As we near the end of a tumultuous 2009, I thought I'd get back in touch with Rebecca Wanta (pictured) to get her thoughts about what CIOs and CTOs should be doing right now.
Becky is the CEO & President of RSW1C Consulting. In that role, she's worked with many Fortune 50+ companies, including Best Buy, Target, DuPont, Cargill, 3M, GE, P&G, Caterpillar, KLA-Tencor, and State Compensation Insurance Fund. During her career, she's served as CTO of Wells Fargo, Global CTO of PepsiCo, and CIO of North America for BestBuy.
She has made her mark by taking an innovative approach to aligning and leveraging the IT resources within major organizations to business goals. Here are some of her current thoughts...
Roger: Traditional concerns facing the CIO are total spend, spend on innovation vs ongoing operations, and proof-of-concepts and case studies when their organizations are considering new concepts and technologies. How will these three broad areas be prioritized in 2010?
Becky: CIOs who did not capitalize on the economic downturn of 2009 as a "lull" to leverage the lull and get their respective "IT houses in order" will be forced with keeping the trains running--that is, focus on on-going operations--as their first priority, versus threading innovation and new capabilities within their business environments. But the latter is critical to enable businesses to survive and thrive in the forseeable future. CIOs who kept their eye on the proverbial ball will be poised to prioritize innovation and new capability--proofs of concepts, case studies, joint-ventures, etc.--first.
Roger: But ongoing operations gobble up the majority of the budget in any case...
Becky: Yes, CIOs historically face the dilemma of an IT run rate of 80 to 90 percentfor business operations, with a mere 10-20% left over for innovation and new capabilities. But senior IT executives should be constantly stepping up to the challenge of looking at how to reduce the direct spend, leaving more variable spend for innovation and capability based on business value.
Roger: We hear a lot about how the business must drive the IT, rather than the other way around. But realistically, how well do the business sides and IT sides communicate in most organizations today?
Becky: Senior IT executives that have earned their "seat at the table' understand that IT must be a strategic partner to the business in vision and execution and be solving problems in support of the business. They also understand that hey must continue to demonstrate their value and re-earn their seat at the table!
This does not mean that the business should be involved in the decision-making of whether an upgrade of the infrastructure--network, server, database, etc.--is necessary. It does mean that it is their responsibility to understand that, as with any investment, continued investment in IT is necessary to ensure that faster, cheaper, and better solutions are available to appropriately support the business.
Roger: In your experience, how do multinational companies address global technology adoption issues? Can a US-based CIO, for example, really influence how subsidiaries and operating units in, say, Europe and Asia spend their money and deploy their technology?
Becky: Yes, of course! The keys to making this happen are executive support and having the authority along with the responsibility to do so.
Roger: Social networking is seen as a way for companies to stay even closer to their customers. Some companies shy away from hearing angry customers vent online, while others embrace this, viewing today's upset customer as an opportunity rather than a problem. What do CIOs make of all this?
Becky: Clearly, social networking is not so much a technology play as a philosophical play. That said, the CIO has a responsibility for the technology involved here. The challenge is to continue to track new developments and emerging technology trends ahead of their customer constituency, to be appropriately poised to bring the new capability into the company, or to effectively interoperate with it internally and externally.
More often than not, I continue to see dated IT organizations that are last to the exploration and possible adoption of new technology. This means their business partners and customer constituencies are out in front, tinkering around with the viability of the new technology, and results in challenges to truly partnering with the business as a value-added service provider.
To remedy this, I traditionally put in place an emerging technologies organization, with a senior executive who understands the business and the technology, and who can create "safe harbor" experiments, proofs of concepts, joint ventures., to demonstrate the viability of the capability before investment is made.
Roger: The Microsoft/Sidekick fiasco has set back Cloud Computing by several years. Do you agree with this statement? And in any case, do you think that organizational anxiety about security and lock-in with Cloud will ever be outweighed by potential Cloud advantages such as lower costs and flexibility?
Becky: No, I do not think the Microsoft/Sidekick fiasco has set back Cloud Computing in terms of adoption. Sure, concerns around security, and who owns the data remain fundamental challenges with the use of external clouds. However, more likely than not, most companies have been operating with internal clouds forever; it just never had this new "sexy" name.
You know, so many companies have already solved their concerns on security and who owns the data, and have therefore made and continue to make the business decision that those IT functions stay in-house and are organic are those functions that provide the company's competitive advantage. All else is not core, and if it can be done more cost-effectively in a quality and price-point manner, the CIO really needs to support getting the work handled through a third-party outsourcer.
The fundamental question, "What is core to the business?" needs to be continually asked, answered and the workload adjusted accordingly so the company's talent is focused on the right priorities.
Roger: How much should CIOs today be up to date on business concepts such as Blue Ocean and Base of the Pyramid opportunities versus less glamorous, day-to-day operational detail?
Becky: CIOs need to be knowlegeable about the concect of Blue Ocean and Pyramid Opportunities to their business, as they have a coaching/educating responsibility embedded within their strategic business partnering responsibilities. Armed with the understanding of these two techhniques, they can adjust the business and lock into the culmination of information from disparate sources, to partner with the business and determine what next "Blue Ocean" their company should be entering, leading, and owning!
