| September 2006 |
| By Mark Eagle |
I have seen many ads for a VP of Software and Technology. What does this mean? Well to be honest, it means whatever the company wants it to mean. For 4 years I was Executive VP of Software and Services for a 150 million dollar software firm. I turned it into a dream job!
This job can be a stepping stone to a COO or even a CEO position. I reported directly to the CEO, and had full accountability for getting results. I had free reign to “make it happen”. Did this job have an impact on the success of the company, you bet it did! The bonuses and options were tied directly into the company’s success.
The description of the job is typically 15+ years of business and technology, with a technical degree, strong leadership and communication skills, and (then they name all sorts of technologies and the industry that you must know).
In reality, to succeed, the technologies or applications aren’t all that critical
I was given full authority (within budget), and accountability to meet my goals. The mission was to deploy an ERP system for multi-channel broadcasting around the world, bring in lots of revenue, make all our customers happy, and maintain the 50 legacy systems we had deployed over the past 15 years.
That came with about 200 professional employees.
My job description: BUILD A GREAT TEAM!
A Director that is skilled in new product development, another one that is skilled in maintenance (avoidance and enhancement), a requirements team involved in the QA process and that also can write documentation, a services VP (who understands the customer), and a really good executive assistant.
By the way, I would have my programmers bet the QA people they couldn’t break their code. How about that for an attitude?
Real Job Duties
Half my time, I was in the office. When in town, I arrived at the office about 7:30 – 8:00 a.m. and I’d leave about 6:30 p.m. I processed morning email from overseas customers and late working staff (30 minutes). I then would clear off my desk and review the days “to do” list (written before I left the previous day).
An important part of the job is talent. I’d spend an hour 3 days a week on personnel issues. This could include working with HR, talking to individual people, evaluating performance metrics, putting together compensation and bonus recommendations, and identifying hidden talent. I also spent 5-15 minutes with every potential hire.
A 3 hour senior staff meeting was held bi-weekly. My goal was to know everything going on in the company, warts and all, and sharing that with the team. Staff-meeting agendas were formed to establish goals for the week, status reporting, and eliminating problem issues. It was a no holds bar type of meeting.
I would walk around the office an hour each week. Met with staff, said hello, and showed that I was a real person.
1-2 hours per week peer meeting, (EVP sales and CFO) getting on the same page.
2-3 hours a day, checking in with customers, (we had 1200), up-selling them, or renewing contracts.
Half my time was spent traveling around the US and the World visiting customers, trade shows and prospects. I was the product evangelist and guy with the resources. I would LISTEN to the future requirements the business would need and a quarter of my time in airports, hotel rooms and on email (yes, that adds up to what it takes).
I was often asked, “you aren’t a sales guy, why are you with so many customers and prospects?” My response was that any senior executive better be in sales and service or he/she should find a new job.
Everything always fell back on business, sales and leadership skills. Understanding enough about the technology was also very important.
Interestingly enough, there is nothing in the company mission that speaks to a specific technology. That may sound funny, but who really cares what is under the hood. However, you better understand and speak the language of developers.
We had software developed in Cobol, RPG, assembler, VB, C, C++, C#, C flat, frame relay, TCP/IP, AS 400s, HP Unix, HP 3000/MPE, IBM Series 1, System 34,36, 38, Unisys Mainframes, Cisco routers, PCAnywhere, Citrix, Onyx, PeopleSoft, Oracle, Cognos, Crystal reports, you name it. If broadcasters had it in their computer room they wanted to re-use it.
So my real job description (not the one advertised) was to:
- Obtain authority from management
- Develop a great staff
- Develop rapport with peers and direct reports
- LISTEN to customers, prospects and staff
- Communicate clear goals up and down, meet them, and deliver more then you promised to customers
- Establish industry and technical credibility
- Never stand still
About 20 years of practice doesn’t hurt.
If you still don’t know what an Exec VP of Products and Services does, then you are probably on par with the employer.
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