The document provides 15 ways for IT professionals to stand out on their team, as shared by various IT leaders. These include keeping skills fresh, speaking effectively to business units, understanding the business, collaborating with the business, focusing on the customer experience, being accountable, being open-minded, proactively solving problems, being willing to take risks, delivering on ideas rather than just ideating, and always being curious. Standing out in these ways can help one gain respect, more interesting assignments, leadership growth, and career advancement.

1. @GinnyHam #ATO2017
15 ways to stand out
on your IT team
Ginny Hamilton
Community Manager, EnterprisersProject.com
Red Hat

2. @GinnyHam #ATO2017
Benefits of
Standing Out
• Respect of colleagues
• More interesting assignments
• Grow as a leader
• Build meaningful relationships
• Helps your career

3. @GinnyHam #ATO2017
EnterprisersProject.com
Online community and publication
for CIOs and IT leaders

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1
“Today, we have to keep up with technology –
there is no other choice. When we signed up
to be technologists, we signed up for change.”
John Marcante
Chief Information Officer
Vanguard
Keep your skills fresh

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2
“In addition to having solid technical skills, they
need to be able to communicate effectively …
the ability to give useful updates and status
reports to other business units is critical.”
Sandy Hill
Director of Technology
Pegasystems
Speak human

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3
“People who work in IT need to be ambidextrous. This
means they must understand business processes,
business value, business mission, and business
strategy if they're going to determine how best to use
technologies to solve business problems.”
Mike Kelly
Chief Information Officer
Red Hat
Learn the business

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4
“Reach out to the business to learn about what they need.
Don’t wait for an invitation. For example, spend a day
building a relationship with someone and understanding
how they use the technology you support.”
Cynthia Stoddard
Chief Information Officer
Adobe
Collaborate with the business

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5
“People are more interested in purpose. So if you
can put it into a story that resonates with them,
the acceptance level is much greater. You really
need to capture hearts and minds.”
Jeff Skipper
Certified Change Management Consultant
Become a storyteller

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6
“The digital era is not about technology. It’s really
about the shift of power to the customer and the
importance of the customer experience"
Charles Araujo
Author, “The Quantum Age of IT: Why Everything You
Know About IT Is About to Change.”
Focus on the customer

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“People want to be thanked, they want to be
appreciated, they want to feel like they’re having an
impact and helping IT to be successful. There is
nothing worse than walking out the door at the end
of a Friday feeling like you’ve failed or weren’t
appreciated.”
Paul Brady
Chief Information Officer
Arbella Insurance
Say “Thank You”

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8
“When you are working with accountable people, the
first thing they will do when an issue arises is become
passionately and unwaveringly committed to
understanding the root cause of the issue – not just
fixing the symptoms, but rather treating the illness.”
Stephen Gold
EVP & Chief Information Officer
CVS Health
Be accountable

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9
“Learn how not to be very strong-headed in a
certain opinion or a thought. Be very open.”
Craig Richardville
Chief Information & Analytics Officer
Carolina Health Partners
Be open-minded

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10
“It is amazing how quickly organizational stovepipes
can appear, even in the smallest organizations; or
how easy it is to think a problem is someone else’s
to solve, even if it impacts you directly.”
Art Landro
Chief Executive Officer
Sencha
Be a team player

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11
“Success will be dependent upon how well (you) are able
to inspire others on their never ending quest to make
something better … be prepared to put collective
objectives ahead of (your) own personal needs.”
Chris Cheney
Chief Technology Officer
MPP Global
Keep your ego in check

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“On his own, one of our developers created this report
that tapped into some public databases that the business
didn’t even know existed. He brought it to me and said,
‘I can show you where those loans went.’
I took him straight to the president’s office with me.”
Tim Elkins
Chief Information Officer
PrimeLending
Proactively solve problems

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“I took too long earlier in my career trying to find ways to create
controlled outcomes even if I couldn’t ultimately guarantee
them. Too often the result is that you end up watering down
the project, you move the needle less far, and you spend
just as long doing it.”
Bryson Koehler
Chief Technology Officer, IBM Watson
Be willing to take risks

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“The best innovators I've worked with are entrepreneurial in
nature, have a network of peers across the industry to
bounce ideas off of, and they are able to take experiments
and make them real.”
Justin Mennen
Chief Digital Officer
CompuCom
Don’t just ideate: Deliver

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“Curiosity is the key to any innovation. Constantly
asking intellectually challenging questions and
pushing the limits all the time is extremely important
for any organization in today's age.”
Subbu Rama
Co-founder & CEO, Bitfusion
Always be curious

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– Dwayne Johnson
The Rock
“All successes begin with self-discipline.
It starts with you.”

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Questions?
Thank you!
Ginny Hamilton
Community Manager, EnterprisersProject.com
Red Hat
@GinnyHam
ghamilton@redhat.com
linkedin.com/in/ginnyham/