Human Interest

IS and HR executives are worlds apart at many companies. But CIOs who succeed in healing that troubled relationship will reap big benefits, including timely hiring of employees with the most sought-after skills

THE SCRIPT BEGAN AS FOLLOWS:

-------ON SCREEN-------

Star Trek video - Starship IS Enterprise flies across screen with the following voiceover.

KIRK

IS - the final frontier! These are the voyages of the Starship IS Enterprise. Its ongoing mission to explore new business process efficiencies, to seek out improved systems performance, to boldly go where no IS department has gone before!

-------QUEUE-------

Star Trek theme music. The action all takes place on the bridge of the IS Enterprise. There is a console where the characters sit and on both sides of the stage, a video screen.

From these humble outlines played out what was generally agreed was one of the most effective best practice strategic sessions the Smith's Snackfood Company had ever seen in Australia. The interaction between Captain Kirk (aka CIO Jackie Montado) and Princess Jane (aka HR director Jane Thomas) was so warmly received it has demonstrably begun transforming perceptions of IS in the real (as opposed to the fictional) HR department and wider enterprise.

The success of the performance helps illustrate how an effective relationship between the HR executive and the CIO, based on mutual respect and understanding, can boost perceptions of IT and play a crucial role in furthering business strategies.

PRINCESS JANE

CAPTAIN KIRK. This is PRINCESS JANE calling from the HR Kingdom! Are you receiving me?

KIRK

PRINCESS JANE. We are indeed honoured by your presence.

PRINCESS JANE

Just what is wrong with your ship Captain? I've had my Minions calling the support deck and they get no response!

RYDALMERIDIENS, TINGALPIANS, DANDENOIDS, PARK REGENTS and CANNING VALIANTS are all experiencing extremely poor response times on the inter-galactic Internet! How are we to ensure we strengthen the bench and recruit aliens of the future when our online candidate selection system does not function properly?

As you know, we have extreme demands from the marketing galaxy. Every day ADMIRAL MCGINNES is on the phone asking me to recruit yet another high- calibre alien.

What will you do about it? Please report back to me.

-------ON SCREEN-------

The image of PRINCESS JANE fades with static.

SCOTTY

Captain, we have lost transmission with PRINCESS JANE. Shame too - a nice set of buns she has!

KIRK

SCOTTY, respect please! Continue to locate PRINCESS JANE. We must meet the needs of someone of her stature!

Thus, with a little bit of dress up, a lot of glitzy technology and even more humour, did a Star Trek cameo (with a sprinkling of Star Wars) fundamentally turn around an organization's - and especially HR's - views about IT.

With so much of an HR executive's success now intimately dependent on technology-enabled HR processes, the CIO is becoming a key business connection for the HR executive, to the extent that some CIOs now report to the HR director or work alongside him or her in the same department. Consultants say both parties can benefit from a strong partnership, with communication and groundwork intended to promote mutual understanding being key.

"[The CIO and I] work fairly closely because we're in the same department here under a group called Business Support Group, which comprises a finance department, information management headed up by the CIO, IT and then HR," says Andrew Prestage, HR manager in the Auditor-General of Victoria's office.

"We relate with all three of those departments, particularly with the CIO in respect to information for areas like internal communication strategy for instance. So we will look at how we can strengthen that internal communication; the CIO would be looking more at the communications processes themselves. We have an internal newsletter and information sessions. We look at things like reward and recognition as well, so [we're] trying to link some motivators in there as well for participation."

Prestage says with new CIO David Kennedy just nine weeks into the job at the time of writing, both men were working on building strong social interactions, recognising the strength of the relationship comes down to a mutual understanding of the other's role, and the sharing of a similar vision.

"To some extent, whether I'm dealing with the CIO or the finance manager, if we both have a shared vision on what we're trying to achieve, I think that's where we get the greater rewards and the outcome," Prestage says. "When you're working with people that have different agendas, I think that's when things start to get strained and you start to have your own agendas, the competition starts to arise there, and the one-upmanship."

Join the CIO Australia group on LinkedIn. The group is open to CIOs, IT Directors, COOs, CTOs and senior IT managers.

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