During the month of December 2004, we interviewed the senior IT professionals in each company either in person or by telephone (Chambers and Griffin, 2004). We asked them to identify at least five goals or expectations placed on them by corporate executives for the coming year. We also discussed with them whether or not they felt these expectations were reasonable given their current budgets and human resources, and if they were confident in their own leadership to get the job done.
Once the interviews were completed, the data were analyzed by our consultants and a list of ten expectations common to all the participants emerged. The list of expectations was then reviewed with each individual to ensure that we clearly understood what was expected of them and they affirmed our findings were an accurate reflection of what took place.
The top ten expectations common to all the IT leaders and managers were presented to corporate executives and Chief Information Officers in a web-based seminar sponsored by eBizQ.com, Magic Software, and BMP2. The expectations were as follows:
- Increase corporate agility in order to respond quicker and more accurately to changing customer needs
- Do more with less while maintaining a sound competitive advantage
- Help drive business growth while operating with limited financial and human resources
- Find ways to integrate legacy systems in order to reduce costs, improve efficiency, and leverage existing investments
- Continually improve the quality and nature of customer interactions and value-added services
- Maintain compliance in the face of increasing governmental standards and regulations
- Provide a high level of security while operating within an increasingly high risk environment
- Keep pace with marketing and sales efforts in supply chain management and B2B transactions
- Provide positive and visionary leadership during mergers and acquisitions.
- Demonstrate and model leadership behaviors necessary to create a positive work culture where innovation, creativity, and problem solving are normative. (Chambers and Griffin, 2004, January, pp. 4-5)
In addition to the expectations identified by the IT professionals who were interviewed, each individual expressed serious concerns about their ability to achieve the desired results, and two were even considering resignation as a result to achieve each one. When asked for the root cause of these concerns, each of the participants identified two things; the increasing demands placed on them by corporate executives who they felt did not understand the time and resources necessary to fulfill IT initiatives, and the inability to learn and adapt new leadership knowledge and capabilities necessary to meet the expectations (Chambers and Griffin, 2004).
The Need for Faster Learning Cycles
According to Guns (1995), one of the most important factors in maintaining competitive advantage in a knowledge-based environment is to learn how to learn faster. He argues, “The ability to learn faster becomes more significant as our corporations become more knowledge-based. If two ‘knowledge’ corporations have the same intellectual potential, the primary differentiating feature then becomes which corporation can learn faster” (Guns, p. 337). Guns (1995) goes on to identify nine different kinds of leaning that he feels is essential to this process, and makes a strong case for adopting a transformational strategy as a way to bring about “significant and needed change in individuals, teams, and the organization as a whole.” (p. 340).
Transformational Strategy to Learning
When adopting a transformational strategy to learning, a faster learning continuum is achieved by stimulating the internal environment or climate that enables learners to assimilate new information and new responsibilities more quickly and effectively (Guns, 1995). Here is an example of how the ten accelerated learning methods of transformational learning proposed by Guns (1995) might be applied to our five client companies:
- Stimulating Leadership. Using this method, corporate leaders would need to actively and continually challenge their IT leaders to focus on corporate visions and goals throughout the year.
- The Entrepreneurial Team. The IT departments would need to function as small entrepreneurial businesses accountable for their own “bottom line.”
- Learning Levels. To achieve transformational learning, the leaders and managers would need to participate in prolonged reflective learning activities.
- Learning Stages. Learning objectives and activities would need to be organized into distinct learning stages.
- Accelerator Effect. Opposing groups or individuals would meet together during the year to confront and learn from their differences.
- Collapsing the “Learning Float.” A team would plan out the learning activities and calendar of events in advance to reduce gaps or redundancies in the learning initiatives.
- Transfer of Learning. Benchmarking, assessment teams, and technology would be leveraged whenever possible to increase the speed and transfer of learning.
- Work-Outs. The IT leaders and managers would have an opportunity to confront their executives on a regular basis regarding important issues and expect immediate response to at least 80% of their requests.
- Counterpoint Learning. The IT leaders would meet together regularly with their team members to share and test ideas for implementation.
- The Faster Learning Continuum. The IT leaders and corporate executives would meet once each month to challenge existing paradigms and discuss new information related to the fulfillment of the expectations. (pp. 341-348)
Summary
There are few objections to the idea that business are changing and that expectations placed on IT leaders and managers by corporate executives is being driven by both internal and external environmental factors (Chambers and Griffin, 2004, Rolls, 1995). As this trend continues, we believe that knowledge-based organizations must formulate plans to increase the learning cycles of their IT leaders and managers and adopt transformational strategies for learning if they are to remain competitive. It is not enough to have strong technical skills; IT professionals must adapt to a new environment of rising expectations by learning how to lead buy learning faster than ever before. At the Institute for Organizational Leadership, we are constantly asked to find new and better ways to raise the level of leadership of new or existing employees. We have found that the application of transformational strategies like those proposed by Guns (1995) can play a significant role in increasing both personal and corporate performance.
References
Chambers, J., & Griffin, F. (2004). [Personal interviews with information technology leaders and managers at five growing US companies]. Unpublished raw data gathered by the Institute for Organizational Leadership, Atlanta, GA.
Chambers, J., & Griffin, F. (2004, January). Innovation and the CIO: Transformation and change in business processes. Web-based business seminar presented on www.eBizQ, New Rochelle, NY.
Guns, B. (1995). The faster learning organization (FLO). In S. Chawla & J. Rensch (Eds.), Learning organizations: Developing cultures for tomorrow’s workplace (pp. 337-349). Portland OR: Productivity Press.
Rolls, J. (1995). The transformational leader: The wellspring of the learning organization. In S. Chawla & J. Rensch (Eds.), Learning organizations: Developing cultures for tomorrow’s workplace (pp. 101-108). Portland OR: Productivity Press.