How to Manage IT Teams?

In recent years, successive studies – verified by practical experience – have shown a trend towards employee infidelity in the IT sector. The right profiles are harder to find, recruit and retain. Turnover rates are on the rise, which means a significant hidden labor cost for companies and a real risk of disorganization for a team.

Given all this data, the Chief Information Officer (CIO) holds a strategic position within his or her department as a manager, coordinating teams and technology to meet the organization’s needs. This role goes beyond simply managing IT tasks and infrastructure; it involves effectively delegating responsibilities and ensuring compliance with technology standards throughout the company.

What are the characteristics of effective IT management?

• The importance of softskills

There’s no question here of drawing up a robot portrait of a good manager. Each person is different, and adapts intelligently to the team and organization they supervise.

Nevertheless, with the advent of digital technology and its central role within companies, a transition has taken place, and the role of the IT Department has grown significantly in importance in recent years. Now more strategic than ever, the CIO is an integral part of the company’s structural and business decisions—and, by extension, so is the CIO’s team. Beyond simply managing the IT infrastructure, the CIO has become a key player in defining IT strategy, in alignment with the company’s overall direction. Thus, demonstrating diplomacy and a degree of empathy—or even political acumen—has become essential to align with this new role within the organization and the significant authority entrusted to the CIO, who serves as the interface between numerous departments.

• Change management

An organization is constantly evolving. The CIO must provide the company with valuable insights into technological innovation and the major challenges it faces. The CIO must engage in continuous monitoring to anticipate technological disruptions and new trends, as well as innovative management methods for the organization and the work of its Teams. The CIO’s ideas can bring real economic, technical, and organizational benefits to the company.

At the same time, he must position himself as an agent of change. Brakes and blockages are human and normal within any entity. It’s up to them to use their communication and teaching skills to explain, raise awareness and integrate this ongoing transition and movement into their management.

Finally, it is also essential for a CIO to be able to identify new roles and emerging technologies so that the company and its Teams can adapt quickly. We’ve seen this, for example, with the search for professionals skilled in data management or Cybersecurity: there’s a rapid shortage of these new roles and the technologies that go with them. Hiring becomes complex and costly. The more the CIO anticipates trends, the better the executive team—and, alongside it, the Human Resources department—can adapt and recruit the best talent. With this in mind, the Chief Information Officer is the ideal expert to identify potential future hires and, when necessary, steer internal training programs to bring employees up to speed.

In what ways does the CIO act as a conductor within his or her organization?

• The challenge of controlled delegation

When it comes to steering and overseeing the Information System (IS) itself, the CIO retains “sovereign authority.” In terms of management, the CIO’s main challenge is to free up as much energy as possible to delegate and shift accountability down to the teams, particularly to team managers. The CIO must therefore position themselves as a true conductor of their department to involve stakeholders in co-management. This is a matter ofcollective intelligence: the CIO is no longer the supreme leader, acting as a bottleneck for information, ideas, and decisions. Delegation must be carefully managed to empower everyone and energize the organization. Their mission? To give meaning to the strategy, foster dialogue, facilitate the exchange of ideas, and encourage open discussion… without losing the ability to access the necessary information in a timely manner.

• Cross-functional management to ensure technology governance

While responsibility for the “core” information system naturally remains with the CIO, the CIO is also faced with the decentralization of technology across all of the company’s departments, requiring a shift in approach.

In fact, the IT department does not have a monopoly on digital transformation, and technology is now present throughout the company, managed by numerous departments. This includes, for example, data experts, AI specialists, and others. However, the CIO naturally remains in the best position to understand the ins and outs of a technology (such as the risks associated with shadow IT or low-code platforms, security concerns, budgetary impacts, and so on). The CIO therefore plays a genuine governance role, and the “orchestrator” aspect of the position comes into play here to coordinate internally, build networks across different departments , and drive a cross-functional initiative through a non-hierarchical management style that combines strategy, “safeguards,” and advocacy.

Furthermore, many IT departments have PMO (Project Management Office) units, for example, which often involve managing two lines of reporting. These are often sensitive issues to address because they require sophisticated communication and coordination among units, departments, and divisions. At the heart of this organizational structure lies the success of a project and the people who depend on it. The CIO must therefore ensure that cross-functional management runs smoothly and facilitate internal communication.

What are the current trends in IT management?

To counter turnover, companies sometimes have to take radical action, even at the cost of reinvention. Beyond purely financial considerations, which are no longer sufficient to retain employees, other levers can be activated.

Like Budgets, Teams can be steered, optimized and controlled. But not in the same way.

• Define clear objectives

Effective delegation requires clear, structured objectives. Even an enthusiastic and talented team cannot maintain its motivation, and therefore its performance, indefinitely without knowing exactly what its mission is. It’s therefore essential to give meaning and carefully define the right objectives to stimulate motivation, empower and proactively delegate as much as possible. According to the SMART method, a good objective is ambitious, realistic, precise, measurable and limited in time.

To enable employees to assess their progress in relation to objectives, it is also crucial to play the transparency card by providing them with access to the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) that concern them.

• Adopt fluid communication

Smooth , transparent communication processes are the key to a successful team. In this respect, there are a number of things that can easily be put in place to ensure that information is passed on and understood, both top-down and bottom-up. One example is the various rituals that often punctuate Projects. Freeing up the floor to allow frustrations to be expressed and questions to be asked, can help to change a deadlocked situation.

