Small and medium-sized business CIOs have a lot to teach larger enterprises, according to Fabienne Wintle, CIO of Navii, the Australian government-backed platform that supports small and medium-sized businesses going digital.
Wintle, who is also CIO of Tribe Tourism, had an interest in connecting businesses with information through technology and tells CIO Australia that she always saw technology as organizing information and making it useful for business.
A tourism-related career was a natural progression as she grew up in the holiday paradise of the Swiss Alps, but so was her enthusiasm for IT and its applications. These two together saw her find her passion in helping smaller organizations. “I really saw that there was something to be done for smaller businesses. That’s how my career has evolved, being able to find the right technology for smaller businesses,” she says.
What enterprise CIOs can learn from small business CIOs and vice versa
Smaller teams are less purely process-driven and have more person-to-person exchanges and communication with the head of IT to embrace digital at every level. It helps each person understand that there is value in thinking about how they can use their business skills and knowledge to improve the work they’re doing by making better use of technology-enabled information, Wintle says.
And when it comes to applications, small business CIOs have the ability to use solutions similar to those used by enterprises. But rather than simply trying to replicate an enterprise-grade solution, small businesses must find ways to maintain and adapt existing tools and look for additions. Wintle points to an example when using project management tools, such as the Trello platform, but requires additional functionality. “The option as a small business is Jira, which is a complete system that would mean losing Trello, which might not work for the team. If you just need a Gantt chart view of the Trello board, look for that solution, which is an overlay on the Trello board.
And one way to help small business CIOs understand how to use enterprise solutions in their environment and become familiar with existing options is to attend events that are appropriate for larger organizations, so that “they can get their brains flowing and see that with technology anything is available for any business these days,” says Wintle. “Thinking about how to translate tools to work for businesses smaller and being hands-on is something I would advise CIOs to do,” she says.
For enterprise CIOs, talking to their counterparts in smaller organizations gives them the opportunity to understand how involved small and midsize business CIOs are in all organizational functions and gain a practical understanding. of the entire operation. In her experience, CIOs in larger-sized organizations can tend to plan the development of a CRM system without fully understanding how the business works, which ends up being a waste of resources.
And that’s why having a hands-on approach is important, so IT chiefs should make it part of their job to see how other jobs are done within the organization. “Being close to teams and understanding their needs can make it faster and easier to see problems and gaps and find solutions, which can be small but powerful. Sometimes it’s just a few lines of code or a new formula for a spreadsheet. With digital, a small change can make a big difference to a team,” she says
CIO training should be broad-based
Wintle shares that her master’s in information systems taught her to think about information and not just technology. “Being able to connect information and see how it works, as opposed to coding hard things and not understanding how it fits into a business environment, has been so helpful,” she says.
For those who want to become CIOs, Wintle suggests developing skills beyond the purely technical to be able to better communicate with all stakeholders across the business. This includes taking HR courses during the course, if they are available. Wintle believes this helps in the long run, especially when dealing with people who are reticent about change, such as introducing a new system.
Panning for gold in mountains of data
With many organizations awash with data and the cyber risks that come with it, the task is to understand what is important.
“Data analytics is able to find the gold nuggets. I love data and systems, so I can easily dive in and look at analytics for hours. But it’s really important to keep the strategic objectives in perspective and have very simple North Star metrics to focus on and always link the data to that,” she says.
Understanding what data is important builds on her previous learnings to understand the entire business and its stakeholders. Learning what type of data is required by each stakeholder and having that focus is key to making that data visual.
For example, small businesses may have a CRM, but the data is sitting there in the CRM, not going back to a simple Google sheet that updates automatically and that the whole team can review. Working with data means finding that metric and then making it visible in a dynamic format. “It’s creating or organizing data in the best way, using the right tools so that the team is able to get the most out of it and not lose touch with the business of why you’re doing it and not going to a tangent. ,” she said.
The other important element is the ability to show teams how to access data and understand data in their work. “What has made a big difference in our team is the ability to understand how important it is to actually have data structured the way we need it, which is supporting the goals of the organization,” she says.
“The goal could be to increase the business by 20%. But what does this mean for example in terms of the marketing team. Should they send more newspapers? Is it a Facebook group, is it more PR [public relations]?” says Wintle.
Strategic planning days, for example, can be used to set goals for the coming year. “So these are the measures of the North Star that everything must land on. Then establishing the metrics and linking the data and reporting system back to these metrics,” she says.
Why digital transformation means thinking like a digital entrepreneur
When it comes to the growing demand for digital transformation, Wintle thinks that in many ways CIOs have been focused on digital transformation since day one. For him, it’s the opportunities that digital brings to all levels of business that require the CIO to step outside the technology center and head into the ‘ring’. “Being able to direct talent and entice them to ‘think’ like a digital entrepreneur is where the CIO’s focus should be. CIOs need to be able to communicate and empower the most tech-adverse employees to embrace innovation, at all levels of the business,” she says.
This means connecting with people in engaging ways.
“Successful small businesses are those that nurture digital transformation from the ground up, where everyone is eager to see how much more interesting and exciting their roles can be by mixing smart technology into their role. The role of the CIO is to facilitate this very human role. Not only must CIOs keep up with technology opportunities for their industry, they must also enhance their interpersonal skills and create learning programs that fit their teams. Out the door with weird, dry, bullet point-driven documentation. It’s time to bring gamification and colorful, animated training videos to YouTube,” says Wintle.
Getting the team on board and understanding how important it is to think like a digital entrepreneur is both an opportunity and a challenge, especially within smaller outfits. “While the role of the CIO was for many years part of the IT team, it is spread throughout the organization,” she notes.
Regardless of size, in every organization every system or process depends in some way on technology. However, Wintle believes it may still be a challenge to encourage some leaders and teams outside of IT to fully embrace the concept. “It’s very important that CIOs are at the management discussion table and not be perceived as the technology team down there,” she says.
If CIOs aren’t at the management discussion table, she believes it means the person above them doesn’t understand how technology permeates the entire organization. In this case, they need a mentor or someone else to talk to their top executives and even the CEO about the importance of digital.
For all organizations today, the cost of doing business must be calculated for technology that is critical to success. It is expertise that should be the minimum requirement for a successfully functioning organization. However, it can create a technical debt for smaller organizations that they need to address. “When I run businesses, I’ll say, ‘Either you have to become a digital entrepreneur yourself, or you have to have one on the books all the time to guide you,'” she says.