Overview
Although we increasingly use the term to describe almost any top executive responsible for IT, it is obvious that all CIOs are not the same. They have different career tracks, come from different disciplines, and offer distinctly different experience and skill sets. The consequence of this is that they create value in different ways that are not always well understood and that are not always well matched to the challenges they face. Over the next five years, the most critical challenge facing the CIO is to create the conditions for an effective business response to the dual impacts of continued technological change and the growing influence of globalization. To enable this effective response, the CIO must build a team capable of addressing the various threats and opportunities presented.
The CIO must play a pivotal role in leading the IT capability deployed by the organization regardless of market, organization structure, sourcing strategy and reporting lines. An effective CIO must embrace all means to create the capabilities required by the organization, through both formal and informal channels, using both authority and influence. CIOs must understand their specific levers of power, and use them to generate the conditions for the changes required. They must use their influence to educate and organize their boards, their CEOs, business partners, suppliers and customers to remove obstacles and enable an effective business response.
Central to all of this is the CIO’s core team. With themselves as member #1, CIOs need to surround themselves with executive IT teams that capitalize on their personal career strengths and experience, and that compensate for their weaknesses through the recruitment of complementary skills and experience. These teams need to lead effectively to create the capabilities and responses their organizations require.
Our research will be based on data collected from very large organizations operating in global markets and on personal interviews with 20-25 leading CIOs operating in Europe and the USA.