The Executive Status Report

Tom's latest eBook has been released on Amazon: "The 7 Myths of IT Integrations". Tom is also a Program Director for a large Midwest corporation and has been an adjunct faculty member at Walsh College. He has managed global web initiatives, data center moves and large multi-million dollar programs.

  Communications Management   Strategy  

The CIO was ticking items off of an already-crowded agenda. There was a new initiative underway that was of particular interest to the CEO--and so the CIO was keenly intent on receiving an update on the project.

This was Jennifer's first time in an executive meeting and she came in prepared to impress; she was a very detail-oriented PM. Unfortunately, she was not coached for success.

“Next up, let’s get an update on the AXIIS project,” the CIO said flatly.

Jennifer led by handing out copies of her Gantt chart. She also had her risk log (with mitigations carefully documented for each identified risk), she had highlighted her critical path, updated status as to how her tasks were progressing, knew her top issues and where she stood with respect her budget. In short, she was ready. As she began unpacking her story, it was clear she was involved in all aspects of the project.

After about seven minutes, the CIO slipped off his glasses, sat back in his chair and with a slight tilt of his head stared at his VP of applications. The VP politely interrupted Jennifer saying, “It certainly seems as if you have a lot of information here. Unfortunately, we will need to move on--can you update us again next month?”

Jennifer was puzzled, but gathered her materials and left the conference room. She didn’t feel like she connected …

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