Being an IT leader is hard. Actually, being a leader of any kind is hard but with the confluence of IT and business over the past decade or so, IT leaders are being increasingly stretched. This phenomenon is just one of the reasons that I’m thankful that I started my career on the business side of the enterprise prior to moving in to IT.
As a recent article on O’Reilly Radar pointed out:
…today, CIOs and IT leaders must be able to partner with other members of the C-suite and in addition to running the operations of IT, be able to grow the business through IT enablement.
Gone are the days where IT was nothing more than just the “fundamental foundation of almost all business†and because of this IT leaders need to upgrade their skills beyond simply working on the next generation of IT certification or adopting new methods to manage a project team.
A firm grasp on basic accounting and financial matters is a great place to start. So is understanding your organization’s sales cycle and larger strategic vision. Spending time with your marketing team is also a good idea so that you have a better understanding of what’s currently driving the marketplace you compete in.
Businesses can no longer afford to have their operations exist in silos that never touch and neither can IT leaders.
UPDATE: A very interesting article on why “Putting Information on the Balance Sheet” and IT leadership’s need to take a more active role in managing it’s value.
