How to build a tech department from scratch in 48 hours

Ten years ago, no one asked a CEO how fluent they were in tech. That's what your CTO was for...Now? It’s a must have! You don’t have to be the tech expert - but you do have to understand how it drives growth, culture, and innovation. This article is worth a quick read - https://lnkd.in/ejraM8iT

I’ve seen teams chase growth like it’s a finish line, only to realize they never picked a route. New tech, new hires, new markets… it all feels like progress. Until change hits and the cracks show. But true clarity doesn’t come from speed. It comes from doing the work: talking to the right people, asking what they want, and building trust before the deal. Because growth doesn’t fail from moving too slow. It fails when no one owns the change.

COO appointments have exploded 671% since 2006 – and that's not the only fundamental shift ⚡ For what seems like the first time in corporate history, most COOs are now being promoted from within. Internal hires jumped from 34% between 2006 and 2010 to 54% between 2021 and 2025 📈   Where are companies building this pipeline? Zero100 data points to four industries: consumer goods & retail, tech, industrial, and financial services. Think companies like Deutsche Bank, Amazon, Microsoft, and Stadler 🌐   They operate in dynamic environments where leaders must constantly adapt to market shifts, new tech, and evolving customer demands – aka the skills that define modern COOs.   Supply chain organizations that cultivate talent who can navigate this complexity won't just keep pace with the feeders – they'll create the next generation of COOs themselves 💡

I love this look at the journey to COO - there’s no one standard path, but those industries that force leaders to manage through significant volatility are more likely to develop c-suite operations executives. High risk, high stakes, challenging experiences build the next generation of leaders.

A lot of companies mistake progress for change. New features. New hires. Same thinking. Real change starts when you stop asking, “How do we make this better?” and start asking, “What if this didn’t exist — how would we build it now?” That question resets everything. The team, the priorities, the outcome. It’s not iteration. It’s reinvention.

Every engineering team I’ve spoken with this month has one thing in common, they’re running at full speed with half the team available. - Delivery dates stay fixed. - Projects keep stacking. - But capacity quietly shrinks. It’s not a management issue. It’s a bandwidth issue. And no one wants to pause innovation just because recruiting takes months. The smartest leaders I’ve seen lately aren’t hiring more - they’re adapting faster.

A fintech client in New York once said something that stuck with me: “We’ve got budget. We’ve got vision. We just don’t have the right people to execute.” They were trying to scale their product but couldn’t find senior engineers fast enough in the U.S. Every delay pushed their roadmap further and their investors grew anxious. Instead of freezing the project, they partnered with Coderio to build a blended team. Local leadership, LATAM senior engineers. Same time zone, shared context, enterprise-level execution. Three months later, delivery times dropped and the product was back on track. Sometimes the difference between traction and stagnation isn’t funding or ideas. It’s the right team at the right time.

🔧 Delivering Technical Change? Ask These 3 Stakeholder Questions First !! Too many technology initiatives stall—not because the tech is weak—but because stakeholder buy-in, clarity and alignment were overlooked. The article from CIO distils the approach into three critical questions that every leader (especially CIOs and consulting advisors) must ask before and during a transformation. 1️⃣ Who stands to gain… and who doesn’t? You must identify not only the obvious beneficiaries but also the stakeholders who may lose credibility, budget or relevance. Recognising latent resistance early gives you space to engage, mitigate and convert them into active supporters. 2️⃣ Can they meaningfully influence the outcome? Change sponsors must have both visible authority and real skin in the game. Without that, even well-funded programmes limp across the line with minimal impact. 3️⃣ Are they truly engaged beyond a signature? A one-time pep talk won’t cut it. The journey demands sustained involvement—decision-making cadence, meaningful participation, shared metrics and accountability. For strategic consultants and senior IT advisors, these questions aren’t optional—they’re foundational. They shift the focus from “Will the tech work?” to “Will the change land and last?” 📌 Boardroom call-to-action: Before you green-light the next major tech programme, pause and ask: have we mapped every stakeholder, assessed their power, and gauged their genuine engagement? The winners in digital transformation are not just great at deploying code. They’re brilliant at orchestrating people + process + politics. Source - https://lnkd.in/e8bKHD3m #StakeholderManagement #ChangeLeadership #ITStrategy #DigitalTransformation #ConsultingInsights #CIOLeadership

M&A moves fast. 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐭𝐞𝐚𝐦𝐬 𝐦𝐨𝐯𝐞 𝐟𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫.   One highly acquisitive corp dev team hit the limits of manual workflows.    Instead of slowing down, 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐥𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐝 𝐮𝐩.   They switched to a single platform that gave them speed, visibility, and control. All in one place.   𝐖𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐭𝐨 𝐬𝐞𝐞 𝐡𝐨𝐰 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐝𝐢𝐝 𝐢𝐭? 𝐇𝐞𝐫𝐞’𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐩𝐥𝐚𝐲𝐛𝐨𝐨𝐤. https://lnkd.in/eB8y5B9W