Chief Technology Officer

The Chief Technology Officer is in charge of running the entire engineering department. He provides the strategic vision and leadership for the development and implementation of information technology initiatives, ensuring that they are aligned with the business’s mission and objectives.

The Chief Technology Officer directs the planning and implementation of technological systems in support of the business’s operations for the purpose of improving service quality and encouraging cost effectiveness. The Chief Technology Officer is responsible for developing all aspects of information technology and information systems.

Objectives and Responsibilities of the Chief Technology Officer

Leadership/Supervisory Role: The Chief Technology Officer plays a leadership role where he oversees all the activities of the engineering department. He is responsible and accountable for the executive oversight of all aspects of engineering operations, service delivery, and management across the entire department.

In his leadership position, the Chief Technology Officer is tasked with articulating, setting, and delivering the vision and strategy for the engineering department while ensuring that they are in line with the business’s core vision, mission, and values. The Chief Technology Officer sets the engineering department goals, objectives, and operating procedures.

He also manages and directs business technologies, infrastructure services, production operations, technological architecture, digital development, site and software development and so forth.

The Chief Technology Officer leads the engineering department in planning the achievement of business goals through the fostering of innovation, prioritization of engineering initiatives, and coordinating the deployment, evaluation, and management of the current and future technological systems across the business.

He is accountable for the efficiency of the department as well as the effective delivery of services and solutions.  He is also accountable for the tracking, development, and control of periodical departmental budgets. In this position, the Chief Technological Officer also plays mentorship role to key engineering personnel, encouraging their professional growth, essentially readying them for the occupation of his position in the future.

Strategy: The Chief Technology Officer plays a leading and strong strategic role where he provides the business vision and technical leadership seeking to deliver technologies to meet the business needs and identify new opportunities for further growth. In his strategic position, the Chief Technology Officer maintains the engineering strategic plan, which he refreshes regularly and aligns with business overall objectives and business regulatory requirements.

The Chief Technology Officer provides ongoing and regular engagement with the business in order to guarantee that the goals, vision, and actions within the engineering department stay in alignment with both short-term and long-term strategies. He develops and implements effective organizational structure that supports effective execution of technology initiatives.

Collaboration: The role of the Chief Technology Officer is a collaborative one and in this position, he creates a healthy and collaboration environment within the engineering department that goes beyond the department. The Chief Technology Officer works with the business’s executive team in developing and communicating top-level goals across the business.

He plays the role of a trusted advisor for other executives and key stakeholders in matters of technological nature. In his collaborative role the Chief Technology Officer works with the engineering department’s leaders, ensuring proper execution of functions at all departmental levels.

Service Delivery & Support: The Chief Technology Officer is tasked with ensuring consistent and high-quality service delivery and support for all core technology processes and services, enabling smooth daily operations across all sites/services/applications lines, both internal and customer-facing. In this capacity, the Chief Technology Officer develops complex technology infrastructure. He anticipates capability challenges and communicates clear proactive plans in order to address technological challenges across the business.

Knowledge: The Chief Technology Officer maintains knowledge of best practices and industry trends within the engineering department adopting the most suitable trends, enabling constant improvement in technological services, both internal and consumer-facing.

Other Duties: The Chief Technology Officer preforms similar duties and duties as he deems suitable for the proper execution of his functions or duties as delegated by the Employer.

Required Qualifications of the Chief Technology Officer

Education: The Director IT Operations must have a Phd in Computer Science, Information Technology, or any other related field. An equivalent of the same in practical experience is also acceptable for the position.

Experience: A candidate for this position must have had over 10 years of working experience in a senior engineering position within a fast-paced and fast-evolving environment, preferably working as a Director of Engineering or Director IT Operations. The candidate must also demonstrate extensive and successful managerial experience leading a technical engineering team.

He must also demonstrate some experience with technology vendor management and contract negotiations. The candidate will also have proven experience in strategic planning and execution as well as a proven ability to set the vision and strategy of technological operations and to develop effective roadmaps.

The candidate must also be highly comfortable with associated architectural challenges and have the necessary experience to address them. A suitable candidate will also have an understanding of the workings of APIs and proven experience in bearing full financial accountability for technological departments, precisely in budgeting, headcount planning, and personnel decisions.

Communication Skills: The Chief Technology Officer will also need impeccable communication skills both in written and verbal form. The Chief Technology Officer will especially need excellent communication skills in in his leadership capacity, where the clarity of his communications will greatly determine the effectiveness with which tasks are executed across the engineering department.

The Chief Technology Officer will also need exceptional communication skills in his collaborative capacity where the clear conveyance of communication will determine the effectiveness with which collaborative tasks are executed. The Chief Technology Officer will also need great communication skills in drafting reports and recommendation for the executive committee as well as key stakeholders advising on technological aspects across the business. He will need to be able to convey technical messages to a non-technical audience in a clear, easy-to-understand, unambiguous, and convincing manner.

Technology/Software: A candidate for this position will need to be technologically adept and possess superior computer skills. He must also have a comprehensive understanding of data management, processing, design and implementation of complex systems, software applications, hardware platforms, and outsourced systems.

The candidate will also have a deep understanding of software technologies that can be used to overcome technological challenges across the business, for example, Hadoop, Varnish, MySQL, Apache, Memcached, Python, PHP, Node.js, Elasticsearch among others. He must also have the capacity to lead and deliver Cloud Software implementation on top of being adept in the use of JavaScript, HTML, CSS, ASP.NET, XML, and Restful APIs.

Interpersonal Skills: The Chief Technology Officer must be highly organized, highly procedural and methodical, be self-motivated and proactive, have an insatiable thirst for knowledge, work comfortably with business senior leadership, work comfortably in a collaborative setting, be a strategic and creative thinker, have a keen eye for detail, have an ability to multitask and meet tight deadlines, and demonstrate an ability to stay calm in times of uncertainty and stress.

Leadership/People Skills: The Chief Technology Officer must also be a people person and a proven leader who can influence senior business leadership as well as influence and inspire a cross-functional group into following a unified direction.

JOB SKILLS REQUIRED FOR Chief Technology Officer
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