Your career isn’t about making it to the top. You want fullness of expression and fulfillment of personal vision. The painter whose art has touched hearts is as successful as the highly touted executive or politician. 

And there is nothing wrong with being at the top. The views can be incredible.

You face no greater disillusionment than being told you have reached as far as you can reach.

For many CIOs, that has been the message. That they are unqualified for CEO consideration, that it would take too much to be qualified as the leader of business. “Stay in your lane” can be really out-of-bounds advice. 

I’ve written before why CEOs need to consider CIOs as their successor. The word is getting out. More CIOs are being appointed as CEOs. But it’s a beginning, nowhere near a tipping point, and the changing tide merits a tidal wave. 

More voices are needed. I’m adding mine. Quite loudly.

But even as we work to change the environment and create greater openness to CIOs as CEOs, CIOs need clarity on the path and preparation that best serves their aspiration.

So how do CIOs best prepare themselves for CEO consideration even if they don’t have the educational background current CEOs do? 

The CIO Edge

Boards who are looking for the best qualified person to serve as CEO understand one quality that sets a candidate apart more than any other.

You have that quality, inherent in your current work as a CIO, and build on that quality every time you are working with other business leaders.

You lead forward.

As opposed to “manage-back” as many of your peers are prone to do in their respective business responsibilities. 

But let’s not get sidetracked in comparisons and exceptions. The point is that CEOs must be leaders who know how to lead forward.

And leading forward is what CIOs have been doing for awhile now, especially coming out of accelerated digital transformation and pandemic adjustments. 

Lead forward. Plenty of people can manage-back; fewer are able to keep their eye on the destination, read the current environment, make the essential adjustments, secure the resources, gather the talent and invest in the best strategies.

But you do, each time you plow into a deeper understanding of the company, embrace the customer experience, consider revenue opportunities, assess costs, lead to KPIs, exercise controls that govern well and restrict minimally. 

In other words, standard fare for the effective CIO today.

How To Lead Forward

CIOs who desire to become CEOs lead forward in four primary areas.

Lead Change - Shape Environment

These two qualities go hand-in-hand but are often not linked together.

You understand change: you have been mastering it for years. Technology doesn’t stand still. But CIOs who became CEOs led their companies into becoming mature IT users. They truly created an environment in which their company was able to honestly say that they are a technology company that serves their given industry.

Obviously, when a company recognizes itself as a technology company, the priority quality of the next CEO is one who has technology in their mindset and blood. 

For you, that may be true today; or you may be in a place where you are still changing the environment. If so, you are not only serving your company well, you are paving the way for your own advancement. 

Business Innovation

It’s like an overplayed song on the radio: CIOs need to think like the business and from their perspective.

Let me put a different spin on it: It is not enough for CIOs to be involved in the business, you must influence the business. There is no other way of doing so than coming alongside business leaders and deeply working with them as they make business decisions of what applied technologies make sense for them.

CIOs, really more than any other C-Suite officer, are involved in every business’s aspect of promoting competitive advantage, market value, customer retention, sales productivity and profitability. 

By helping businesses mitigate risk, choose the right technology, and maximize investment, you are getting a better business education and understanding than any degree will provide you, and your fellow leaders are getting trusted insight that establishes your leadership credibility.

Decision Making

CEOs make decisions. Decisions make the CEO.

You lead forward when you demonstrate the ability to make right decisions with less than full information, and when you make right decisions because you had all the information that you needed. You demonstrate the value of data; you lead despite the limitations of data. 

In recent years, you, my dear CIO, have made decision after decision, oftentimes on the spot and certainly under deadline. 

Be encouraged; whereas you were “just doing your job” your job was preparing you for one of the most critical characteristics boards look to in their next CEO. 

Critical Adjustments

Not all decisions are made equal (or equally). Successful CEOs have learned the art of the pivot, the necessity of resilience, and the strategic switch. 

Who more than you has done the same? 

Those who manage-back are foreigners to critical adjustments, strategic decisions, business innovation and change. 

But you who lead forward, they aren’t just the daily reality that you face, they become the essence of how you lead.

And that is what boards are looking for in their next CEO.

And Don’t Forget About Leading Yourself

Perhaps you have heard my mantra of becoming a better professional, better leader, better executive and better expert. Those are the avenues I drive on as I seek to advocate for and develop CIOs.

I wasn’t surprised to find those four themes emerge from interviews of CIOs who have become CEOs. Specifically, they worked on:

• Improving personal and public communication skills (better professional).
• Developing and motivating employees and teams (better leader).
• Building relationship with peers and translating technology into business terms and needs (better executive)
• Engaging a coach and mentor (better expert).

If becoming a CEO is in your growth path, you are uniquely positioned to do so. Your work as a CIO has prepared you for the critical skills necessary to lead the company.

Keep pressing into leading forward, and do not minimize the importance of continuing to develop and lead yourself. You are not alone. We can help you with each of the four priorities I just mentioned. 

I would never force you into becoming a CEO, but more importantly, there is no force that can keep you from it. The tide has shifted in your favor. I am one of many on your side. I happen to be very strongly on your side.

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