How to approach this?

crazyITguy

I am looking for advice into my next role at my current organization. We are small(15 people) but growing and I am looking to take a vested interest in moving forward. Currently we have the following.

• 4 Support people including me
• 4 Dev people including dev(mgr)
• 2 trainers
• 1 project manager

Currently my title is Support manager and my day to day duties include

• Managing all support related issues
• Managing tickets in and out of dev
• Managing direction of the support team
• Hiring/Firing
• More, but these are the main

I have been here about 2 years and posed the question to my manager(CEO) about having a conversation as to where are the next steps for me in the business.

I already really manage the entire technical team so I am thinking about asking him to change my title to CIO where I would manage the dev, support, training, and project teams. My questions are below

1. With us being so small would CIO be a too aggressive role
2. What type of % salary increase would you ask for in a move like that? Support mgr to CIO?
3. Has anyone else on this board made a switch similar?

GAngel

The CIO title in a company that small holds no weight if you're trying to leverage it down the road. You wouldn't be managing a budget on a team large enough if I were interviewing you to justify a senior management jobs. As well if you're involved in the day to day that's not what a CIO does. Qualification wise I'd expect my senior execs to have atleast 1 business related masters degree and a bare minimum of 10 years increasing senior management experience. You also don't seem to realize the liability from a legal perspective that comes with a senior management role.

I'm not sure what you mean by vested interest maybe elaborate a bit?

cknapp78

I tend to agree with GAngel here. Since your company is so small, advancement and promotion can be very difficult. The other thing you have to consider is that asking for a CIO position with management over other groups you may not have worked in can cause a serious amount of strife internally. If you have worked with them before, what do you possess that makes you their senior? As GAngel said, a Masters or at least 10 years of experience can usually sway pre-existing teams to accommodate your leadership.

My first management role was to take over a server farm installation as project manager for the Navy on the west coast. I was directly responsible for about 15 employees and another 100 under them. My biggest roadblock was my age. At the time I was only 22 and had employees twice my age reporting to me. Once they found out that 5 large server farm projects of at least 3000+ servers under my belt, any questioning of my ability went away pretty quickly. I myself haven't even finished my college degree and I will be 35 on Wednesday. Experience is the big kicker here. Trust me, when I took my first IT Director role, there was a lot I wasn't ready for. I adapted but it was a tough haul.

If you are really serious about a CIO role, I would suggest looking into either ITIL or PMP or both. Would definitely show the manager that you are grooming yourself for upper management. If you prefer more of a technical role, then i would suggest more of a specialization in a field you are already certified in.

Just my two cents.

Corey

crazyITguy

This is the type of answer I was looking for. I wanted to see what everyone else has seen from a business perspective. I do have more career experience than anyone in the technical team, but I had the same concern. I just am not sure how to show people outside the organization that I really already manage the entire technical team. I enjoy what I do, but at some point may need to move on.

@GAngel
I probably should of elaborated more, but he has mentioned in the past giving me some vested ownership in the company. I am looking long term and so that is why I mentioned this.

@cknapp78
I have started the ITIL study(50%) done and have been accepted to take the PMP so I am moving in that direction.

cknapp78

Glad to help. Let us know how thing work out for you. Always willing to lend a hand.

Corey

GAngel

If you're managing the other managers then Director of (insert whatever suits your overall role) is probably what you're looking at. Owning a piece of the pie would also make that quite legit jsut make sure you know your liabilites I can't stress that enough.

If the company is going to continue growing you will need more than just a few spreadsheets for the budget side so think on some finance courses they will save your butt down the road.