Two heads are better than one

The new Headforwards CIO Advisory Service

Business and technology leaders need to be thinking strategically about data, cyber and software strategies, and how all these elements affect and contribute to the overall business.

With so many plates to spin, it can be easy for IT leaders to get caught up focusing on here and now, prioritising the operational aspects of the business. But as a consequence, finding dedicated time to think strategically about longer term IT needs can be a challenge.

Getting the how right in terms of building software, is important. But IT strategy and digital transformation underpins so much of modern-day business that what we build and why we build it plays a significant role in a business’ ability to compete long term.

At Headforwards, we’re very good (if I do say so myself) at introducing better ways of building software so that it’s more reliable and delivers better value. But we also wanted to support clients with their strategic decision making, so this year we launched the Headforwards Advisory service.

The benefit of external support

An external perspective has multiple benefits to a business. For complex strategic decisions, advisory can bring a broader range of experiences into the mix. What’s more, from within a business it can be hard to see the wood for the trees, with all sorts of internal influences shaping outcomes.

External perspectives can help to take company bureaucracy out of decisions, and provide additional credibility to strategic decisions. Advisory is about working with an organisation on a long-term basis to help build the strategic knowledge and capability within it.

Our Advisory partners work with a business to increase the knowledge and capability of its people. It’s a long term relationship and an alternative approach to outsourcing questions and receiving answers. ?

It’s down to the individual business to decide how much value they want to get from the additional capability; there’s no set length of time to sign up to. It’s about supplementing existing knowledge with the knowledge of people with wider experiences, in a way that fits with budgets.

We’re really lucky to have Pete Reed as Lead Partner for Headforwards Advisory. Pete has over 12 years’ experience of being a CIO, and Headforwards worked closely with him over a six-year period during his time at AXA Health.?

A long term partnership

The addition of Headfowards Advisory allows us to partner with businesses in a new way, observe closely, see how it operates, and how it develops.

By working with a business long-term and understanding how it operates, we can help it continuously improve; the value of the leaderships’ expertise builds over time as the business leverages the greatest value from its software, data, cyber, and cyber security.

As a technology business, we help organisations move forward, become more Agile and introduce better technical Agile practices into their software development approaches. And I’m really excited that we now also have the capability to help each business understand how to get maximum value out of the process.