CIOs should be consistent role models: Danielle Di-Masi

Being a CIO means working not only with technology but also with human beings. Managing a huge team of juniors, superiors and colleagues, and constantly keeping them motivated can be a difficult task. Danielle Di-Masi, digital communications and marketing strategist, gave a few handy and easy tips to the top CIOs of the country gathered at the CIO100 2017 India edition held in Pune.

The mantra is, she says, to consistently keep telling and affirming the team through words and action. Three phrase matter much: I see you, I get you, and this makes sense. “Humans crave for acknowledgment and recognition. As leaders/CIOs we must reach out to them constantly,” said Di-Masi.

She says a CIO should act as a role model. The way they conduct themselves in front of team is the way the team will do in the absence of the CIO. The second thing to be done is, to answer the question on who the employees are.

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“There should be a story consistently conveyed on who the employees are, and why they are here? One needs to also consistently tell them where they were before, where we (the company or the CIO) got them from, and where they are now?” said Di-Masi.

Citing an example from Google offices which believes that any employee of the company should not be more than 200 m away from food at any point of time, Di-Masi encourages CIOs to have conversations beyond work and also engage in collaboration with other departments.

“The idea is that when an employee gets up, takes a break, and walk up to grab food, they reboot their brains. Also, the food counters are placed between two very different teams, encouraging collaboration and discussions. This leads to innovations. One must build environments like this,” added Di-Masi.