Are great tech leaders born or made? It’s an age-old question for anyone working in the technology space. Whether you have worked under an inspiring leader or one who has inspired you to run for the hills, understanding the qualities that set exceptional leaders apart is important for your career growth and hiring the right people.
Without a strong CIO or CTO as a role model, business transformations, employee engagement, and productivity can all be negatively impacted. Even in the most conservative environments, program managers, chief information officers, and heads of IT must have certain qualities that go beyond completing basic management tasks.
Going beyond the conventional offers measurable results. As recent IBM research has found, high-performing tech leaders significantly outpaced their peers, with 52% achieving revenue or budget growth compared to 21% for others since 2020. High performers also achieved a 16% improvement in operating margins compared to just 10% for peers.
While leadership abilities may come naturally to some people, we firmly believe the traits of the best tech leaders can certainly be cultivated. Hint: it’s not just about technical talent! Let’s dive in to explore this further.
Exceptional Communication Ability
Leading increasingly diverse and distributed teams demands clear, effective communication. The ability to articulate to non-technical and technical teams why something is important or how it works is the bedrock skill that all other aspects of tech leadership rest on.
CIOs need to connect with a wide range of stakeholders, from their IT teams and business leaders to the CEO, board members and clients. Each group requires a tailored explanation of the technical vision in a way they can understand and support.
Communication is such an important leadership skill in tech that one survey has crunched the numbers about its impact. Research from Info-Tech Research Group shows that for every 10% improvement in communication, stakeholder satisfaction with IT rises by 8.6%.
Prioritise Skills Development
Good leadership involves developing team skills, empowering team members and making learning a priority. In today’s market, where IT and tech talent shortages remain a critical challenge, even in a softening economy, this approach is more important than ever. As many as 68% of tech leaders have three or more unfilled positions on their teams, and more than half (56%) are having a hard time filling those positions, according to a Skillsoft survey of CTOs, CIOs and other technology leaders.
Savvy tech leaders recognise they need to complement their tech recruitment with internal development strategies – by building skillsets from within, particularly among younger team members who have the potential to become the leaders and specialists of tomorrow.
Beyond equipping their teams with the latest technical abilities, skills-focused leaders can achieve exceptional employee engagement and retention. Showing a commitment to upskilling their teams is key to closing the talent gap and keeping their organisation competitive.
Trusting Their Teams to Innovate
Effective IT leaders understand how foundational creativity is to lasting success – not just for their own but for their team members. They recognise that innovation doesn’t thrive under rigid constraints – it needs room to breathe. That’s why the best tech leaders develop work cultures where space is created for experimentation.
Offering teams a safe space for trial and error is where breakthroughs happen, and it’s the hallmark of leaders who truly understand the creative pulse of the tech world.
Measuring the Right Types of Success
Great tech leaders understand that success isn’t just about ticking off tasks. Technical achievements are important, but they’re just the baseline. Rather than micromanaging, they trust their teams to deliver, focusing instead on the most valuable metrics that align with the organisation’s goals.
Smart leaders measure their teams on how effectively their work impacts growth, customer satisfaction and operational efficiency. Day-to-day metrics are not the whole story, and true success isn’t possible with a broader view of performance.
Excitement About the Future
There’s no need to be demure about this: Inspiring tech leaders enjoy being geeky about emerging tech. We know the most well-known names in tech leadership are unabashedly curious and fascinated by the possibilities of future tech and how it can be applied in ways many of us haven’t dreamed of.
Gartner has highlighted ‘neophilia’, an affinity for newness, as an essential trait of successful tech leaders “because the rate of obsolescence and the rate of change in the information technology field is not for the faint of heart”.
As IT headhunters, we see leaders with a genuine passion for staying on top of future trends have a unique edge that allows them to spot new opportunities before others do. This enthusiasm not only fuels their own curiosity but also energises their teams, helping shape a culture of forward-thinking.
By keeping a finger on the pulse of what’s coming next, tech leaders can make smarter decisions and position their businesses to use the solutions that will best drive growth and competitive advantage.
Connect with IT Headhunters Who Champion Tech Leaders
At Exclaim IT, our deep experience in the search and selection of exceptional IT leaders can help you decide your next career move or help you appoint leadership talent that will exceed expectations for your organisation. Whether you’re searching for your next CIO role or looking for an IT manager to improve project delivery, we can find the solution that suits you best. Please feel free to get in touch with us today.
