AVO Chief

Let’s face it, for some companies the role of the CIO driving business really doesn’t make sense.  Don’t get me wrong I am not saying that the CIO role is going away.  But according to CIO magazine the role of the CIO seems to be changing. It was like riding a business wave that may have peaked.  What many companies seem to need now is not just an IT manager that can speak business but a business manager that can speak product and technology. Remember that for the most part many company org charts have not changed over the years.  Because of a need for quicker solution and agility it was thought that IT may be the solution.  The only problem is that in order to grow business much more than technical knowledge is needed. A balanced skill set is needed to provide the vital business agility that product companies need.

You see business agility comes from several areas. Here are the key areas:

• Market Research/Marketing
• Analysis
• Development
• Business Strategy

So you see although technical knowledge is important in order to drive business agility, this era’s C-level executive will need to have a good understanding of core product functions like market research, analysis and business strategy.  This is not to say it is not possible for a CIO to accomplish but rather that for many an IT background by itself may not be enough to bridge the business/IT divide.  In other words a new position may be needed that works tightly in conjunction with the CTO, VP Finance and VP-Sales & Services.  In fact, some schools of thought are suggesting that for larger companies the CIO really requires a handshake from a C-level business partner for maximum benefit (much like paired programming in the Extreme Programming Model).  I will expound on these reasons in a later article.  So what most companies really need now is a new central position for a Chief Business Agility Officer (Product and/or Services) or CBO for short in order to survive the challenges to come.

Why do I say this?

Well you see many companies become dysfunctional when it comes to defining, building and delivering products? Many organizations have marketing and R&D as separate entities and they sometimes just do not play nicely together. And in hard times rather than work together these departments may go into turf protection mode. And since product managers have to work with both they often bear the brunt of all this as they try to get products and releases out the door.  But it doesn’t have to be this hard.

If you are in a product-driven company where the business model for generating revenue is driven by defining, building and selling products or if your company is transitioning into a product-driven company, then your company can definitely benefit from a dedicated Chief Business Agility Officer.  Why don’t I call this a Chief Product Officer?  One reason is that while it would primarily aid product companies this re-organization can apply to certain services companies as well.  Secondly, “product” never really conveys the importance of this position.  What the desired result of this position is business agility and therefore continued business survival and growth.  The Chief Business Agility Officer will need to align both business and IT goals and resources.  This can be done by training key staff on business agility known as the AVO Method. Although future CBOs may come from the ranks of product managers they need to be able to deal with issues at the C-level in order to do major cost and resource re-alignment effectively and in order to be competitive.

To be more specific I will expound the 3 major key areas for a product-driven company.

• Finance and Corporate Services – makes sure that everything is in place and operating properly.
• Next is Sales and Services (if Services apply) who are responsible increasing revenues from new and existing customers; whether it is direct, indirect, online, telesales, etc.
• And last (but not least) are the activities around finding markets, defining and building solutions to address market needs and supporting customers. This needs to be clearly focused on Product Management.  But for many companies these critical activities are split between Marketing and R&D.  Why? Shouldn’t the managing of the product portfolio be one of the most important activities in a product-driven company?

So we need to view the org chart from this perspective. I suggest that standard org charts for companies that view the activities of defining, building and delivering products as paramount be redrawn to include a new role – the role of  CBO  - Chief Business Officer.

Written by AVO Chief

Efren Duarte is Director of Products & Services and AVO Chief (Strategist/Evangelist) at Avocera Products & Services Consulting and principal of the AVMI Group, a market research based venture management firm. The AVO Chief provides 2-Week Money Back Guarantee Product Marketing/Management Services Trial for qualified Startups and SMBs with growth potential. Inquire at avochief@ymail.com for more details.

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