#Trending Traits of the Modern Tech Leader
Modern tech leaders exhibit specific behaviours and attitudes, which have changed over time. It’s to be expected as the evolution of the role demands more insight, practicality, and vision.
Here are some of the key characteristics we’ve seen emerge prominently over the last year or so.
The astute CIO
One thing is for sure, without generalising too much, a fair percentage of CIOs are outspoken and analytical. As technology grows in importance for the performance of businesses, so CIOs need to engage the board and the wider business in what the future looks like. In doing so, CIOs have to develop the skills to explain sometimes complex matters in business and layman’s terms.
People and culture is a topic that has come into focus like never before. The expectations of a modern workforce, namely millennials and Gen Z, seem to be driving the need for a more intelligent approach. This includes but is not limited to creative development, flexible, remote working and a generally more humane approach to work-life balance. CIOs have become champions for the importance of culture, putting it above all else in the recipe for success.
Without a doubt, the ambition of tech has been to enable businesses. That has most certainly not always been the outcome. It’s fairly recent that organisations are with certainty and conviction talking about cost-savings and revenue increases due to tech, for example, hybrid data analytics. The tech function is now so aligned with the business, that it’s proactively seeking opportunities and delivering tangible outcomes.
Not only is ‘new tech’ not so new anymore, but there are also real-life examples of how organisations are testing, developing and leveraging AI, Data, AR/VR, IoT. 5G and Blockchain hold tremendous potential, in terms of the former’s ability to power the current opportunities and decentralised platforms enabling democratisation across society.
These are just a few of the areas and issues you can look forward to learning more about with CIO WaterCooler. We believe being knowledgeable about these and other topics are important for the success of any modern tech leader. We’ll continue to bring you analysis and initiatives to help you keep abreast of issues affecting your professional environment.
