#223 Chief Digital Officer: Digital Business at UL

With the Chief Information Officer role in transition, business expectations of the CIO have also changed. In this episode, we talk with a seasoned CIO, Christian Anschuetz, who left that position to become Chief Digital Officer of Underwriters Laboratories. The discussion explores the Chief Digital Officer (CDO) role and offers advice to both CIOs and their organizations.

Christian Anschuetz is the Chief Digital Officer at Underwriters Laboratories. He has been the Chief Information Officer of Underwriters Laboratories since November 2008. Mr. Anschuetz is responsible to establish IT strategies, goals and priorities and to provide senior leadership on key technology initiatives in the areas of enterprise resource planning, business process automation, computer systems validation, and electronic communications. Mr. Anschuetz served as the Chief Information Officer and Executive Vice President of Americas at Publicis Groupe SA, where he was responsible for the strategic management and delivery of IT support to over 17,000 associates in more than 100 unique lines of business. Prior to Publicis, Mr. Anschuetz served as Vice President and Director of Operations at BCom3.

Michael Krigsman is an industry analyst and host of CXOTALK.

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Excert from the transcript:

But, I want to circle back to a previous comment and part of our discussion beforehand. You know, so much of this has to do with, again, people, right? We have to be absolutely deliberate and focused on making sure we bring people along for the ride. It’s so, so critical, Michael. And, I will tell you: if you were to ask me some of the differences between like a traditional CIO or maybe a CDO role, they’re both important roles and certainly, one is not better than the other. They’re just different, right?
I think that CIO role is really more typically, typically more about internal, you know, transformation, efficiency; can be in a contemporary firm, internally. A CDO role has, you know, has to trust that a lot of that is happening internally and then project it externally, and bring the customers in. So I think the CDO role is typically, typically more of an externally-facing role. But regardless, when we are affecting like the transformation either within your firm, or you’re trying to create new values outside the firm, you really need to be considering people all along the way.
With regards to the CDO, because it may have a tendency to have an external impact which we change the internal dynamics and how the company sees itself, maybe even how – definitely how it runs itself, right? How it actually delivers this new value, start these new things.
The scope of the responsibilities tend bigger, right? So, one is internal, and one is maybe more external, at least in this definition, right? And, but the CDO role is really all-encompassing, at least in my opinion. And, you know, this is where the soft skills become even more important […] because you really are responsible for changing the external perspective on […], and then you have to change the internal perspective, perhaps, on exactly what the firm does to the value that it creates.
And so, again, I’ll go back to what I think the CDO role [is], and you actually manage transformations really involve people and organizational change management. It’s that saying – I’m stealing it from a contemporary of mine that said that, you know, “The hard results you get are really coming from the soft skills.” And I do believe that’s true for the CDO role. Both roles. All these leadership roles, for sure, but definitely the CDO role.
Michael Krigsman: So, in practical terms, how is your role; how is your work as Chief Digital Officer different from what you did and what you focused on as Chief Information Officer?
Christian Anschuetz: Well, it kind of follows that same path that I was just on. I mean, the CIO role is really much more internally focused around internal operations, and the CDO role is much more of a customer-facing, customer-discovery, customer-exploration role. Again, going in front of customers and saying, “Okay.” You know, what are the really big problems that you’re trying to solve? And doing this out of the context of how they normally see you as the firm. Remember, relationships are contextual, right? So if you and I only know each other in a certain context, and we keep talking about the opportunities to work together in new and different ways, it will always be influenced by the context in which we know each other. Is that a fair thing to say?

[CXOTalk]

This is a great discussion with someone who has experience with being a Chief Information Officer and a Chief Digital Officer. Ask your questions and leave your comments!