Category: Themes

Orginally published on CIO.co.uk, April 2015. People skills in technology leaders are as important as ever. The abiding memory that I’ll have about this year’s CIO100 judging is how solid people skills were a differentiator for so many of the eventual top 10. What is worrying is how this should still be seen as exceptional … Continue reading CIO Archive: It’s a people thing

Orginally published on CIO.co.uk, April 2015. It's hard to believe that live streaming for the masses was still a novelty as recently as 2015. How quickly things change. I'm part of the disenfranchised majority. But hey, that's enough about the UK's political system. I'm also an Android user, so that's two disenfranchised majorities of which … Continue reading CIO Archive: Up Meerkat

Orginally published on CIO.co.uk, June 2015. Thoughts on how Technology teams should be ahead of a commoditization curve in internal business services. In hindsight I was probably a bit optimistic on how far Technology teams had come on that particular journey. Last week I spent some time running workshops with Market Insight professionals from across … Continue reading CIO Archive: Pioneering

Orginally published on CIO.co.uk, June 2015. A longish article to try and explain some of the useful stuff that came out of the Socio-Technical movement of the 1960s and 70s... Matt Ballantine debates the importance of culture change as part of the move to a cloud based operating model for CIOs  We are facing uncertainty … Continue reading CIO Archive: Of Clocks and Clouds

Orginally published on CIO.co.uk, July 2015. During lockdown I've been observing that online meetings strip out much of the value of getting people together. Seems it took a tube strike to observe this first time around... This week we saw transport chaos in London with the walkout of London Underground staff causing the most significant … Continue reading CIO Archive: eMeetings, bloody eMeetings

Orginally published on CIO.co.uk, December 2015. I still wholeheartedly believe that Curiosity, Empathy and Humility are the key to successful technology leadership. This week the panel for the 2016 CIO100 awards met for the first time and we discussed what we thought would be the important facets to look for when judging the awards in … Continue reading CIO Archive: Ideal CIO Personality Traits

First published on CIO.co.uk, March 2016. The early glimmers of what became the Play Matrix. In Project Management 101 there is the concept of the Project Golden Triangle. There are three dimensions: cost, time and specification. The idea is that for any project, some of these dimensions are likely to be constrained. If cost is … Continue reading CIO Archive: Agile methodology best avoided when you have known answers

First published on CIO.co.uk, May 2016. CIOs should still be careful for what they wish for. For some time I've been voicing scepticism of the importance of the CIO having a seat on an organisation's board to be effective. Too often it has sounded to me like a perceived shortcut to the hard work of … Continue reading CIO Archive: Sitting on the board might not make you a more effective CIO

Humanoid intelligence is more than just skin deep First published on CIO.co.uk, July 2016. Sticking a face on technology is still a cheap trick used regularly. There's a friend of mine, a colleague from back in the days when I worked at the BBC, who is a touch obsessed with the psychological concept of pareidolia. Every week … Continue reading CIO Archive: The rise of the anthropomorphs