IT from a CIO's Perspective

Bruce Barnes, president and CEO of Bold Vision, a leadership consulting firm, recently discussed a myriad of topics with Financial Services Special Edition Editor Shelley Sessoms. In this interview, Barnes tackles the role of CIOs (he's a former one himself) and the importance of IT, particularly in the financial services industry. He also gives us his top three requirements for a company striving to compete successfully.

Shelley Sessoms: You've participated in many IT events, so quite a few of our readers will be familiar with you. But for those who aren't, tell me a little about yourself.

Bruce Barnes: I grew up in an applied sciences environment, although technology did not really enter into it until I was out of college and in the armed forces. I spent a number of years in the Army in a technology-related assignment, and when I left, being an educator by formal training, I drifted into the educational side of IT. I wanted to then get better grounded in the science itself, as well as begin building my future relationships, so I first found my way in as a developer, and then as a midlevel manager, in the commercial space.

I have worked in a variety of different industries. For about 35 years now I have been involved in IT, and for at least 20 of those years, I have been in senior leadership roles. I've gone from a global company to a midsized healthcare company, then into a Fortune 100 company, all at the CIO level. About four years ago, I left all that behind and moved into my own business.

SS: Tell me a little bit about your business. It's called Bold Vision, correct?

BB: That's correct. One thing that was pretty apparent to me in the commercial space is that all the folks that came to see me on a daily basis [and] who then said, "I can help you," had never spent one second ever being me or experiencing the demands of my role. Rather than listen to those folks, I tended to do most of my advice-seeking, if you will, through other more trusted sources; i.e., peers in the industry, other practicing CIOs and other senior IT leaders.

It worked well for me through the years. So what Bold Vision does is essentially extend that peer counseling and apply the power of peer-based knowledge and resources to the senior leadership level. It puts CIOs together with [other] CIOs so that they can learn from each other, collaborate with each other, share with each other at all levels.

SS: As a former CIO, what did you find hardest about your position?

BB: The hardest thing in those times was learning how to effectively influence the thinking and the actions of the people around you. You start that by working to learn the business that you serve in order to better understand the needs of the people you are serving. In then applying what you learn, you quickly come to realize that the only person in life you can really control is you, and thus trying to play a control game with your counterparts is a dead loser. You really have to become very adept at managing through the influence that you wield within an organization or within an industry in general. Back in [earlier] days, when folks were frustrated with IT anyway for jamming preconceived answers to unasked questions down their throats, that "influence game" got to be a really tough assignment. Because you were, in effect, trying to learn how to influence a hostile audience. The way I see it, the human dimension – the carbon-based stuff – was a lot more difficult than the technology itself – the silicone-based stuff.

SS: Did you ever find a good solution for influencing folks?

BB: Well, when you're talking about people, you're talking about concentric circles of trust. Those are the sequential gates that you walk through in any relationship – the more gates you travel through, the more you are trusted – and that takes time and attention. And you must realize that the formula basically is that you have to make people understand that you are: a) Willing to see things through their eyes, not yours, and b) Willing to be held accountable for performance against their expectations of you. And that's a real leap because it's a vulnerable position to be in. It's through continuing to demonstrate that [when] you get deeper and deeper into the field of concentric circles that you become more trusted – and that's when you win. But it's also hard because remember that trust is really hard to get and really easy to lose. So it's important to remember that as hard as it is in building the relationships and the trust through influence – it becomes even harder yet to maintain them.

SS: Five years ago you were a CIO. Now you own Bold Vision, where you facilitate knowledge-sharing among CIOs. What has changed with CIOs in that five-year span?

BB: I think the role of the CIO has evolved from once being the technological visionary to now becoming more of a needed business partner. In my vernacular, "business partner" means that in concert with all of my peers at that C-level table, I am truly sharing five different things: risk, cost, profits, information and resources. Anything less than that, and I'm just a service vendor…not a true partner…and it's through partnerships that the real gains are made. Thus, I see CIOs needing to become more of a needed and effective business partner in today's world. Similarly, in really successful IT organizations the role of the CIO has changed from once being a control-oriented management role now into more of a very high-level influence and leadership type of position. You are helping to inspire people. Whereas before it was simply "managing" people.

