What Duxbury Networking’s CIO does to balance head with heart

What keeps IT leaders up at night covers a broad range of issues including improving overall IT performance, data security, process risk and compliance, and meeting needs to improve business agility. For Shamiel Kimmie, Duxbury Networking’s CIO, a few of these make his list, as well as addressing talent shortages, managing relationships with his C-level peers, and finding a balance between the head and the heart.

With a battle of so many fronts, it’s a constantly shifting sense of priorities, but, specifically, South Africa’s brain drain is a main problem, he notes, with around 900,000 South Africans settled abroad since the end of 2020. For businesses looking to hire skilled people, this reality makes it more difficult to find needed talent and means that the hiring process is more drawn out than it was before. So when Kimmie looks to expand his team, he doesn’t focus on qualifications. Candidates could have computer science degrees, but if they don’t have the basic skills, necessary competencies, hands-on experiences, and practical knowledge, they won’t be a good fit for the business, he says.

Given how many skilled IT professionals are leaving the country, he’s very strategic about upskilling his more junior engineers and providing them with opportunities to learn from senior staff members. This, he says, is also a great way to retain them, which is incredibly important given how frequently top talent is poached by brands with bigger budgets.

A relationship with security

“I recently read an article that said: ‘If it’s smart, it’s vulnerable,’” he says. “With so many devices now connecting to our networks, it would be impossible for the modern CIO to not get involved in cybersecurity” — even if the business has a dedicated CISO. But when both the CIO and CISO are involved, this can create a bit of a standoff, with the former being asked to innovate and move the business forward, and the latter mandated to make sure this innovation happens with security in mind.

As such, the relationship between the two can end up being quite adversarial. Luckily for Kimmie, he works alongside Duxbury’s CISO well, and together they collaborate to better understand where key vulnerabilities lie in the business, as well as educate employees about emerging threats.

According to Kimmie, managing any relationship between C-level executives comes down to mutual respect. Whether these relationships are between the CIO and CEO or the CIO and CFO, everyone needs to take time to understand the other’s perspective.