Management and leadership hiring mistakes can be expensive - even disastrous. GEN5 Consulting can help. Engage us before you hire your next CIO. We'll help you identify and clearly articulate the qualifications required of the ideal candidate – the candidate who will drive heightened levels of performance and business results without destroying the key differentiators and cultural aspects of your organization that contribute to overall success.

As you recruit your new team member, you’ll have the comfort and benefit of knowing that we’re ensuring your IT organization is aligned to the rest of the business and functioning optimally. We’ll pick up the pieces and get the IT teams performing and ready for the transition. There’s no need to endure a leaderless IT organization, or to suffer from cascading turnover during the long months of recruitment – we’re standing by to serve as your interim or transitional Chief Information Officer.

You may have a CIO, VP of IT, IT Director, or IT Manager on your team today who could benefit from our added perspectives, or your business model may not call for fulltime IT leadership at all. Either way, we're the “on-call” CIO you need right now to provide IT answers when nobody else can. We're there for you with the solutions that drive performance – with solutions that bridge the gaps between people, process, and technology. With over twenty-five years of direct IT / IS leadership experience we can assist with:

• Strategic Planning & Strategic Alignment
• Organizational Turnaround & Performance Optimization
• Organizational Optimization & “Right Sizing”
• Business Process Optimization & Work Flow Enhancements
• Large / High-Risk Project Management
• Large / High-Risk Project Rescue
• Recruiting & Retention Initiatives
• Mentoring, Coaching & Training – When appropriate, teaching your staff to do what we do
• Interim / Transitional CIO Services

GEN5 is the retained CIO you need, at the price you want. Hire us to focus on IT so you can focus on your strategic business initiatives. Call us today and see what a difference we can make for you tomorrow.

Your small and mid-sized business (SMB) relies on technology more than ever before, and you’re facing unprecedented challenges with managing the increasingly complex IT systems to deliver business value through innovation and technology that’s deployed effectively. The technology requirements and environments of most SMBs’ are just as complicated as those of much larger enterprises, but you just don’t have the same resources to support them. Systems that continually have problems, or experience catastrophic failures, or simply fall short of enabling business operations or innovation can severely impact your bottom-line. Even worse, they could grind your business to a halt. Just as importantly, every small and mid-sized company experiences periods of growth and contraction. IT systems and the organizations needed to support them cannot typically scale at the same pace. You can’t just “switch on” new systems or highly-skilled staff – nor can you simply “switch off” those systems and staff when you no longer need them, or need less of them. That leaves you with a rather high baseline of IT costs that you’re stuck with regardless of business conditions. You’re constantly balancing resources when it comes to technology and support. What’s the answer? Well…

• When you need advice on financials you talk with a peer-level expert in financials and accounting– a CFO or equivalent.
• When you need input on operations or production, you consult with your GM or COO – peers who, like you, understand how to keep a business on track. 
• When you need peer-level strategic advice and guidance with your company’s technology direction, you ask your … IT manager, Director, or “technology guy / gal”? Probably not, because in all likelihood, they just don’t have the business experience, leadership, or strategic vision that you require from other members of your team. 

What you need is an executive-level peer with broad and deep technology expertise. You need a CIO that “gets it” – an experienced IT executive that you can communicate with about business and technology. Like other SMB owners or executives, you and your team have at least one fulltime job already – running your business. What you really need is trustworthy advice and guidance from a highly skilled expert regarding complicated technology-related issues such as: 

• How will you drive Innovation through the proper use of technology? How to develop strategic IT planning that enables and can even drive the business?
• How will you decide upon, and select the most appropriate, business-enabling technology?
• What technology or applications should you be outsourcing or moving to the Cloud? What are the cost-effective approaches to more effectively supporting, or even eliminating legacy applications and systems?
• The technology itself – what are the right hardware devices and software for your company?
• Which enterprise projects do you need to be doing right now? Who will manage them? 
• How will you get your IT staff and organization to focus on strategic business outcomes? It’s impossible for your small IT shop to even stay up-to-date on all new IT solutions – and the pace is accelerating. How can your IT team support tomorrow’s business needs with yesterday’s technology solutions? 
• What industry best practices do you need to implement now? What works, what doesn’t, and how will you avoid the sales-hype and other pitfalls?

