Hold The Presses! CIOs Are Becoming Strategic!
That's right, CIOs are becoming more strategic. And it's official too. Well as official as having the Wall Street Journal saying so that is. The WSJ is a pretty good indicator of what's going on in the business world so I'm taking this as a good sign.
In yesterday's edition (February 20, 2007 Page B1) the Wall Street Journal ran a story by Pui-Wing Tam entitled "CIO Jobs Morph From Tech Support Into Strategy". This story is available online, however you must be a registered subscriber to view it. It is a rather interesting story of how IT is progressing from just tech support to becoming a strategic business partner. Tam provides some examples of IT and CIOs being involved in the development of new business lines, meeting with customers and helping to transform the business.
In the article Tam talks about 4 high-profile, large company CIOs. These include Tom Shelman at Northrop Grumman, Randy Mott at HP, Marc West at H&R Block and Louie Ehrlich at one of Chevron's business units. Given the size of their IT operations this is not at all surprising. It does however, beg the question: What about the rest of us? What is the situation in companies that are not as large and don't have the resources of these large companies?
Although Tam doesn't provide detailed specifics it does appear that this trend does go beyond just large companies. Tam reports:
According to recent CIO polls from research firm Gartner Inc., 50% of CIOs surveyed said they now have duties outside of core technology, such as helping to craft corporate strategy. That is up from about 20% three years ago, says Mark McDonald, a Gartner analyst.
"Companies are requiring CIOs to be more thoughtful about strategy," says Reynold Lewke, a partner in the Palo Alto, Calif., office of recruiting firm Egon Zehnder International who leads the firm's CIO practice. "Many CIOs have become business partners."
In recognition of this job shift, more CIOs are now reporting to top executives such as chief executives, chief financial officers and chief operating officers than to other parts of an organization. Last year, 74% of CIOs surveyed reported to a CEO, chief financial officer or operating chief, up from 69% in 2003, according to Gartner.
This is good news. I don't say this because it appears to be an upgrade in our stature (that is a nice side benefit though). Rather, this represent a unique opportunity truly utilize the full potential of information technology. We've been talking for years about this potential. We might now get a chance to help deliver on this. Are you ready?
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Posted by Mike on
February 21, 2007 in
Strategy & Management
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