Rather than regarding them as adversaries, Wu Choy Peng, the group Chief Information Officer, of Singapore-based global transportation and logistics group Neptune Orient Lines (NOL), says she has an excellent working relationship with her C-suite team.
“They provide tremendous sponsorship, commitment and support to our major IT initiatives,” says Wu, “from re-structuring the IT organization and business-IT relationship, to replacing our legacy systems.”
The NOL Group’s brands, APL and APL Logistics, are leaders in the global container transportation industry with more than 11,000 employees providing services in some 140 countries.
Wu says the NOL Group Executive Team, or ‘GET’, comprises all the C-suite members and heads of NOL’s three main business units. Group strategy, investment opportunities and other organizational matters are discussed and decisions made at the GET level.
Building rapport and teamwork
“We meet regularly and communicate openly,” she says. “Our Group CEO puts a lot of time and energy into building rapport and teamwork among his direct reports. Good relationships, open communications and trust among members of the C-suite are critical to the smooth running of any organization.ö
This global CIO believes a key to a CIO’s success is “to do a good job in translating the technicalities of many IT initiatives into a language that our stakeholders can understand and appreciate”.
“We must develop a business case for all IT initiatives. In today’s business environment, it is hard to imagine any IT project being approved only on the basis of technology obsolescence.”
Wu maintains that a big part of developing a business case is to make sure that the relevant stakeholders from a broad spectrum of business functions are actively involved in the process.
“A great achievement is when the biggest advocate for an IT project is someone responsible and accountable for a particular business,” she says. “On the other hand, any IT project that is seen as purely IT-driven is doomed to fail at some point of the project life-cycle–if it even gets approved in the first place.”