GEN5 – THE CEO’S ADVOCATE IN IT

Most SMBs simply can’t find that level of expertise externally and probably can’t afford the high cost if they could - and it just doesn’t make sense for most to try to staff it internally. But why even consider hiring fulltime when it’s clear that the value an SMB actually receives from a fulltime IT executive will ebb and flow, while the fully burdened staffing cost continues to increase over time. GEN5s CIO Services fill that need by providing an experienced CIO On-Demand at a fraction of the cost. You get all the value but only pay for the time you actually use! It’s the perfect model for today’s SMB. No IT prima donna’s, no conflicting agendas, no techno-babble or geek-speak. GEN5 CIOs are highly skilled IT executives with excellent communication skills, broad business experience and deep domain expertise who will deliver strategic guidance, direction, and management in a manner that you and your team will immediately recognize as valuable to the business. 

CUSTOM SOLUTIONS TO FIT YOUR REQUIREMENTS

As with all GEN5 solutions, our CIO On-Demand service is infinitely customizable to precisely fit your needs. We don’t believe in “one-size fits all models”. Your business is unique and so are our solutions, because they’re designed to adjust to suit your requirements and budget. Our flexible service options range from placing a CIO onsite at your offices, to a virtual CIO that’s accessible by phone, email, and web, to fully customized combinations that uniquely align with what you need. This can vary widely from a few hours each month for a quick “reality check” or advisory calls regarding specific questions or situations, to fulltime onsite support during assessments, projects, or strategic planning sessions requiring full immersion and face-time. Of course we’ll work with you to help you decide on the optimum model, but you’re never locked in. That’s a key benefit of our approach – to provide you with virtually infinite agility. Our CIO Services are one-hundred percent elastic. This elasticity allows you to avoid the high costs and fluctuating value of staffing this level of IT expertise, yet retains all the benefit of having ready access to it when needed. Accessible ExpertiseTM – that’s the GEN5 way.

Most importantly, GEN5s CIO Services will ensure that IT is properly focused on serving your business needs. We’ll transform your technology and IT organization so that it performs better than you’ve ever experienced, or even thought possible. We’re IT experts who always maintain an objective eye on current and upcoming cost-saving approaches, right sizing personnel for the needs of the business, and right sourcing technology to ensure clients are getting the most “business bang” for the IT buck. GEN5 is also a leader in innovation through IT, and you can count on us to ensure that your IT investment is always directed towards supporting innovative approaches to gaining and maintaining competitive advantage.  

HOW THE CIO ON-DEMAND PROGRAM WORKS

GEN5 clients are assigned a dedicated Chief Information Officer with at least 10 years of experience and domain expertise delivering strategic guidance and applying innovative, cost-effective technology solutions in your industry vertical. Your CIO On-Demand has the ultimate responsibility for ensuring your business is gaining maximum value by:

• Acting as your trusted business technology advisor and helping incorporate technology plans that support your overall business strategy and goals
• Guiding your business technology decisions to ensure the best technology investment for your business
• Monitoring the overall performance of your company’s technology and service offerings, ensuring the highest levels of support for your business
• Delivering regular input and advice on how to leverage IT to drive innovation for your business

The relationship starts with an initial business review and analysis, and development of measurable goals and outcomes required for IT to serve the operational imperatives of the business. Your CIO On-Demand will put together a plan to maximize your use of technology to increase efficiency while reducing costs, and specific measureable outcomes that will contribute directly to business outcomes that you identify. From there, your CIO On-Demand will work with both your IT and your business leadership team to collaboratively develop and implement your go-forward technology plan and IT organizational strategy. 

Your CIO will schedule regularly occurring calls to review goals and assess outcomes, discuss strategic initiatives, and recalibrate if necessary. These calls can be as often as weekly, but once we’ve worked with you to get your IT “on track” the schedule typically shifts to monthly or quarterly to align with your business planning cycles. Your scheduled calls will provide you and your leadership team with the opportunity to review and assess business goals, discuss strategic growth plans and initiatives, and look at additional ways for your business to leverage your technology investment. Your CIO will continue to examine the current technology budgets and goals, and to provide the experienced guidance and suggestions aimed at maximizing IT operational performance and efficiency by implementing technologies and approaches such as cloud computing and virtualization, outsourcing, or personnel strategies. GEN5s constantly remained focused on ensuring that IT is business-driven and strategy-focused.

PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Every GEN5 CIO On-Demand has managed numerous small, medium and large projects including enterprise systems upgrades, or deployment of new mission-critical applications systems. The experienced senior-level oversight and project management expertise your CIO On-Demand delivers will quickly become your “guided missile” to manage current projects and future initiatives across the entire project lifecycle from requirements to successful on-time, on-budget completion.

CLOUD SERVICES, OUTSOURCING, AND RIGHT SOURCINGTM OF TECHNOLOGY & SERVICES 

Through GEN5s CIO On-Demand Service you will benefit from direct access to an experienced CIO to analyze your IT infrastructure, including current or future outsourcing services, contract and pricing negotiations, SLA analysis, and relationships with contractors, consultants, and professional services firms.  In addition you will experience the positive impact of executive level assistance in analyzing IT spend, including hidden or “shadow IT” costs, assessment of current and future systems, and analysis of possible alternative solutions utilizing outsourcing and cloud-based technologies. As performance improvement experts, we’ll advise you on correct staffing models and proper IT organizational structure. Your CIO On-Demand will help you to reduce the time you spend on managing technology so you can focus your energy on running the business. 

TECHNOLOGY PLAN

GEN5s CIO On-Demand will work with you to establish the proper planning cycle consistent with your broader planning processes to analyze and review business needs as they relate to IT. From there we’ll take a deep dive into your technology environment, IT staff and organization, service agreements, contracts and licensing, maintenance and other requirements. We’ll work with you to discuss new technologies, set new goals, and establish IT budgets for new technology purchases and upgrades. We’ll also encourage you to explore the many new options for moving to the Cloud or outsourcing “commodity” IT functions. We will keep you up to date and continually look at areas to manage or even reduce IT spend by researching the latest technologies or services which optimize your IT investment to maximize the value for your business.

DISASTER RECOVERY & BUSINESS CONTINUITY PLANNING

Disasters, natural or otherwise can strike anytime. When disaster occurs, will your business continue functioning, or will you be out of business for days, weeks, or even months? Our CIO services include disaster recovery and business continuity planning. Through this offering, we can assist you with implementing plans that get your business back up and responding to customer needs as quickly as possible following a disaster. At GEN5 we believe that the goal should shift from “recovery” to “business continuity”. While your competitors are working towards eventual recovery from a disaster, you’ll be “back on your feet” interacting with your customers. We understand that disasters touch us all. We simply believe that our clients deserve the peace of mind that comes from knowing they’ll be able to continue with business as usual.
 

IT STRATEGY DEVELOPMENT

Clearly defined, documented, and socialized IT Strategy often represents one of the key missing pieces to the complex picture of your company’s future. Once those pieces are in place, the sky is the limit. We can help you fill in the missing pieces. Our proprietary Strategy Actualization methodology will guide your leadership team through the complex process of IT strategy development. Unlike other consultants, we don’t believe that this should be a long, drawn-out process ending with reams of strategy documents that are not executable. Instead, our short-cycle methodology quickly drives to the very heart of your ideational notions about who your IT organization is, and how it fits within the broader corporate strategic context, goals, and targets. We then focus on high-level assessments of IT's internal and external environment to understand “your IT world” from an operational and expectations-driven perspective. We work with your IT and business team to synthesize these interrelated factors into a very tight executable IT strategy that you will begin applying and immediately benefiting from.

IT STRATEGY ACTUALIZATION – EXECUTING ON YOUR STRATEGY

So you already have your IT strategy nailed? You know what your IT team should be doing, but it just doesn't seem to be happening? Your IT team may understand what needs to get done within their functional areas, but they may be struggling to coalesce around both your corporate and IT strategy. We will help you to identify the solutions to this challenging "knowing - doing" gap experienced by many IT organizations. We will assist you in mapping a clear course from a kernel of organizational purpose and ideation to fulfillment of your desired IT strategy. Your IT staff will clearly understand their roles and accountabilities relating to executing your strategic initiatives. You’ll benefit from heightened levels of team commitment and competitive drive across the entire IT organization.