SS: What brought about those changes? Do you think it is the new CIO, or are companies getting it and beginning to rewrite the job description?

BB: I think it's a lot of things. In the '90s things were going great and everything in IT was skyrocketing up. Then 2000 hit and the market crashed, and then all of a sudden we went spiraling downward from the heights into this perfect storm of non-spending. IT suddenly shifted from often reporting to the CEO to now often reporting to the CFO for one specific reason: For about the last three or four years it has been largely all about "'Be cheap. We've thrown lots of money at you guys over the years and all of a sudden we're starting to wonder what we are getting for that."

And so it initially became about cutting costs, and the myopic management focus got even tighter, and then it was all about continuing to operate "on the cheap" as well. Yet, there is truly a point at which you can't squeeze any more blood out of a stone. I think the bar has clearly reset itself, and what we are starting to see now is that you really can't simply cost-cut your way to global excellence; it's just impossible. You have to provide more, and companies are now saying, "Show me the value. Take me to the next level." More is being asked of IT, as well as the CIOs that lead it.

SS: You pointed out that more is being asked of CIOs. It seems they are getting the squeeze from all sides – their companies, the public, the media. If someone were to ask you, 'Why should I become a CIO?' what would you tell them?

BB: The role of the CIO is a steppingstone to something bigger. Just think about that for a minute. If you look across the scope of the enterprise, where in the enterprise – amongst all the C-level roles – where is the job to know, to understand, to be literate in and be responsive to, and supportive of, every other person around that C-level table? I would submit that there are probably only two [such roles]. One is Finance, but even Finance doesn't understand IT completely. The other is IT. IT serves everybody. For those IT aspirants who are willing to step into the role of business partner and be true leaders, inspirers and influencers, as well as know the business and help shape demand within that business so that value is obtained, the role of the CIO is a steppingstone role to CEO. If you want to go that way you better start looking at that CIO position.

SS: You mentioned world-class CIOs. What skills do those outstanding businessmen and -women possess?

BB: I think the first skill is really knowing how people think and how to influence -not control – that thinking. Now that's huge. You have to be able to do that. Next up is the ability to build and maintain effective collaborative relationships, and that's both internal and external. Within the company and outside of the company – within the industry and across the global scale at large. You have to know how to communicate, and communicating isn't just writing a good memo, it is also about telling good stories. There are a lot of folks out there, me included, who are visual perceptives. If you want to make your point like old Aesop, put it in the form of a fable. Make it real, tell stories – make it personal.

You also need the ability not only to understand the business but [to] understand the environment that affects it. That could be regulations, legislation, marketing trends -whatever. You have to know the business, the influencers and especially the regulators; you have to know that stuff. And lastly, I suppose, is the ability to innovate and imagine. It's about the difference between leadership and management. Leadership is about being inspirational, and part of inspiring people to [reach] the next level is getting them outside of the right-now. It's not just about managing, it's about innovation and inspiration.

SS: Let's switch gears and talk a little more about the IT side of things. If you've heard anything at all about SAS in the last few months you know we're heavily involved in business intelligence. That's our main imperative right now. So I wanted to get your perspective on the state of BI in the industry right now.

BB: I think in the large context it's struggling to evolve. It's going from a world where it has been seen as an add-on to a world where it must become standard fare – standard components – in the arsenal of the business. Let me give you some examples. I think it is steadily evolving from tools to an operational platform. It's going from being ad hoc, or reflective, to being predictive. That is, I think its intent is moving from more reflective post-activity reporting to more of an emphasis on the driving analytics. How are we doing? Where should we be? How should we position ourselves? It's looking ahead as opposed to looking into the rear-view mirror.

This also means [that] in a world that's changing around us all the time, I think that BI, which has tended to be very structured, is in the future going to have to be more transparent. That transition needs to happen. There are some real laggards by and large; however, the intelligent companies, as well as their customers, will make that transition, in turn driving companies like SAS to make that transition as well. You can have the greatest vision in the world, but if nobody gets it or nobody wants to do it, then you have wasted your time. So that's all part of the influence thing, too.

