Gartner findings on CIO role in 2015

Gartner findings on CIO role in 2015

by | 18 Jul 2015 | Technology

Gartner findings on the CIO Role change in 2015

Takeaways from Gartner research on the ever evolving role of the CIO.

If you take a moment to scan the social media, technology is a constantly moving ball, but sadly the CIO role does not always move at the same pace and there’s a lot of discussion being written about CIOs where you’ll get a range of different perspectives — the job is fraught, constantly in flux, no one wants it, or the CIO has not moved into the digital arena fast enough.

“There is validity in all these views, some more so than others, and the fact that so many are discussing this on social media proves there’s a good reason to be addressing it,” says Craig Ashmole, Founding Partner at London based IT consulting CCServe. “What is clear to me however is the boardroom needs to take the ‘bull-by-the-horns’ now, by asking those difficult questions:- Do we have the right CIO for the job?”

It would be naive to think that the CMO or even the evolving CDO (Chief Digital Officer) role can really just walk in and replace the CIO and the company will carry on from a technology perspective. If the CIO is addressing their technology department by moving to a world of innovative leadership and commoditising the utility elements of IT then the CIO is well on the road to getting things right.

So, how to get a grip on what’s going on in the world of the CIO? Reading a recent blog I notice that it is a serious C-Change environment, here’s a rundown of some of the most recent data from research firm Gartner about the role of the CIO, from the descriptive to the prescriptive over the first 8 months of 2015.

Perception is important

According to the Gartner report “CIOs Should Consider a New Approach to User Satisfaction,” perception of IT performance plays a significant role in how CIOs view the extent to which IT is delivering on executive expectations. The unfortunate thing here, the report says, is that what executives expect isn’t always matched up with what IT is actually able to deliver. The report details better methods of gauging satisfaction by asking the right kinds of questions to the right people in the company. It describes CIOs as bridge builders, in part by “[enabling] business leaders to better interpret the needs of their organisations.”

The percentage of female CIOs has plateaued

In Gartner’s CIO Agenda 2015: A Gender Perspective, 337 of the 2,473 respondents were women, which is about 13.6% of the sample. That percentage fits into the worldwide average of female CIOs, which is estimated from 10-14%. Gartner said the numbers have plateaued and actually are fairly similar to the plateaus found in the numbers of women in senior positions in non-technology leadership roles.

Women CIOs expect greater budget increases in 2015, more so than male CIOs

The breakdown is 2.4% vs. 0.8%. It’s unclear why exactly that is, but it’s happened two years in a row. Gartner did point out that other previous data showed that when it comes to risk management, women CIOs were more concerned about underinvestment in risk initiatives. Risk data plus budget numbers might hint toward women putting more attention toward resources.

Software-defined infrastructures, IT service continuity, and integrated systems are the top 3 emerging trends that will affect CIOs’ decision-making this year.

When looking at these trends, Gartner recommends a trio of being aware, engaged, and proactive. That means tracking trends, understanding how they’ll affect current, new, or future operations, placing them on the “shortlist” for things to evaluate or implement. The report describes a situation where people expect to have access to everything always, and as a CIO, merely delivering on that expectation is the “bare minimum.”

CIOs should take another look at their company’s chief strategy officer

Gartner put out an entire report focusing on this idea, saying that culturally, even though CSOs are c-suite, they’re often viewed as “externalities” and even treated with suspicion. In the digital business era, that should be the case, and the report talks about how CSOs increasingly affect the IT and digital business agenda.

Men and women CIOs are more similar than different

One of the report’s recommendations was to avoid gender bias as it found that there are actually more similarities than differences between men and women CIOs in their approaches to leadership, how they view technology, and how they handle digital leadership priorities. For example, the top two tech priorities for men and women CIOs in 2015 are BI/analytics and infrastructure and data centre. Women put cloud ahead of ERP in the third and fourth spots, and both put mobile as no. 5. Similarities went on from there.

Publicly announced initiatives are up

When looking at the world’s largest insurers (CIOs of World’s Largest Insurers Continue to Invest in Digital Transformation), Gartner found an increase of 10% in publically announced IT initiatives as compared to 2013. They interpreted this as a possible indicator of growth in IT spending.

A large chunk of those initiatives are mobile apps and digitisation

Gartner said about a third of publicly announced initiatives were digitisation (18%) and mobile applications (15%). They recommend looking at these trends as a point of comparison and seeing where one’s own company was in relation to market trends.

One thing not addressed by specifically by Gartner however is; how the boardroom gets their CIO to change if they have not already done so. The first and primary move should consider external support to bring creative recommendations to the table the secondary move should be the actual transition based on the revised TOM.

“There is the obvious Big-5 consultancy houses that can be approached and are so often used, but don’t neglect to consider the huge pool of innovative and agile interim consulting and transformation resources from the smaller boutique marketplace.” comments Craig Ashmole. “These interim independent resources are often well qualified for this change game, especially where it’s to support existing CIOs for short periods of skills Top-up”.

Boardrooms should do less finger pointing but enable the CIO function to transition as quickly as possible and don’t look at skills augmentation as a failure but as a means to take the CIO from their present comfort zones to where the “IT Magic” is.

Having spent a majority of my career working with and supporting the Corporate CIO Function, I now seek to provide a forum whereby CIOs or IT Directors can learn from the experience of others to address burning Change or Transformation challenges.

