Many companies are led by CEOs who don’t have technology backgrounds, nor much in the way of technical know-how. Still, they hear about tech in seminars and get pitched by tech companies to buy their products.
To help ensure the success of the company, it’s in the best interests of CIOs to educate their CEOs so that these corporate leaders understand the new technologies that are out there, as well as their benefits and risks. More importantly, CIOs must impart to their CEOs the why and wherefore of information technology’s direction — within the market and within their organization.
But many CEOs also have big egos, and don’t like to ask for help. So how do you educate them without courting a career setback?
An interesting use case from history
A colleague of mine, now a retired CIO, recalled how he had to fight with his CEO to get funding for the Y2K date conversion project.
“Why should we spend all that money just to fix a few dates?” asked his boss. Rather than explain, my friend left a few article clips on the boss’s desk from the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. He also put a yellow sticky on it, with the note: “How Y2K can affect the company.”
“I know this sounds incredible,” he said, as we recently visited over coffee, “but he honestly didn’t think that changing the date fields mattered. I know he read the articles, because the next time we had a board meeting, he was front and center telling the board how critical it was for us to get funding to change all the dates.”
Treading lightly
I was stunned by this story — but as I thought about it more, maybe not so much.
In my own career, when cloud computing was first coming into focus, I can recall all the water cooler conversations about “cloud” that board members and C-level executives were having. Everyone was reading about “cloud,” but the very term “cloud” seemed amorphous and vague. No one really knew what cloud meant as a technology or how it could benefit the company.
It was around this time that I had a meeting with my CEO on projects. As I was leaving his office, he asked me, “I wonder if you could speed me up a bit about cloud and some of the new technologies.”
My initial response was enthusiasm. Of course, it would be great to go over tech subjects and bring up various technology initiatives I was considering for our organization. But then I rethought this. How would he respond to a situation like this, where our traditional positions were reversed — with me as the training authority and he the student?
I think he too had some second thoughts about it, because the next time I saw him, there was no more mention about technology education — and the subject never came up again.
The hard reality
As these examples show, it’s absolutely critical for CEOs to have a working knowledge of IT and how it can benefit the business — especially for CIOs to sell them on important IT projects, including addressing pernicious business risks.
And while many CEOs won’t have this working knowledge of IT, most won’t want to ask for it, either.
So what can you do?
Your CEO education action plan
A good approach to CEO education is an indirect one. This can be done by leading the CEO to technology sources outside of the organization so he or she can self-educate, or by letting the technology itself show how it works.
Step one: Invite the CEO to technology seminars
There are numerous half-day and one-day executive IT seminars that cross CIO desks each day — but the CEO never sees these. These seminars discuss technology at a top level and relate it to the business. And they provide a great opportunity for CIOs to invite their CEOs to go with them, learn together from a third party, and discuss it later. What’s great about this approach is that the CIO is not the teacher. The seminar presenter is; so there is no authority threat.
Step two: Give demos of new technology
In early pilot stages or even in later project phases, there’s an opportunity to demo a new technology in front of the CEO and other C-level executives. This is a good way for everyone to see how the technology works in a business process. Creating a mock digital twin that emulates an actual physical entity is a good project fit for a demo, because a test “what-if” business scenario can be set up and demonstrated.
Another project demo example is a test of a robot on a production line. You can easily show how the robot will automatically perform a repetitive task and “take orders” if you need it to do something different by inputting an instruction, enabling your C-level guests to see the process in action.
The advantage to sharing a demo with everyone is that they have working knowledge of what the technology does and how it works. This is a plus for CEOs, who could be asked a question at any time about the technology by a board member and are now ready to answer it.
Step three: Wrap technologies into business cases
CEOs might not know what AI-driven loan decisioning software is, but if they run a bank, they want to have a strong loan portfolio that has lucrative high-quality loans, and few loans at risk of default.
Given this, there’s a golden opportunity for any CIO and/or lending VP who is introducing AI-driven loan decisioning software to show how the lending department can input its underwriting guidelines into the software, with the AI operating under this guidance to assess additional elements about the loan requester and the loan to determine what kind of loan — or if there is a loan — that is to be approved. The advantage to the business? An automated first-line loan determination that is made, subject to the final decision of an underwriter or supervisor. What does this deliver to the business? Consistency in underwriting, fewer human errors, staff time savings, faster loan processing, and better customer service.
By spelling out the business case for each technology investment and explaining in plain English how the technology delivers, CIOs are able to get faster budget approvals and executive endorsements. Best yet, the CEO’s comfort level with technology grows.
Read More from This Article: How to educate the CEO on IT — without losing your job
Source: News