When you transition into a leadership role

As an IT leader, what you do in your first days will set the stage for your leadership style. Consider what kind of leader you want to be:

If you ask those who report to you to give you a strategic overview of what’s going on… you’re taking a strategic view and indicating that you will rely on the managers and others in your organization to get things done. Set expectations carefully here; you are taking a strategic view, but you will need to engage at some level to get things done. You can’t stay on the balcony forever.

If you lead a SWOT exercise with your management team, or with your staff… you’re probably a collaborative leader and signaling that you want to operate as a collaborative team. Be careful about optics with this one; set expectations that while you are listening for advice and thoughts, you will take that feedback to make a decision on your own. Listening to feedback does not mean giving up decision-making.

If you go around and meet with people to build an understanding of what’s happening across your org… you’re taking a hands-on approach that indicates you’ll operate at a “boots on the ground” level, rather than a strategic “on the balcony” level. This can be a good fit for small teams, where the IT leader needs to be more directly involved. But for larger IT organizations, this can stretch the IT leader too thin; you’ll be too involved in the day-to-day to focus on the strategic long-term goals of the organization.

Whether you are moving into your first leadership role, or moving from one leadership role to another, these steps will help you with a planful transition:

1. Understand the IT landscape

What projects are you working on? What do your customers expect of you? What is coming up?

As the CIO, you should have complete autonomy over the IT organization. But check to see if that’s true. Some organizations may say one thing about autonomy, but the reality is quite different. In other organizations, the CIO may have the autonomy, but needs to go through several levels of approvals/buy-in before projects can really begin.

2. Understand the team

What skills do you have across your team? Who are the top performers? What skill gaps do you have that need to be built up? Also consider if the right people are in the right place in the organization - are the managers managing effectively? Do you have hidden leaders in the organization that need to be recognized or moved up?

For smaller IT shops, or smaller overall organizations, the IT leader may be more operational in nature. By the nature of the org or the position, these IT leaders need to be more immediate than strategic. For those leaders, also focus on these:

3. Do a SWOT exercise

Understand what is working well today, and what needs to be fixed in your first 100 days. Also understand what things might continue to work well for you in the next 6-12 months, and what issues might become problems in the next 6-12 months.

Use this SWOT to create a 100 day plan. Identify what you need to do, and let that be your roadmap.

4. Understand your IT security

Smaller IT organizations may not have a dedicated CISO role. In these cases, the senior IT leader effectively also takes on the CISO role. Understand how IT security is managed (if at all) in the organization, and how IT controls are set up. Ensure you have a cyber response plan; you may need to start with a DR plan.

5. Understand your resource allocation

This isn’t an issue in larger orgs where the IT leader has managers and supervisors under them to manage the teams. But for a smaller team, you probably don’t have that luxury. Do an analysis with your teams to see what projects and other work items they are currently working on, and how much time they are able to commit to each. Consider creating a work-effort plan for your team; if you do, I recommend creating it for the entire team, so you maintain transparency about staff expectations, time commitments, and who is doing what.