To Lead Change, You Need a Deep Bench

Last week, I posted about three CIOs who suggested culture smarts as a top qualification for the job. But I was wondering: Is the bar higher today for IT execs than it used to be, when deploying new technologies and revamping business processes advanced at a more leisurely pace?

I asked my former CIO magazine colleague, Martha Heller, president of Heller Search Associates, who recruits senior IT leaders. Her answer: Yes and no.

“Any good CIO is going to be a good change leader,” she says, because that’s what CIOs do. And there’s no question that companies invest a lot of time and effort to ensure they hire executives who fit in with the corporate culture.

These days, though, CIOs are often involved with transforming the business culture. “We have a culture of people who are afraid to stick their necks out, and what we want is culture where people are willing to take risks. That’s what a lot of companies are trying to do,” Heller notes. It takes more people than the CIO to shepherd such a change. He or she needs a team.

The big skill that CIOs need now, she says, is knowing how to hire or promote technologists who are also good at building relationships, mentoring people and communicating with customers or business colleagues. They won’t be successful if their IT leadership team consists of “people who have spent 25 years with headphones on looking at screens.”

Do you agree? What are you doing to build a deeper bench of business-savvy, culture-aware technologists?