Why communication, not technology is the key IT leadership differentiator at Renault

Lorraine Dodd, IS/IT Director at Renault UK explains why transparency is one of her key leadership principles

By moving away from command-and-control messaging and inevitability narratives, Renault’s Lorraine Dodd believes IT leaders can build genuine cyber resilience, stronger teams, and more inclusive career development through context, trust and shared responsibility.

In an era of constant cyber threats, accelerating transformation and lean technology teams, IT leadership is often framed as a technical challenge. But for Lorraine Dodd, IS/IT Director at Renault UK, the real differentiator is not technology, it is communication. Dodd believes that the way that IT leaders explain risk, share knowledge, shape culture and engage people ultimately determines whether IT enables resilience or breeds complacency.

Nowhere is this clearer than in the way organisations talk about cybersecurity.

When Messaging Creates Complacency

Dodd is candid about her concerns with the message that is now at the core of the marketing strategy for many cybersecurity services which is that a cybersecurity breach is inevitable and that organisations should focus on remediation and recovery rather than prevention.

“The first time I heard it, I agreed completely,” she says. “It felt honest and necessary. I get the motivation behind it, and I completely understand that we're trying to make it clear people are vulnerable, and you need to be prepared and that we need the budget to be able be prepared. I see that, but now I worry that people have become a bit complacent.”

The problem, she argues, is that inevitability can quietly morph into resignation. When leaders fail to fully articulate the real-world consequences of a cyber incident, the message loses its urgency. A breach becomes something abstract, technical, and fixable by “the IT team”, rather than a business-wide crisis with human, operational and reputational consequences.

Recent high-profile incidents have helped bring that reality into focus. Public disclosures, such as the British Library’s transparent account of its cyber-attack, have helped other organisations learn from their experience.

In addition to the British Library, Dodd also cites the string of cyberattacks against big name retailers last year. These incidents served to reconnect people with the consequences of an attack, not just the probability.

Don’t try to command and control

One of the biggest communication challenges for IT leaders is avoiding leaning into the impulse to issue directives and dictates when it comes to cybersecurity.

Telling people not to click on links or leave their laptops unattended are still necessary, but on their own they don’t do the job that IT leaders need them to do.

“If you don’t explain why you’re asking people to do these things, they disengage,” says Dodd. “Even worse, they might hide mistakes because they’re afraid of getting into trouble.”

At Renault UK, Dodd has focused on reframing cyber communication as shared responsibility. Initiatives such as “cyber security for the whole family” sessions deliberately move the conversation out of the office and into everyday life, helping employees understand how small habits affect not just the company, but their children and elderly relatives as well.

The result has been a high level of engagement. People have been asking for more training, not trying to avoid it.

Dodd also emphasises the importance of communication within IT teams themselves. She highlights how easily knowledge can become siloed, particularly in lean, fast-moving environments.

“We deliver a lot with a small team,” she says. “But delivery alone isn’t enough. Knowledge has to be shared, or you create risk.”

For Dodd, leadership means creating deliberate space for communication: monthly team briefings, shared documentation, demonstrations, and clear explanations of cause and effect.

This kind of transparency is essential for resilience. When knowledge is distributed, teams are less dependent on individuals and better equipped to pivot when priorities change. While it takes time it is an important investment.

Transparency as a Leadership Principle

Dodd’s emphasis on communication extends into recruitment, diversity and career development. From job adverts to interviews to succession planning, she sees transparency as a leadership obligation.

Clear language in job descriptions, she notes, makes a measurable difference to who applies. Being explicit about what is mandatory versus “nice to have” helps counteract the tendency for women to self-select out of roles they could excel in.

The same philosophy applies in interviews, Dodd explains:

“When it comes to interviews, I like to just try and make it as relaxed as possible. I want to see the person in front of me and give them the best chance to come across well.

“In advance we can let them know if we're going to ask them to do a specific task, and then just try and make them feel at ease before we start. If there’s a question where they might need to come back to it that’s absolutely fine. You’re not going to get the best out of someone by stressing them out.

“I think transparency is really important, just to make very clear what the role is, what they would be bringing to the role, so they know exactly what we're looking for. I often say the candidate is interviewing us as much as we are interviewing them.”

Post-hire, open communication underpins development and succession. Dodd believes leaders should actively talk about future roles, potential moves and skills gaps, rather than leaving people to guess what progression looks like.

This approach also shapes her mentoring work with initiatives such as SheCanCode and Elevate Women in Tech. Much of that mentoring, she says, revolves around helping people articulate their aspirations and realistically assess the gaps between where they are and where they want to be.

“Once you put it down on paper,” she says, “those gaps are often much smaller than people think.”

Across cybersecurity, team leadership and diversity, one theme runs consistently through Dodd’s approach: people perform better when they understand context, expectations and consequences.

It’s an approach which is less about issuing directives and more about shaping narratives. The leaders who succeed are those who can translate complexity into clarity, risk into responsibility, and strategy into something people can see themselves within.

In a world where change is continual, communication remains the skill that can anchor everything else.