SS: Let's talk a little bit about IT, especially how it pertains to the financial services industry. Earlier this year, you participated in a discussion titled, "Does IT Matter?" So, tell me, does it matter?

BB: It should matter, even at the lowest execution level. Within the financial services space, we are talking about money…which is very personal…which means trust is key. Yet, where I think it matters even more is beyond that where consumers are looking to financial service firms and now saying, "Help me. Help me think, help me act, and help me anticipate. I don't want you to help me count my money after I have it. I want you to help me make money. I want you to help me think ahead."

This is a place where the influence game really needs to be played well, and technology has the ability to help affect that outcome for all of these financial services firms. Financial services firms in large part disappoint me because I think that it's still the green eyeshades and the back-office "count the money later" kind of thing. It's a shame. It's like MDs and Doctors of Osteopathic Medicine (DOs) in the medical arena. MDs fix it when it's broken. DOs say, "Let's help make sure that you don't get sick." It's a different mentality. I think it's more the latter where the financial services firm needs to go. I think IT matters a lot if you want to differentiate yourselves that way. For those firms that are saying, "Nah, we just want to worry about being cheap. We don't want to grow, and we don't want to be responsive to the cries of our clients" – for those companies, IT doesn't matter at all and it never will.

SS: What can be done for IT to matter more to these types of companies?

BB: I think that for IT to matter, IT needs a stake in this, too. I don't want to hang all of this on the businesses and say they are screwing it up. IT has to start leading and not managing, which is a huge difference. [IT companies] have to start inspiring, they have to start shaping lives and needs, not just reacting. Companies need to say, "We are dedicated." I have tried to find financial services firms that were really dedicated in their mission and in their behavior that meaningfully say, "We are going to get in the head of our consumer. We're going to know what you are thinking before you think it. We are that wired into your life, into your home, into your family. When you need help we're going to help you think, anticipate and act before you even know you have a problem." The first company that does that owns the world. Technology has the ability to make that happen.

SS: This has been a truly interesting and thought-provoking interview, Bruce. I have one final question for you. What, in your opinion, are the top three things that make a company competitive?

BB: Competitiveness can all be boiled down to three things, and you can pick your order, it really doesn't matter. The three things are simply seeing, doing and knowing. Seeing, what does that mean? I tend to be more of a strategic guy so I'll go through that one first. You know the old adage, "without a map any road will do"? You have to know where you're going, and in this case, seeing means imagining, being able to step outside of the box of the right-now and set the course for the future. Not only with regard to the company, but also for those that are really doing it well, set the course of industry. Imagine a four-box matrix with axis' of growth and profitability. There are companies that are in the upper right-hand quadrant who are maximizing growth and profit. Not because they are necessarily doing it better than anybody else right now [but because] they have changed the game. They stand out there alone. They have reformed and re-energized the industry that they are in. That's why they stand alone. They have stepped outside of the right-now and set the course for the future in a way that sets them apart. That's the first requirement.

The second thing – the doing – is really execution. The greatest vision in the world is worthless if you can't execute, right? So, in the case of doing, there are really four elements: You have to be efficient, and you can't just fritter money away. You also have to be precise. You need to meet your expectations; you absolutely deliver what you promise when you promise it. It's safe, you do that in a way that helps to build trust and you do it in within an environment that assures agility. Part of being good at doing is being agile and adaptive to changes that will occur. You can't make the world stop changing. All of those things build trust.

In the course of seeing and then doing comes the knowing – and that's the third part. Organizations that are really going to be competitive in the future are going to know exactly how they are doing day to day. They know the score of the game anytime you ask them. Their eyes are on the horizon; they are looking at weather radar 50, 60, 80 and 90 miles away. And they know what they are going to do to take advantage of the future. Part of knowing is being able to inform what you know. To be able to pass that along, both internally and externally, depending upon all your relationships, is important. So, there you go: seeing, doing and knowing. Those are the three elements of competitive advantage to me.