Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.
– George Bernard Shaw
Chief Information Officers (CIOs), primarily were responsible for acquiring, implementing, and operating a business’s information technology systems and services. Now Technology and Digital Disruption have compelled CIOs to match their pace with the rest of the world. According, The 2018 CIO Survey “Nearly all (95%) of this year’s CIO survey, respondents expect their jobs to change as a result of digitalization.
The new role of Chief Information Officers (CIOs)
Today, as we progress towards a virtual world success for businesses, lies in transformation to digital. And at the fulcrum of Digital Transformation lies the customers. While businesses are rapidly adopting disruptive technology to ensure customer experience, the role of CIOs is evolving along. Here’s how the role is changing-
CIOs now will address overall business risks
Once, the CIO was responsible simply for keeping IT projects on time and on the budget – but today, the job involves active management of every aspect of complex investment programmes which can cost millions of pounds. Stakeholder skills are crucial, and strong programme management skills are needed to ensure that investment programmes deliver the full value expected by the organization. Today the apart from IT risks CIOs needs to address overall business risks.
Deliver Collaboratively
Not only just IT department and technology, but a CIOs role today also extend to almost every aspect of a business- From Marketing to Sales and Customer service. And hence there are Newly added objectives – customer focus, business growth, innovation- for CIOs across the industry.
Not only as support function CIOs now need to strategize
CIOs now need to communicate strategy and business benefits as thoroughly and compellingly. They not only have to understand technologies that are reshaping the business landscape—mobile, cloud, big data—but also recognize how these technologies can benefit and affect their business architectures and infrastructures.
Revenue Generation for overall Business
Not just IT cost control, The role now moves away from controlling cost and engineering processes to revenue generation and deriving value from information (Data and Insights).
Data will come first
Now they’ll have to think strategically and leverage technology to delve the right Data to fulfill an organization’s goals and objectives. They’ll not only have to manage data, but also interpret data and insights, and effectively communicate it to CEOs, CMOs, CDOs, and CTOs
Innovation will stay, top of the mind
For CIOs and IT teams, procurement is pivotal to source new and required technologies. Today sourcing the right technology to drive business values and create new businesses opportunities is the key to drive innovation.
Drive culture Breaking the Silos
For long IT departments across industries has worked in silos. No longer which is possible. Because of the growing dependency of businesses on technology, CIOs and IT are operating now at the forefront of businesses. Hence CIOs along their team would require footprints across departments. This would provide an opportunity to drive the organization’s culture and building trust, creating strong relationships among executives and managers.
The bottom line
Information (data and insights) today is the core of success for any businesses. It’s only the chief information officers (CIOs) who has the ability to understand current and emerging technology trends. This not only empowers them to delve into new business opportunities seamlessly but also deliver the right information turning it into a competitive advantage for the organization.
Lavelle Networks is currently helping CIOs and CTOs to transform their legacy network into the network of the future – Software-Defined Wide Area Network (SD-WAN). It is interesting to see how not only CIOs but overall Information Technology teams, in their new role are strengthening their capabilities, and are constantly learning. At Lavelle’ we truly believe professionals should keep learning to avoid the risk of falling behind. Share your experience below in the comments.
Tell us your thoughts on how you see the role of CIOs and IT teams in the coming future.
The blog was curated using the following sources
