In a similar manner to technology itself, IT leadership trends also go in and out of style over time. This evolution or change isn’t surprising when considering the current impacts of innovative tech on the business world. Continued managerial success requires keeping an open mind about the relevancy of older ideas.
With an eye towards a successful career as a technology manager, here are a few formerly popular leadership trends that are simply outdated. Leverage these ideas to keep your managerial style fresh, current, and effective. Good luck!
Conservative and Risk Adverse IT Leaders Are Not Wanted
It’s an era of great transformation and massive disruption across the technology industry. In this environment, the older, more risk-averse technology leadership style no longer fits. Just like in the traditionally conservative financial sector, where AI is making a massive impact in everything from automated stock trading to chatbots performing a customer service role.
Drew Lydecker, president of Avant Communications commented on this fading trend. “CIOs used to be judged on mitigating risk for an organization and now their biggest risk is that they don’t innovate fast enough,” said Lydecker.
A Turning Away From Results-Focused Tech Leadership
IT leadership used to be judged by the raw numbers produced by their teams. These possibly included lines of code written, the number of defects fixed, or even the percentage of downtime for a server farm. This results-oriented leadership isn’t as important in the modern business environment.
Deloitte managing director Kristi Lamar notes: “being a results-oriented [CIO] is not the most significant focus right now, but really what they need to be mindful of is being conscious of driving transformational change, building and enabling their team to do that on a scalable and sustainable basis.”
IT Leaders Who Only Focus on Basic Management
As noted earlier, this is a transformational era in the technology world. As such, IT leaders who stay in their lane without displaying truly innovative ideas are on their way out. Being able to champion a digital transformation is more relevant compared to basic managerial skills.
Sure keeping the servers running and the applications bug-free remains important, but today’s tech leader also needs to stay at the forefront of a changing IT world.
Looking to Find Top Talent?
If you need advice on building a great tech team at your company, speak with the experts at Synerfac. As one of the top IT staffing agencies in the country, we provide the best candidates able to make a difference for you. Schedule a meeting with us as soon as possible.