CIOs Top 10 priorities in planning for new year
Will the economy recovery? What technology will drive the next 12 to 18 months? How can service levels be improved? These are just some of the questions that CIOs are asking as they start the budgeting process
CIOs Top 10 priorities in planning for new year - The Top Ten concerns CIOs are including in planning for the new year are:
- Budgets - Budgets have never been tighter. Organizations are striving to keep tight control over expenditures, even though they still need innovative technology to keep ahead of the competition.
- Staffing - Recruiting, managing and training staff are the most pressing concerns for CIOs as they are pressured to keep head counts down while improving service levels.
- Security - Internal and external threats are on the increase, especially as enterprises continue to increase the growth of mobile and wireless based applications.
- Compliance - Security and compliance work together for CIOs as many governance and compliance regulations were spawned from risk management and directly affect security.
- Resource Management - Enterprise management now demands more efficient processes. CIOs must now allocate more of their time and resources they used to spend on legacy maintenance on more productivity activities.
- Infrastructure - Updating technology infrastructures and keeping the backbone of an organization's IT up to date consumes more resources.
- Business Alignment - Keeping IT strategy in line with business strategy is something CIOs have become masters of, but it is still one of the areas that is resource intense.
- Managing Users - CIOs must prioritize the needs of their users and customers. Excellent customer service and cost effectiveness in driving the business forward are the two overlying themes for many businesses.
- Managing Change - The fast moving pace of technological innovation means change is a guaranteed part of the CIO's role. But the way they manage its effect on the business is more critical. As business processes change, changes in organizational cultures and how they affect people are very high on the CIO's agenda.
- Organizational Politics - To manage change and integration effectively, CIOs need the support of their senior management team. The success of change management programs and the contribution IT can make to those depend heavily on the support and drive of senior managers. If the CIO lines of report - CEO, CFO or COO -understand the power of transformational IT investment and if a CIO can educate and communicate what is possible.
CIO Role is Changing - Value Added is Key to Success
More CIOs are now part of the "C Level" executive management team
The chief information officer's (CIO) influence is growing in today's boardroom. And the role of the IT organizations that they lead is expanding as well. The CIOs of the next decade face many challenges. The CIOs who will succeed will have a common set of skills.
- CIOs both visionary and pragmatic - It is not enough to plan for innovation, the CIO needs to be perceptive and realistic. As an insightful manager, a CIO promotes broad technology agenda to help the business profit from leading-edge initiatives. At the same time as a pragmatist, a CIO deals with the realities of the business. The pragmatist also facilitates the productivity of current IT solutions. The CIO focuses on minimizing cost and maximizing results, in addition the CIO helps to increase the customer and product/service base of the enterprise.
- CIOs focus on ROI improvement of IT - CIOs will find new ways to help customers and the organization profit from how data is used while focusing on managing budgets and processes to eliminate or reduce costs.
- CIOs inspire the enterprise and expand the business impact of IT - CIOs will have proven expertise in both business and technical facets of their role. CIOs will interact with the enterprise and its executive team as enterprise leaders and drive new business initiatives and shifts jointly the other members of the executive team.
Top 10 CIO Management and Planning Priorities
Change from what was originally published - Updated to the latest data
Survey conducted by Janco Associates, Inc. identified the the management and planning priorities that CIOs and CFOs have. CIOs and CFOs were asked to list and rank their top 5 management and planning priorities. 142 companies participated in the survey and included both large and mid-sized companies that had at least 150 professionals under their direct control. Most recent discusion of this can be found at
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