The Higher Education Interim CIO

A developing trend in the ever-changing higher education landscape is the increasing demand for interim CIOs. Survey and anecdotal evidence suggests that CIOs are retiring or nearing retirement at unprecedented rates. Permanently filling these critical roles with experienced leaders has become more challenging for myriad reasons including COVID-19, the lack of sound succession planning, and the dearth of the evolving and expanding skill sets needed to perform this complex job. Thus we are seeing the emergence of and demand for the Interim CIO position.

When I was researching and writing my doctoral dissertation, some ten years ago, on the evolving role of the higher education CIO, I never imagined that I would ultimately become an Interim CIO. However, after retiring from my last permanent senior leadership role to focus on teaching and consulting, I found myself desiring to get back in the game, and the interim role began to resonate with me. I'm now on my second year-long interim assignment and have learned some lessons about this iteration of the higher education CIO position. As a result, I offer six suggestions for others who may want to pursue this role.

1. Create and Pursue a Short List of Measurable IT Goals

Typically, college/university leaders will have some very specific goals in mind when contracting with an interim CIO. It's always a good idea to collaborate with the client on these goals. Without specific goals, your engagement will be dominated by operational management such as putting out fires rather than making substantive progress on initiatives that will bring productive change and improvement to IT operations and services. In my current engagement, I wrote my six goals on a whiteboard in my office to remind myself about what I've committed to accomplish. If you're not careful, it's much too easy to get embroiled in, and distracted by, day-to-day operational issues.

You will frequently find yourself getting dragged into numerous long-standing flash points or issues that are peripheral to your goals and that, on closer examination, would be difficult if not impossible to resolve during your engagement. As I encounter these issues, I always ask myself: "Is this something I should be spending my limited time on, or is this something better left to the permanent CIO who will follow me?" Remind yourself that there are a limited set of IT issues that you can reasonably resolve in a year.

Since we know that the evolving role of the higher education CIO has thrust the CIO into almost every aspect of the campus, you will find yourself tempted to try to influence change in a number of leadership and functional areas that, in many cases, are deeply rooted in history and campus culture. Once again, remind yourself that your role is limited in scope and time and that your ability to influence broader change on the campus is also quite limited. Carefully leading disruptive change is certainly a key part of any CIO's role, but in a limited CIO engagement, going down this road is probably not wise.

2. Take Some Time to Understand and Appreciate the Culture

Experienced CIOs will be tempted to hit the ground running at full speed. However, keep in mind that campus cultures vary considerably and that your success or failure as an interim leader is very much married to your ability to understand how to get things done on this particular campus. As you begin your engagement, do a "listening tour" during which you can meet/greet a variety of stakeholders across the institution and, through informal conversation, learn to appreciate what makes this campus unique and what makes it tick. I would underscore "listening," since this is how you will learn best. You will find yourself wanting to instantly offer suggestions and solutions to many of the issues and questions that surface during these conversations. I recommend that you refrain from offering quick solutions; instead, wait until you finish your listening tour.

3. Understand That Your Level of Authority and Decision-Making May Be Different from What You Were Accustomed To

If you have served previously in a role with significant authority and autonomy in decision-making, you may experience some frustration in the interim role, where your status isn't similar. Remember that it likely took years for you to earn a trusted status at your other institution(s). Thus, this status will not automatically be bestowed upon you during your interim assignment. The largest downside to this change in status is a slowing down of actions that you might want to enact without thinking twice. I frequently remind myself that I can use my experience to make optimal recommendations to decision-makers and that decisions will most probably not happen as quickly as I would like. Experience and instinct will tell you, over the course of your engagement, how much authority you can exercise in certain situations. Don't allow impatience to drive you to overstep your bounds.

4. Resist the Tendency to Recommend and Implement the Same Solutions You Were Comfortable with at Other Institutions

You will undoubtedly come into your interim role with some bias toward solutions that you had a hand in deploying and grew to trust at other institutions. And although some of these solutions may very well be advisable at your current institution, remind yourself of the context and duration of your role. For instance, if you believe that Microsoft 365 is the preferred campus office automation solution and your current campus has been using the Google Suite for years, resist the temptation to push for this change. In the same vein, if you believe that Canvas is the optimal LMS solution and your current campus is successfully using Blackboard, remind yourself that effecting this kind of change is not wise at this time. However, you may find yourself entering an institution at a time when a decision about implementing a solution, such as upgrading a wireless infrastructure or moving a campus-hosted ERP to the cloud, is imminent. For instance, if the campus leadership is trying to decide between Cisco and Aruba for a wireless upgrade and you have experience with one or both of these vendor solutions, it is perfectly reasonable for you to influence these decisions by leveraging your experience and insight. Carefully select when to use your experience to influence decision-making, and always check yourself to control any bias.

5. Don't Underestimate the Power of Frequent and Effective Communications

I can't think of a consulting or interim assignment in which a lack of purposeful and effective communications wasn't a problem. Over the years, I have learned that communicating frequently and in various ways can be powerful. Yet this is frequently overlooked, seemingly because of its stark simplicity or monotony. In most IT organizations with silos, misunderstandings, lack of cooperation, distrust, and the like, the underlying problem is usually a lack of communication. It is critical for interim CIOs to regularize communications among IT staff and between the IT organization and the campus community. For the IT organization, this means weekly IT leadership meetings, weekly meetings with the CIO and individual IT leaders, monthly IT all-staff meetings, frequent email communications with and among IT staff, and use of IT messaging systems such as Slack or Microsoft Teams. My mantra is that there is never too much communication. For communication between the IT organization and the campus community, you many want to consider a central point of communication, with a frequency of at least weekly (more often as needed). Make sure the communications are branded in some way to ensure that they are easily recognized for authenticity. This kind of communications strategy takes some time and planning, but it is well worth it.

6. Help Recruit a Permanent CIO Who Will Build on Your Efforts but Not Necessarily Follow Your Roadmap

In many interim engagements, you may be asked to either lead or participate in the search for a permanent successor CIO. In my experience, successful CIOs are cut from many cloths. Some characteristics enhance chances for success: knowledge of the higher education and IT industries, well-honed people skills, a knack for identifying the need for and ultimately leading change, and the list goes on. But approaches and priorities differ. So as you pursue this final major goal, keep in mind that the marriage between a CIO's skills and personal qualities/tendencies and the institutional culture is much more important than a CIO's commitment to following the roadmap that you forged during your interim assignment. Recruiting a permanent CIO is not about finding someone who will agree with you; it is about finding a fit with the institutional needs and culture.

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The role of Interim CIO can be fulfilling, challenging, and exciting—especially for CIOs who are in the twilight of their careers. But keep this in mind: adaptability to your new reality as an interim is crucial for your success.

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Jerry DeSanto is Interim CIO at Illinois Wesleyan University. He is the former CIO at the University of Scranton and the former Interim CIO at EDUCAUSE.