The Weekly Insight of the “Future of CIO” 3/3/ 2017

The “Future of CIO” Blog has reached 1.7 million page views with 3500+ blog posting in 59+ different categories of leadership, management, strategy, digitalization, change/talent, etc. The content richness is not for its own sake, but to convey the vision and share the wisdom. Here is the weekly insight about digital leadership, IT Management, and Talent Management.


  The Weekly Insight of the “Future of CIO”  3/3/2017Three Traits of Digital CIOs: The digital CIO role is multifaceted. CIOs today need to have both business acumen and technology know-how; They have to understand the business drivers, and speak in business terms; but also they need to know technology, how that technology relates to business drivers and what is and is not possible. In short, CIOs have to have a leg in both worlds, be the business strategist and technological visionary to look further, and be the IT managers to dive into technical know-how, and deliver IT-enabled business solutions. Here are three traits of digital CIOs to improve IT leadership effectiveness and achieve IT management excellence
CIOs as Chief Insight Officer: The “IN & OUTs” Viewpoint of Digital Transformation: The business and the world are experiencing the major societal TRANSFORMATION from the industrial age with the scarcity of information to the digital era with the abundance of information/ knowledge (but often insight is still scarce). These changes and transformations are reshaping our thinking and recasting the way we view the organization, the digital ecosystem of which we are the part of. In order to broaden the changing perspective and deepen the understanding of the digital business as a living thing, here are set of “IN& OUTs” viewpoint of digital transformation.?
Accelerate Digital Transformation via Reducing Unnecessary Pains? As many organizations are at an inflection point in digital transformation, that transformation represents a break from the past, with a high level of impact and complexity. The goal of the digital paradigm shift should look beyond immediate symptom fixing, the focus should include the mind shift and actions designed to solve real problems, sustain performance improvement and anchor change as a new opportunity. Some say, no pains, no gains; but to be fair, it is also important to reduce unnecessary pains and speed up to ride above the change curves. Because there are so many obstacles need to overcome, and numerous pitfalls on the way; it is so important to keep the end in mind, and laser focusing on the most critical things, continue tuning the business to get digital ready.
Bridging the Potential Gap Organizations today need both performance and potential. Performance keeps your business running, churning numbers etc, whereas potential looks at an employee that can bring your company to the next level, and the collective human potential in the organization is the greatest thing the organization should ever invest in, because it is the driving force to catalyze the business growth and build the unique organizational advantage the competitors cannot beat. So, how to understand both potential and performance at the deeper level, bridge the gap to unleash the collective potential and accelerate business performance to the next level
IT Management Quality Check in Digital Transformation? Quality is defined by a number of factors such as innovation, effectiveness, flexibility, or maturity, etc., and to effectively lead an organization into good practices to focus on quality attributes takes work and a level of credibility within the organization. IT plays a significant role in digital transformation, as more often than not, technology is a major digital disruptor today, the purpose of digital transformation is to embed digital technology into key business processes, to improve business capability and competency to compete for the future. Hence, CIOs should do the periodic IT management quality check to ensure its effectiveness, efficiency, and maturity.
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