How to Write Good. (Updated)

Image: MS Office Imagebank

I've recently blogged about communication skills as a critical resource for today's leader. (That post is here.)

Along with all the other facets of communication (verbal, non-verbal, visual, etc.) effective writing is a foundational element.  Nothing loses a reader faster than bad writing.

Years ago, before Al Gore invented the Internet, a list of rules made the rounds through fax, photocopy, and word of mouth.

 I was able to find a complete list of them here.

Consider this a guest post for your edification. Here they are for your reading (and learning) pleasure.

#5/10 Crucial Survival Skills for the 21st Century CIO - Conceptualization

This is the fifth article in the series of 10 Crucial Survival Skills for the 21st Century CIO. If you haven't read the earlier postings, start your journey here.

Image: MS Office Imagebank

“John Chambers says to me:
‘Your job is to think of what I think
before I think of it,
and have it ready to go
when I think of it.’”

—Rebecca Jacoby - CIO, Cisco Systems

If you are a Chief Information Officer and are only dealing with operational issues and next year's IT plan, then you have the wrong title.  Director of IT would be more appropriate.

If you like the title, then you need to add some new skills to your portfolio.

There are a lot of CIOs who have the title but are never called on to envision the future, to gather together the trends and cut through the chaff to define a vision of how technology can be leveraged to gain strategic advantage for their organizations.  And they have to do this while running a highly effective IT operation.

The competency of today's post is... Conceptualization.

#4/10 Crucial Survival Skills for the 21st Century CIO - Corporate Contributor

This is the fourth article in the series of 10 Crucial Survival Skills for the 21st Century CIO. If you haven't read the earlier postings, start your journey here.

Choices.

Image: Still shot from the Alfred Hitchcock movie: Lifeboat

We've all face them.   Choosing the type of car you can afford vs. the type of car you want. Choosing a life partner. Choosing a thick juicy steak over tofu (Wait! there's no choice there!)

As leaders, we sometimes find ourselves making difficult choices that have profound impact on other people.

We can't be in charge only when times are good.

Which projects are delayed? Or cut?

If things get tough enough, the choices may get harder.

You have to reduce your team size.  Who do you pick?

Side note: If the thought of doing this makes you incredibly uncomfortable, that means you are human.  If you could never, ever let someone go, then you should not aspire to be a senior leader.  There are times you will need to do this.  It comes with the territory. On the flip side... If you can let people go and it doesn't bother you, then I would suggest you are missing a key element of leadership - empathy.

Philosophy classes over the years have loved to present these ethical dilemmas - the most famous of which is the "Lifeboat Dilemma". Who stays? Who goes?

Here's a wrinkle in this scenario.

Sometimes the person with the dilemma is not you.  It's the person you report to.  If they were faced with operational cuts, would you or your department survive?  Especially with all the Cloud vendors hawking the increased performance and reduced costs that the cloud will bring? (Disclaimer - this is marketing rhetoric, not my opinion).

I would suggest that your personal and organizational survival are based on one key metric - value.  And by value I mean the contribution you and your team make to the overall corporate goals and objectives.

So the competency of today's post is... Corporate Contributor.

#3/10 Crucial Survival Skills for the 21st Century CIO - Collaboration

This is the third article in the series of 10 Crucial Survival Skills for the 21st Century CIO. If you haven't read the earlier postings, start your journey here.

"No man is an island unto himself, every man is a part of the whole." 
- John Donne





When I started my new role as CIO at a large college, I spent time meeting with other executives in order to introduce myself and find out from their perspective how the IT department had provided services.

I was somewhat shocked when the theme of many of the answers came back something like this - "IT folks are nice people, but I'm not really sure what they do".

Many saw us as a large budget, and a huge team (over 100), and while they liked us as people, they weren't sure we needed the large budget, or the large team. (This is not comforting coming from the CFO)

A secondary theme of the answers was "IT couldn't help us do what we need, so we are doing it ourselves."  Two of the departments in the school had formed their own shadow IT departments.

This was a marked contrast to the excellent innovation, creativity and world class implementation of hardware, software and systems I saw when I interviewed my new team.

Where was the disconnect?

I thought long and hard about it...The answer?... "IT does not play well with others".

Today's post is about - collaboration.

#2/10 Crucial Survival Skills for the 21st Century CIO - Communication

Image: MS Office Imagebank

Based on the scars and callouses I`ve earned in my career, and combined with the experiences of colleagues who have been highly effective in leading IT teams, I've distilled a list of the 10 competencies which are critical for IT leaders (CIOs, Directors) as well as anyone else in leadership in today's globally focussed, results driven environment. 

Note: These postings are intentionally short. They are designed to stimulate additional thinking and conversation. I'll unpack these ideas further in subsequent postings, as well as incorporate any comments you may add to the mix.

Without these competencies in action, IT leaders risk being relegated to the unrewarding mission of controlling costs, or watching IT services being outsourced (yes, that is still happening) to an IT provisioning company, or having your end users continually bypass your department and contracting for software, services and infrastructure in the cloud.

This is the second in the series on 10 Crucial Survival Skills for the 21st Century CIO. Today`s topic is communication.