Craig Ashmole

Founding Director CCServe

The CIO becomes the Chameleon In Chief

The CIO becomes the Chameleon In Chief

by | 29 Jun 2015 | Consulting, Technology

We are seeing a high volume of discussion on the expectations of the CIO and the need to change tactics

The two-speed CIO just isn’t going to cut it – tech chiefs need to be able to respond to changing environments and requirements more quickly than ever.

he modern CIO must act like a professional chameleon, changing their form and their IT function to suit the fast-changing business environment.

Analyst Garter suggests CIOs are fully aware that they will need to change in order to succeed in digital business, with 75 per cent of IT leaders saying they will need to adapt their style and skills during the next three years. The analyst talks of the need for executives to adopt a bi-modal stance to IT.

Modern CIOs, suggests Gartner, need a rock solid and efficient IT operation that, frees up time and resources for innovation. So, does the idea of a bi-modal CIO resonate with IT leaders and how can technology chiefs change their style to suit business need?

Does bi-modal IT resonate with CIOs?

Former CIO and digital advisor Ian Cohen says the keys to success in the digital age, such as understanding product management, behaviour, and sentiment, often have very little to do with the traditional view of enterprise IT. In fact, Cohen says the often used description of a bi-modal IT is nonsense.

“I still hear people talking about the need to manage both the back and the front office as if they are two separate things and are all you need to consider,” he says. “If you understand the power of technology, you’ll know that IT has always been multi-modal. The best CIOs already have responsibility for a broad range of digital transformation projects as part of their portfolio of management skills.”

Gartner says as many as 89 per cent of CIOs believe that the digital world is creating new types and levels of risk for their business. What is, perhaps, more surprising is that 11 per cent of CIOs do not recognise the change. For such IT leaders, a wakeup call is surely required. And as Cohen suggests, that moment could be fast approaching.

“If you don’t have that focus, there’s a big risk that you won’t be a CIO for much longer,” he says. “Ultimately, digital needs to be everyone’s responsibility – no single executive can own the digital agenda. But someone has to be the catalyst for transformation and the best CIOs are agents of change. It’s not about being bi-modal, it about your organisation – and the technology that enables and supports business – being multi-modal.”

Research suggests technology chiefs do understand the importance of responsiveness. Consultant Deloitte reports that more than two fifths (41 per cent) of executives recognise the importance of an agile delivery model to mature IT organisations. There is, however, confusion about how this state might be reached — and Tullow Oil CIO Andrew Marks is another executive who believes the phrase bi-modal IT is nonsense.

“There’s a lot of talk about the evolution of the CIO role, but technology management is, and always has been, multi-speed,” he says. “While IT leadership does change over time, it’s impossible to say how the position will change in the future or how many years it might take to reach the next stage of leadership.”

Marks’ suggestion is that the act of being a CIO is directly related to the context of the business within which an individual operates. And there isn’t a “CIO to order”; your career could go in any direction, such as working in operations, working for a start-up, and then returning back to work in IT.

“I don’t think you need the badge of successfully transforming a business through IT to be considered for your next role,” he says. “If you’re not into running continuous change initiatives, you will still be involved in milestone events, yet these tend to be subtle changes, rather than complete organisational transformations.”

How can CIOs change their style and meet business need?

The modern CIO, therefore, needs to be a multi-modal chameleon. There is an almost limitless amount of variations in form and function of the role due to the different demands in host organisations. What is more, some CIOs will not necessarily find it easy to adopt the right stance.

Stephen Hand, former CIO and principal consultant at Consult 360, says a willingness to think differently – particularly in regards to innovation – can be a big ask for IT leaders. Unlike other c-suite peers, technology professionals are not necessarily used to thinking in new and radical ways.

“The IT professional’s longstanding focus on governance, strategy, and information means many technology executives have more in common with the finance chief than some of their more entrepreneurial executive peers, especially those in the marketing and sales departments,” says Hand.

But an insular style of leadership is simply not an option. As businesses look to gain a competitive advantage from digital transformation, engagement seems to be the watchword for IT leaders, who must continue to spend less time in the data centre and more time facing internal and external customers.

David Reed, head of information services and infrastructure at the Press Association, picks up on this point, suggesting that successful CIOs spend as much time as possible trying to understand how technology can make a positive impact to the overall business.

“IT must align with both internal and external business objectives,” he says, stating that stakeholder management is an absolutely critical success factor for modern CIOs. “If the technology you implement doesn’t do anything for the bottom line, it’s a waste of time, and will lead you down the path to failure.”

Engagement requires commitment on both sides. Such close working is engrained into the working culture at Top Right Group. The media firm’s IT director Sean Harley says the technology team supports the firm’s product managers that are delivering new services for customers. Many of the projects being delivered have a strong digital element.

“Customers today want social interaction and personalisation,” he says. “Does a dedicated CDO give you an advantage in those areas? It’s debatable, but what I do know is that a decent product manager who knows their sector – and who works hand in hand with the technology team – can deliver those benefits. And that’s what we see in our organisation.”

Having spent a majority of my career working with and supporting the Corporate CIO Function, I now seek to provide a forum whereby CIOs or IT Directors can learn from the experience of others to address burning Change or Transformation challenges.

Craig Ashmole

Founding Director CCServe