February 2015: Swings and Roundabouts

As some of you are no doubt already aware, James Rundle left us at the end of February after three-and-a-half years. During that time, he became a key member of the Waters and WatersTechnology teams, and was my right-hand man in the London office. And, like Jake Thomases, who left us just under a year ago after accepting a place at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, DC, James’s departure has left us with large shoes to fill.

But fill them we must, and, as Dan DeFrancesco, Jake’s successor, has illustrated in the short time he has been with us, that which we lost with Jake’s departure, we have more than made up for thanks to Dan’s arrival.

This revolving-door scenario is by no means particular to the publishing industry. Capital markets CIOs face similar challenges, although they would argue that their tribulations are that much more acute, given the nature and often complexity of the technologies they deal with, especially when it comes to mission-critical and aging legacy systems, of which every financial services firm has at least some experience.

It’s natural at times like this to dwell on the negative aspects of losing key staff members. CIOs might panic at the thought that the one person with intimate knowledge of the firm’s proprietary portfolio management system had just left the building, which, in the short term, would naturally be a cause for concern. That “key-man risk” might even escalate and present the firm with any number of operational risks, but on the whole, once the dust has settled, these things tend to work themselves out.

Panic and a lack of perspective can also lead to the hunt for a like-for-like replacement and then shoehorning the new arrival into the vacant mold, a strategy that is both unfair and naïve—unfair to the new starter, in that he or she would be expected to mimic the skills and capabilities of the person they have replaced; and naïve on the part of the CIO, who is almost guaranteed to be disappointed by the new starter and likely also to overlook their expertise and ability to add value to the organization.

It’s difficult being sanguine and pragmatic at times such as these, but it’s important to remember that organizations are invariably more substantial than a single person. Losing or replacing staff members is a storm that all managers need to weather from time to time. Those who have been in positions of authority for any length of time, and have seen it all before, tend to manage these situations without too much difficulty. They’re also able to focus on what the new arrival offers the firm. And so from their perspective, what they lose on the swings they gain on the roundabouts.