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Ebusiness Despatches: The death of the tech CEO
"When it came to Y2K, a chimp could have run a tech company."

By René Carayol

Published: Wednesday 15 May 2002

How many IT directors can really justify their technology spending? And how many tech CEOs have been peddling snake oil? Rene Carayol calls for action...

A recent Economist cover story was called 'Fallen idols: The overthrow of celebrity CEOs'. I think I can be more precise. I can predict the death of the tech CEO.

We've recently seen a spate of execs exit stage left, whether by force of shareholders or their desire to 'do something different'. Consider the COOs of both Microsoft and Sun and Bernie Ebbers at WorldCom. And there are countless bosses under pressure, including Chris Gent at Vodafone, one of my past-heroes.

The problem is that many tech CEOs built or shored up their reputations during the last boom. When it came to the run up to Y2K a chimp could have run a tech company. They didn't have to sell - we, as IT users, simply bought.

Post-Y2K, when we had already spent more than our usual annual IT budgets, along came the pressure to spend on internet technology, making ourselves into ebusinesses. What next - everyone having to invest in becoming an m-business, in tune with the latest GPRS and 3G developments?

No one, no IT director - as I was back then - has ever stood up and said they got all this spending wrong. Certainly no vendor will say their products shouldn't have been bought.

Only now the onus is on those vendors proving their worth. CEO shouldn't stand for chief erosion officer.

The days of the unholy trinity of analyst, IT director and vendor - as reported on by silicon.com in the past (see: http://www.silicon.com/a43488 ) - are on their way out. At least they should be, as the technology chickens come home to roost.

There's a new wave of anti-vendors who are pushing things like open source software and business services over pure technology. Does the technology on its own really make as much difference to a business as we've been told? I'm not convinced.

I'm sceptical whether many UK IT directors can come forward and say CRM spending or Y2K spending or other tech spending has added value. And those who bought from the celebrity tech CEOs must be able to explain themselves.

Allow me one small anecdote, back on the subject of one of my favourite types of end user organisation, the budget airline. You'll know if you've flown easyJet that its check-in system is low-tech, involving laminated cards and a seating free-for-all. I don't believe a Go or BMI Baby can be as low cost and just as good by making use of expensive technology.

To any IT directors wondering just what their role must be, I say think 'vision' not 'spend'. Partner to do everything apart from what you do best.

And how about those tech CEOs? Clearly they aren't all going to disappear but I hope they learn to focus more on our businesses and less on our technology.

I spoke of Vodafone's Gent as a former hero mostly because I find it hard to find heroes right now. I look at the top of silicon's recent Agenda Setters poll (http://www.silicon.com/as2002 ) and I see plenty of CEOs but the individual I admire the most isn't one of them. He's Sergey Brin, the twenty something founder and CTO at Google, a company millions of us are grateful for.

My message to the tech CEOs is simple - deliver, deliver, deliver. Users' spending must be meaningful.