Already a subscriber?When the CEO of Brisbane-based software company TechnologyOne was pitched the idea of having his executives swap jobs, he never considered it a crazy idea, even if others do.
TechnologyOne CEO Ed Chung says there has been a noticeable shift in the tech market in the past three to six months.“But he said, ‘I love what you’ve been doing, I’m going to pluck you and put you as our head of R&D’.” “You don’t have to be an expert in their part of the business, but it wakes you up like you wouldn’t believe. When you speak to the executives they learn so much,” Chung says.“When you become a CEO, you start watching people, everything about them, their behaviour, their decision-making and leadership style, you watch them in the job swap and you go, ‘yeah, this person has got it, or maybe they don’t have it and need some more development’.
For example, the CFO reported there wasn’t enough financial rigour and due diligence in the people and culture department. TechOne is now looking at extending the program to its middle managers across its top 30 roles. BOSS asks MacDonald where the job swap idea came from. “We made it up completely,” he says. “It is a little on the crazy side, I’ll admit it.”
TechOne’s head of strategic operations Brock Douglas became the CFO. The CFO Cale Bennett became head of people and culture. Head of people Alison Chalmer became the COO. The chief technology officer Chandan Potukuchi became head of sales and marketing. “You are also getting your teams to see a different view,” he says. “They say ‘a change is as good as a holiday’ and our teams get to see a vastly different leadership style,” he says.