Hiring an Interim Chief Information Officer

Companies often contact us because they want to hire an Interim Chief Information Officer (interim CIO) and they are looking for an interim CIO agency. The term CIO is often used by larger businesses, or by business owners who have a background in larger companies.

We generally use the term IT Director as this is has a broader meaning and covers a wider range of skills and backgrounds.

What is an Interim CIO?

An interim CIO will generally be a Board-level position and will normally have the following objectives:

1. a robust, secure, trouble-free infrastructure (eg example desktops, email, phones, network, file storage)
2. efficient line of business systems including processes, people and technology and everything needed to make this work well (eg training, data standards, documentation)
3. deliver digital initiatives which probably encompass customers, partners and suppliers
4. ensure compliance and risk management (eg GDPR, PCI, ISO27001).

Click here to download our CIO CTO and IT Director Job Description

The breadth of each of these points and the balance between them will depend very much on the nature of your business.

• A larger company on multiple sites with large numbers of people might have complex infrastructure challenges. Poorly designed or poorly managed infrastructure can be expensive, unreliable, difficult to scale and insecure. But these issues are less prevalent than they used to be and infrastructure is often delivered over the cloud.
• Some companies have complicated internal processes so automation, integration and reporting are vital to their success. An effective interim CIO can bring the necessary leadership and clarity to deliver major cost reductions and customer service improvements.
• Digital initiatives can range from simple websites to full digital transformation programmes that fundamentally change how the business is presented to customers, how the business works internally, and how it works with suppliers and partners.
• Compliance and risk challenges vary hugely for companies. For example, do you provide 24/7 critical services; do you manage highly sensitive data; do your clients impose stringent requirements on you; are you in a highly regulated industry? Some businesses have relative simple challenges in this area, others not.

The Right Interim CIO for Your Company’s Strategy

It is critical to establish the balance between the 4 points above and to attract an individual who has a track record in your critical areas.

Your company strategy may be to achieve lower price, better service or both. You may be looking to focus on internal efficiency, or excellent online experience. Or you may just need to overcome specific issues or risks. Before embarking on a search, you should untangle these points so you know the kind of interim CIO you’re looking for.

In addition, there are 2 other fundamental questions:

1. Are you looking for someone to envisage and lead major change, or to manage gradual improvements and fix specific issues?
2. Are you looking for someone to manage internal teams or external suppliers or both?

There are personality and behavioural differences between people who thrive in situations of major change and those who manage steadier improvements. Similarly, there is a great difference between people who build and enthuse internal teams, and those who manage external suppliers through contracts.

How to Hire an Interim CIO

There are a large number of agencies available for interim CIOs that can be found easily on the web. Senior professionals are very credible so we would advise careful preparation for interview and that you diligently take up references before making any offers.

We advise that you consider the following points in relation to interim CIOs:

• they will rarely want to engage with your company’s culture and values, that is why they have chosen the interim lifestyle
• they have little knowledge of, or interest in, the long-term viability or their work
• once your project is complete they will immediately be seeking a full-time role elsewhere, and they will not be available to you at all
• they may have arrangements with suppliers that they recommend.

We spend a huge amount of our time recruiting the very best CIOs in the business to form our elite team of “fractional CIOs”. Our team are committed to working for our clients for the long-term, on a flexible basis, so during intense periods they can spend the bulk of their time with a client, and during quieter periods then can have a lighter touch to keep the client’s IT on track.

When one of our fractional CIOs joins your senior team then they immerse themselves in your business and aim to be with you for the long-term. We’re completely independent and only recommend the best for you.

There is no lock in to our contracts at all and our clients simply work on a “pay as you go” basis, so our people have to make a difference every day.

We use the term IT Director rather than CIO as it is recognised more broadly in the UK. We use the term fractional rather than interim to emphasise between how we work over the disadvantages of an interim.

If you’d like to discuss in more detail how a fractional CIO can benefit your business, please get in touch via our contact us page or call 0203 020 1864.

7 Key Points When Hiring a CIO, CTO or IT Director

The IT leader is a critical role. But what is this role and how do you hire the best at an affordable salary?

There is no generally accepted definition of the differences between the roles of the IT Director, CIO (Chief Information Officer) and CTO (Chief Technology Officer). So for simplicity we use the term IT Director to encompass all 3 roles. In all cases the role covers information systems and the underlying technology. It may encompass strategy, business process and management information, digital and online, and office and facilities management as well.

The term CIO might be more appropriate for a role emphasising business process alignment, management information and business strategy rather than detailed technical leadership. In addition, they are going to be more focused on the operations and delivery of technology including infrastructure and management of third party service providers.

A CTO is generally someone focussed on software development, perhaps for digital projects. Ecommerce and customer interactive systems from social media through to customer portals are going to be where a CTO will be at home. They may be more aligned with marketing and revenue generation, and able to represent the company in relationships with funders and external parties.

An IT Director is perhaps the broadest term. It generally means an individual able to strategically lead all aspects of IT and its usage in business. They should have experience of business systems, software development, projects of all kinds, and IT infrastructure and facilities.

Feel free to use the attached Job Description to give you a template for defining this role.

7 Key questions to consider when defining the role for your organisation:

1. Who will the individual report to? To work across the whole company, to change processes and how people work, the person needs to be part of the senior team and may need to report to the CEO.

2. Will the individual be responsible for your company’s Digital Vision? If you have plans for ecommerce or social media marketing then will the person be responsible for this?

3. Do you need a supplier manager or team builder? If your IT is largely or wholly outsourced then this requires a leader with strong contract management skills who is very used to commercial negotiation and procurement. If your IT is largely insourced then your IT leader needs the personal style and leadership qualities to inspire and build a team.

4. Is the plan for major projects? The mindset and attitude of a leader who drives change is typically quite different to the person who oversees a steady-state.

5. Is there is already strong technical management in place, or IT infrastructure provision is outsourced to suppliers who have proven themselves technically capable. Or do you need a technical leader to provide technical vision and oversight.

6. Does your business include complicated processes and no existing senior leaders with time to address issues?

7. Is there a clear need for good data management or good management information, or are these issues already covered off by existing roles?

We only hire the best in the business – fewer than 1% of the people who apply to join us are able to successfully complete every stage of our recruitment process. We are completely independent and able to provide IT Directors, CTOs and CIOs on a part-time and flexible basis (we call it “fractional”). If you want to talk to us about what one of our team could do for your business then you can get in touch my emailing contact@freemanclarke.com