is quality assurance testing (QA). Testing is the last thing that stands between development and launching a solution that will be accessed by its users to do their jobs. Cutting corners on QA appears to save time and money, and by squeezing testing, you’re merely hoping to still ship a quality solution on time.
This is not a suspenseful story; we all know what comes next. The release is buggy, the users are frustrated by these defects, and the new features create havoc for the customers. Now IT is not just a burden on the bottom line—it is negatively affecting the top line. Fixing these bugs must become the CIO's full-time job, and the dream of being a strategic partner will have to be postponed. Top talent is redeployed to remediation, and the beautiful three-year Gantt chart is quickly turning from yellow to red because you can't move forward when your house is on fire.
At this point, more bad things happen:
The CIO loses his job.
The CEO brings in outside consultants to “fix” the IT Department.
A decision is made to outsource IT.
The chances of an internal candidate becoming the next CIO are slim to none as the internal team is associated with the failures.
The conventional wisdom that you can improve IT by implementing more and more processes and controls is wrong. You may try to combat this by embracing an Agile methodology, but done poorly, Agile can create the same problems. Leaders who micromanage lose their team first and their job second. Trusting and empowering your team is the only way to create an Amazing IT Department.
Notes
1 2. G. Bock, K. Carpenter, and J. E. Davis, “Management’s Newest Star: Meet the Chief Information Officer” (Business Week, 1986, October 3), No. 2968, 160–166.
2 3. Nicholas G. Carr, “IT Doesn't Matter” (Harvard Business Review, 2003), https://hbr.org/2003/05/it-doesnt-matter.
3 4. H.R.3763 - 107th Congress (2001-2002): Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 | Congress.gov | Library of Congress. https://www.congress.gov/bill/107th-congress/house-bill/3763/text.
4 The Right Foundation
When formulating your plan, make sure it's the right plan for your company, your team, and the times. Don't bring what you did at your last job and just impose it on your new team.
Collaborate with your leadership team, and get the right answer together. The same advice goes for this book—it should be used to inform, not direct, your actions. When bringing 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