To this end, it is beneficial to rely on tools that help establish a framework, standardize practices, and, above all, facilitate information sharing and collaboration. Many CIOs report that they successfully use the Abraxio platform to structure and facilitate team meetings, such as project or project portfolio reporting sessions.

I’ve noticed that project reviews are much simpler, more relevant and more constructive than they used to be: we quickly move on to Projects where the weather’s fine; this allows us to dwell on those that require more discussion or questioning, because they’re behind schedule for example.

Cyrille Vincent
Chief Information Officer at ERILIA

The CIO’s availability is also essential. Gone are the days of the manager who hides away in an office far removed from their teams. A CIO must be present, visible, and available to their teams to address questions and suggestions. In fact, another important point is how to communicate with teams. Long-winded speeches risk losing the audience’s attention. Opt for simple, clear sentences that get straight to the point. When you don’t know something, say so. There’s nothing worse than a manager who gets lost in empty rhetoric just to save face.

• Managing skills and career paths

An employee who is bored at work and sees no prospects for advancement can quickly lose motivation, leading to a drop in productivity. It is therefore crucial to encourage internal evolution by offering training opportunities to develop the skills and responsibilities of those who wish to do so, all the more so in an Information Systems Department where skills and technologies evolve very rapidly. Talk to them regularly, spot trends and signs that are emerging, and hold regular reviews with the team managers of your departments if you have a multi-level organization.

In addition, working closely with the Human Resources department can enable you to adapt or implement a maximum number of tools to help your team evolve. These include annual appraisals and training plans , which are essential for providing visibility and maintaining the Skills capital of your IT team.

• Embodying values

Teams’ perception of their working environment has a considerable impact on their level of motivation. Trust also plays an important role. It is therefore essential to implement actions designed to promote their well-being and professional fulfillment. Depending on the organization’s culture and rules, this may include flexible working hours, encouraging creativity and so on. If you’re worried about abuse, you should know that, although present, it remains marginal in a healthy team. In fact, the trust placed in an employee tends to reinforce his or her commitment rather than provoke defection.

At the same time, many companies pride themselves on their noble values. The words “benevolence” and “respect” have thus become completely overused, as few of them actually take the trouble to embody them. Some people, seduced by the promises made at their job interview, may be disappointed to discover a very different reality. So there’s a real card to play in adapting your discourse to the reality of your management and thus creating a real relationship of trust.

All of this ties into the concept of employer branding, in which you play an active role as a manager and CIO.

What practical tips can you follow to effectively manage an IT department?

The makeup of an IT department can be full of surprises, and we don’t always have complete control over it. Sometimes we “inherit” the structure when taking on the role, or changes in the company’s structure may directly impact the team. We must therefore adapt to these changes and manage a gradual transition.

• Managing remote management

Since the COVID-19 pandemic, remote work has become a reality, and IT teams are particularly affected. Younger generations are seeking a better work-life balance, which translates into more flexible hours and less commuting time. Remote work is therefore a real asset for a CIO to attract and retain top talent and expand their recruitment pool. More broadly, it is quite common for teams to be spread across multiple locations, across a fairly large geographic area (France or even internationally), sometimes with representatives or small teams ensuring a presence at the organization’s various sites. For all these reasons—and without neglecting the value of in-person collaboration—it is essential to implement tools and routines that foster remote collaboration so that all these aspects can be accommodated and the risk of employees disengaging can be prevented.

• Recruiting better than you are

The role of a CIO is that of a manager. Technical skills and expertise are no longer at the core of their job; their goal is to take a broad view of all issues in order to better lead the team and steer the organization. A good CIO must therefore know how to surround themselves with the right people and not be afraid to recruit top-notch experts—to whom they can easily delegate both strategic and operational tasks—without neglecting middle management, so that they can focus on their core responsibilities: strategic direction and management.

• Be the guarantor and promoter of your team internally

A CIO serves as the representative of his or her team within the company at the organization-wide level. Given that this field is often misunderstood—because it is technical and therefore not easily accessible—it is all the more crucial for the CIO to perform tracking and understand the work of his or her various teams, as well as their potential needs, in order to advocate for them and explain them across the organization. And even more than that: the CIO will earn respect by championing the work done by their team, highlighting its contributions, and recognizing the individuals who make up the team. This goes a long way toward boosting pride in being part of the IT department and strengthening everyone’s commitment!

• Creating links between generations

Age gaps within an IT department can be significant, as younger generations—trained in new methods and technologies—work alongside more senior IT professionals. This generational gap can lead to disagreements and misunderstandings within teams. Simple, targeted measures can be implemented to prevent this risk, such as mentoring programs, so that each generation can benefit from the other’s contributions to their work. It’s also important to make your team managers aware of the importance of adapting their management style to each individual’s profile. Needs regarding work organization, career development, and skills development are likely to differ, but all are important to consider.

Thus, just like a team, the management of an IT department is multifaceted. It is important to remember, however, that a good manager is, above all, someone who has fully embraced the role of leader, facilitator, and motivator for their team. This requires specific interpersonal skills and an approach that will ensure the success of initiatives carried out both internally and across the organization. Ultimately—and most importantly—it means knowing how to leverage the strengths of one’s team—and therefore knowing the team well— to create a dynamic that benefits the entire company.