Who are the CTOs of the Future? – Their Roles and Responsibilities!

Business
September 14, 2019

We are living where everything around us is changing rapidly and an invention is just an imagination away! Technology is evolving as fast as the time. Some technology that was booming on top of the market is rendered obsolete in six months. The extreme speed of technological change makes it critical for companies and their CTO’s to stay ahead of technology trends and be able to anticipate disruptions. The CTO is the Chief Technology Officer of the company. They are the people in charge of their company's technology strategy. A CTO must have numerous qualities to enable an organization to threats into opportunities and sustain success in the marketplace. They must have a deep understanding of customers, networks in the customer space, the ability to comprehend the company’s current technology and the acuity to see the implications and possible uses of such technologies. They must also have the curiosity to learn about potentially relevant new technologies coming online or in development, willingness to challenge the status quo, a mastery of systems engineering and fluency in design thinking. In this world of uncertainty and rapid growth, nothing is more valuable than balanced left-right brain thinkers and doers backed by a management team that knows how to nurture both, the minds and hearts of its team. The CTO’s can be divided into four types:

The Big Thinker

The big thinker usually expands the boundaries of the use of technology within an organization. They play the leading role in setting the corporate strategy and driving overall technological infrastructure. These CTO’s have a close relationship with the CEO and senior management team within the organization and they create business models, contribute to new technology and analyses target markets.

Infrastructure Commander

The CTO’s that take over the role of the Infrastructure Commander oversees the data, security, maintenance, and network for a company. They are likely to be recruited into an established company, rather than part of a start-up and they charge to manages the overall technology roadmap of the business.

Technology Visionary

The technology visionaries conceptualize how technology is to be used in the company and sets the technical strategy for the company to enable it to achieve its goals. They seek out the current and future technology that should drive the company’s success and are possibly have been with the company since its inception.

Customer Champion

They are responsible for customer relations, understanding the target market and influencing the delivery of IT projects accordingly. They operate as the conduit between customers and the business itself. They are common within tech companies with a software focus. Over the past several years, the rate at which ideas are being converted into reality has been profound. At the end of the day, it does not matter which of the above four styles of CTO’s make sense for a particular organization, the basic requirement of the CTO remains the same – The CTO must own the responsibility to keep the company ahead of the technology curve not only merely to adapt to difficulties but also to anticipate them beforehand and turn them to the company’s strategic and operational advantage. Today the technological change is inevitable and so having a CTO is imperative. The CTO of the future must be willing to embrace several new roles except being in charge of a company's technology strategy. They will have to evolve into the person who leads an organization's business strategy along with playing the role of a CTO. Certain mistakes are made surrounding the CTO’s that should surely avoid and some of them are as follows:

Bad assumptions

Assumptions often lead to a lost cause. The first assumption that people usually make about a CTO is that they bring knowledge. The second assumption implied by the first one, is that the CTO would educate all the other engineers in the company with his or her current knowledge. The third implied assumption is that the company will always remain focused on the same technology. These assumptions can be harmful to the CTO as we as the company.

Resistance to Change

A CTO knowledgeable about current technology but not curious about the upcoming technology may be resistant to the idea of moving the company into a different technological area. As a result, to make progress and move from one technology area to another, the company might need a new CTO.

The Wisdom CTO

Having the most knowledgeable person in the company as the CTO means that the most difficult decisions are made by him or her. This may lead to all technical people looking up to the CTO and are less likely to try new things or fail. They don't try to make those technical decisions themselves. So, a good CTO should first and foremost be the leader of technical people. The CTO's must be not only well versed in singular technical discipline but also have a breadth of technical knowledge. A great CTO knows to lead the team and push them to explore, be creative and experiment. They challenge their R&D team to find new technologies and identify new areas of growth for the company.