The National CIO Review: Issue III.VI Deepak Kaul, CIO for Zebra Technologies

Q&A: Deepak Kaul, CIO for Zebra Technologies, on Scaling Innovations for Improved Efficiencies and Building a Reputation of Execution

By: H. Michael Burgett

For Deepak Kaul, Chief Information Officer for Zebra Technologies, the company’s constant growth and evolution allowed him to adapt, take on various roles, and rise through the ranks to his current position.

In this issue, we talked with Deepak about the initiatives that he has overseen while CIO, from completing a complex M&A carve-out project, to building out a cyber and physical security organization, to launching a Digital Automation Center.

Deepak also shared with us the ways in which a former boss positively influenced his professional life and how three women have shaped his personal life, along with his advice for aspiring CIOs on the importance of being results-oriented, team culture and business savvy.

Walk us through your CIO path. How did you decide to pursue a career in technology, and how did you progress to your current organization?

In college, I pursued both sciences and engineering. Technology has always been a natural interest for me. When I graduated in 1992, I started looking for a job in the technology sector. Software was red hot with plenty of open positions. I started work at Interleaf and landed at Oracle after a year. I spent eleven years at Oracle. This was the most formative period of my career.

My role at Oracle was in consulting services. It was an amazing training ground. Not only did I learn about technology, but also about complex cross-functional business processes. I had the privilege of managing very large ERP implementations for Fortune 500 customers. I was able to gain hands on experience with business process re-engineering as well as all aspects of software development and implementation lifecycles.

I finished my MBA on weekends at the University of Chicago. This undertaking was very impactful for me. I was finally able to make  sense of what they meant in The Wall Street Journal. I learned to appreciate how finance and economics drive management decisions.

My hands-on experience, coupled with the business education, inspired me to take a role in the industry where I own my own decisions rather than being a hired gun for projects at multiple customers. So, when the opportunity at Zebra became available after a two-year stint at Brunswick, I made the career move. I joined Zebra when it was at $800 million in revenue. Today, we are almost at $5 billion. There was never an opportunity to get bored at Zebra. The quest for change and growth created all sorts of challenging and diverse opportunities. I was fortunate to work with an immensely talented team. We developed a solid reputation for successfully completing complex global transformation projects.

Eight years later, when my boss left the company for another opportunity, I applied for his job and was selected as his successor for the CIO role.

Would you consider yourself a CIO, a CTO, or a hybrid? Why? What are the essential differences?

I consider myself as a CIO. I view a CTO being more focused on setting strategy and vision for commercial products. I see a CIO as an enterprise leader. A CTO drives the product vision externally. We have a CTO who is very, very good at that.

I am engaged in working with our business leaders for running our business. This involves developing a technology strategy which enables the vision for corporate as well as various business units and shared services.

What initiatives have you overseen to date in your time with your organization? What’s on the horizon?

Shortly after becoming CIO at Zebra, my first initiative was to finish an inflight complex M&A program. This was not an ordinary project because it involved a complex carve-out from a large company, integration of a business with two times our revenue, and with three times as many people. This was one of the most challenging assignments in my entire career. The whole company was impacted and stood behind this program. Ultimately, we were extremely successful and able to realize our “One Zebra” vision.

We built out our security department from a two-person team to a full-fledged, mature security organization. We now have a Chief Security Officer, and we are responsible not only for cybersecurity, but also for product security and physical security.

Last year, IT completed 129 projects successfully. We have earned a reputation of being a “highly disciplined execution machine”. Our team is extremely proud of all this and is earning respect and credibility among our business partners.

We are running IT as a business. By defining key metrics and measuring them quarterly, we are able to make better decisions regarding value delivery, costs, and new service offerings. We have made significant improvements in our SLA’s and customer satisfaction metrics.

Right now, I’m in process of launching a Digital Automation Center. This will be able to scale our successful innovation pilots and drive efficiencies in various business units. Modern digital technologies like robotic process automation, chatbots, machine learning, optical character recognition, and API microservices services will be leveraged in this initiative.

[Click Below to Read Full Article]

The author, H. Michael Burgett has more than 25 years of experience in the technology sector. He is the founder of CIO Partners, a nationally recognized executive search firm with a niche in the technology sector specializing in top-level leadership engagements. He can be reached at [email protected].

To subscribe to future issues of The National CIO Review - visit www.nationalcioreview.com