Modernizing Without Impressing
Chuck Scharnagle joined Revere Copper Products three and a half years ago as CIO. Revere is the oldest continuous manufacturer in the United States, celebrating its 225th year. When he arrived, the company had spent decades putting money into the plant and keeping technology alive with minimal investment. Systems were 20, 30, and 40 years old. Some programs had been written by the grandfather of a current help desk employee.
The team was five or six people, and their job was keeping the lights on. Every employee Scharnagle met in those early weeks told him the same thing: they loved the people in IT, but they hated working with IT. The department did not deliver, did not support, or respond in a timely manner.
Scharnagle's career before Revere included Fortune 500 hardware manufacturing at EMC, apparel retail at Fruit of the Loom, power generation, and a 14-year run as CIO for the Mohegan Tribe. That range of environments taught him that credibility transfers less than most CIOs expect.
Same Game, Different Players
Scharnagle compares the CIO transition across organizations to a coach changing teams after 15 years. The game is the same, but the players, the owner, and the expectations are all different.
"That's why it's really important when you first get in to learn your new environment," Scharnagle said. "You've got to stop going, well, we always did it this way. You need to take those lessons and apply them, but recognize that you're applying them in a different environment."
At Revere, that meant spending 60 to 90 days talking to people across the organization before presenting a plan. When he did, the ask was large. The president's response was measured: how about one or two hires now, and we'll see about more later. Scharnagle accepted. Within six months he was getting more people. Within a year, more again. Two years in, there were less questions regarding team requests.
Shipping Product and Paying People
Early in his career, Scharnagle learned how non-technical executives actually evaluate IT leadership. In his first CIO interview, he told the CEO directly that executives have the attention span of gnats and that he understood he needed to operate within that.
"CEOs in manufacturing," Scharnagle said, "they care about two things: shipping product and paying people. Because if you stop either one of those, everything stops."
He traces that clarity back to watching a surgeon explain a complex procedure to his father after his grandmother's accident. His father understood none of it. Scharnagle asked the doctor to explain it again in plain terms. The lesson stayed with him. CIOs who try to impress with technical detail are solving the wrong problem. Executives want to know if the data will be there when they need it, if the new system can go live without stopping production, and if the acquisition can be absorbed on schedule.
IT Is a Customer Service Organization
When Scharnagle arrived at Revere, help desk tickets were low because people had stopped asking for help. He restructured the team, built out the help desk, and focused on responsiveness. Tickets now increase every month because people trust that their issues will be addressed.
"One of the things I learned running the help desk at Black & Decker was just that. It's about customer service," he said. "You need to listen and understand what the problem is. Then you need to respond. Even if you can't fix it, you need to let the person know that you understand and that you will get somebody to help them."
The team has grown from five to fifteen. They have moved from a model where everyone did everything to a structured organization with dedicated application, technology, and project management groups.
What Three Years Changes
Scharnagle acknowledges that the company still sees IT as too slow. The backlog is real. But the relationship with the executive team has shifted because the department now delivers on what it promises. He is building internal presentations to help operations understand what IT is working on and why certain projects take priority.
"Trust is about honesty," Scharnagle said. "Looking at people and saying what you know. And then as you learn more, update them and don't keep them in the dark."