Taking Care of Business
As befits someone who's absorbed a great deal of management know-how while ascending the IT ranks, ING's Heege can rattle off a list of competencies necessary for leadership. "It's about being able to create a vision, build a high-performing team, make sure the right talent is in the right position, execute, challenge the status quo to ensure we're creating fresh thinking and relationship management skills - building relationships with our business partners," she says.
Business relationship management, as Heege calls it, is a critical component of the well-rounded IT leader. "The way to build strong relationships is to really know the business, talk the business language, and, as the technology needs are expressed [by the business], you come back and deliver solutions," she says. But to deliver solutions, she emphasises that potential IT leaders had better know technology well enough to be able to show the business how it can meet its needs in different ways, thereby increasing business value.
Heege has built an affinity for the business side through several affiliations: project management training at Boston University, a women's leadership council at a previous job and an internal leadership council at ING US (headed by CEO Tom McInerney). Her role on ING's Defined Contributions Market team, which was formed in November 2002, is both her reward for business knowledge and a high-level training ground. "To have respect on the team, you need to know the business, have passion for the business and have the desire for the business to succeed," she says.
Harrah's Entertainment builds business expertise among IT staffers through its Executive Associate program, which pairs potential leaders with senior executives in the company for about 18 months. Executive Associates are given special projects to help them grow as leaders. Sometimes they even vault the IT wall: Tim Stanley, CIO of Harrah's Entertainment, notes that one IT staffer worked for the COO, then was promoted to vice president of strategic sourcing.
For hospitality companies like Royal Caribbean, it all comes down to taking care of people. So CIO Tom Murphy has come up with an innovative way of targeting future IT leaders - he sees which folks shine brightest in the company's community service initiatives. The company's annual Give Day event requires some people to coordinate projects with a number of non-profit organisations. "It's the single largest one-company community service event in Florida," Murphy proudly notes. "We observe who shows an aptitude for leadership on those projects. Those people tend to get a little bit more opportunities. They're actively engaged in the culture of the organisation, taking on additional responsibilities. Passion is an important part of effective leadership," he adds.
Are you passionate about developing leaders? If not, now's a good time to get on board. Maintaining the status quo will guarantee you and your crew sure passage to mediocrity.
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