The Old Joel on Software Forum: Part 4 (of 5)

Job Description for a CIO

What would be the typical day for a CIO (Chief Information Officer)

A company (they are an Art & Decoration company in the WholeSale & Retail Biz) is offering me the opportunity to join them as Internation Project Manager for their ERP.

I've got 8 years solid experience as a Developer for this particular ERP.

They currently dont have an IT department as such, and from my understanding I should become CIO within 3 to 4 years.

But I wonder what are the CIO responsabilities ?

Gollum
Thursday, May 13, 2004

You can get typical position descriptions at salary.com (CIO would probably be under "executive").

But if they don't even have an IT department, you'd probably be wearing a lot of hats regardless of what they call you.

Ron
Thursday, May 13, 2004

Ron :

I guess I would be wearing a lot of hat.

Can you be a CIO and still get your hands in the code ?
Project Managing, Designing Solutions ?

Gollum
Thursday, May 13, 2004

No,

if you're a CIO, you're an executive. Focus on that. You'll spend your time in meetings with vendors, strategy sessions, board meetings etc. If you try to get involved in the coding and design, you'll be too busy to do a good job and will just muck everything up.

If you want to design / code, don't become a CIO.

Koz
Thursday, May 13, 2004

Gollum,

If nothing else, you can always become a PHB ;)

Steve-o
Thursday, May 13, 2004

Gollum,

I kind of get the feeling that you could be getting in over your head. A CIO is more manager/business that technical. Typically you won't see the CIO getting involved with writing code unless it is small software company and the CIO might be the architect also.

Going from develper to project manager/IT guy is going to be a big jump for you. My advice is to you to think long and hard. Speaking very generally most developers who are happy with what they do probably wouldn't like this move.

Bill Rushmore
Thursday, May 13, 2004

To be a CIO of a large firm entails selling out your American workforce, who brought your company the success it now carries. Be sure to come to the table with a lot of talk about how much money can be saved by shipping their jobs to india.

edmundo posada
Thursday, May 13, 2004

Two words: "Fall guy".

I believe I've read that the average stint in a CIO role is 18-24 months. That's not a great career path unless you're one of the exceptions.

But, by all means, if you like endless meetings...

dir at badblue com
Friday, May 14, 2004

If I were you, I'd be prepared that they may not live up to their promise. 3-4 years is a lifetime in this industry. Lots of companies will talk about your future in order to get you on board but things have a way of changing. When an IT department gets more than a few people, they may decide to hire somebody who is a CIO at somewhere else.

If you really want to make this work and become a CIO at this place, I'd suggest that you act like a CIO from day one. You definitely should insist on hiring authority and signing authority (for at least 10s of thousands of dollars per year). Start hiring as quickly as possible, within a few months of your arrival (you'll have to be savvy and ask at the time when everybody feels fat and happy). Insist on regular meetings with the CEO of the company. If your CEO has a weekly C-level meeting, make yourself a part of that. Play golf, hang out the CEO and those guys, be one of the gang.

Essentially, you have to make yourself the "go to" guy for the technical part of the operation. Over time, you'll have to make it clear (in a subtle way) that you will destroy any outsider's chances of managing the department.

Still, all that is a lot of effort and can make you feel pretty bad about yourself. Your alternative is to take the job and just hope for the best; maybe they'll come through.

Daniel Howard
Friday, May 14, 2004