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What's The First Thing A CIO Should Do?

It’s the first day of a brand new position. What’s the first order of business?

Chemical Bank, in Midland, Michigan, said earlier this week that it had hired its first CIO. Chemical bank is the third-largest bank holding company headquartered in Michigan, according to the company, with 129 banking offices and $3.7 billion in assets.

Gary Richardson, formerly a senior VP with ABN Ambro where he was responsible for technology strategy and architecture, has been tapped to take the position of senior VP and CIO -- “Chemical Bank’s first Chief Information Officer,” according to a statement.

Chemical Bank has operated its own data processing operation center for more than 29 years, the company said. Richardson will be responsible for “planning and implementing enterprise information systems to support both distributed and centralized business operations,” according to the statement. David Ramaker, chairman of Chemical Bank, said, “Under Gary’s leadership, we look forward to making our information technology offerings a strategic advantage for the company.”

What’s the first thing Gary should do?

1) Check the service level agreements and software contracts with the Bank’s major vendors to see what can be renegotiated immediately to improve service for customers and save money.
2) Appoint a chief security officer and haul out the network configuration maps to try and find the weakest security points; immediately put the three best network adminstrators to work fixing them.
3) Meet with the applications development team to determine the status of all projects, figure out which ones have the best potential for offering customers new features, the bank new opportunities, and the employees improved processes. Kill the rest.
4) Call IBM Global Services.
5) Check the luxury box schedule for Detroit Tigers’ home games for the rest of the season.
6) All of the above.
7) Other ________________________________ (please specify)

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