volution of CIOs to Prevent Existential Threats

The evolving role of CIOs, the need to adapt, and the risk of being replaced by a chief transformation officer.

FREMONT, CA: The increasing significance of digital technology in business is causing the CIO role to change rapidly. As a result, IT leaders improve their advisory skills, establish strong relationships, and embrace strategic transformation to avoid being overtaken by business executives with a blend of technical and business knowledge needed to lead transformational strategies in the future.

CIOs are facing a new challenge as they are taking more control over technology decisions, leaving the CIOs with reduced influence over the technical agenda from the C-suite.  This is happening when CIOs are already feeling the pressure to accelerate digital transformation. Business executives are learning technology faster than CIOs are learning business, leading to a challenge for CIOs from LOB counterparts.

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Fragmented technology budgets and transformation strategies could worsen the situation where CIOs are challenged by LOB counterparts. This can result in challenges for CEOs as money is distributed in different pockets within the organisation, and there is a lack of a cohesive and holistic transformation, which ultimately affects the realisation of collective value for the organisation.

The Growing Stature of LOBs

In the current situation where organisations have multiple strategies such as digital strategy, IT strategy, security strategy, business strategy, and corporate strategy is a challenge. They become irrelevant in a fast-changing world as they collect dust and are reviewed only once a year or more. Advances in AI and quantum computing will further empower LOBs to lead digital transformation.

How CIOs Can Remain Relevant

Recent years have demonstrated that the CIO position is essential for companies to remain resilient and carry out digital transformation plans. To prevent LOB executives from taking over their responsibilities, CIOs need to prove to other C-suite members that their decisions and actions directly contribute to the company's financial success. Additionally, CIOs should establish relationships with stakeholders in LOBs and use business relationship managers to provide better service to customer-facing departments.

CIOs work with LOBs to deliver successful digital business outcomes, provide strategic advice and facilitate communication between IT and the rest of the organisation. They should review their sourcing practices to maintain their architecture goals and budgetary targets. Additionally, they should manage technical debt across the application portfolio using agile portfolio management and value stream mapping.

CIOs need to do more than just acquire business knowledge–they also need to develop strong interpersonal skills and lead people across different functions and locations. They should also be able to use new technologies to give their organisation a competitive advantage.

It is vital to take action to address the trend by changing the mindset of technology resources and preparing them to integrate into LOB through training and a culture shift. CIOs must recruit a digital-savvy workforce that aligns with customer expectations and become an advisory function to stay relevant.

Preparing the IT workforce to work with LOBs requires a cultural shift, training, and awareness. CIOs need to become advisory functions by recruiting digital-savvy staff, aligning themselves to customer expectations, and blending into LOBs. the budget has also been decentralised from IT business units, allowing ownership and responsibility for services and contract lifecycles. LOBs are taking the lead with IT taking an advisory role, and market innovators are being connected to LOBs with IT support to encourage innovation.

What the Future CIO Role Could Look Like

CIOs are expected to go beyond their traditional IT responsibilities and play multiple roles in today’s business landscape due to covid-19 pandemic and the growing demand for digital transformation. To stay relevant, CIOs must continue to learn new skills and enhance their existing ones.

In the future, CIOs and other technology professionals will have opportunities to expand their roles beyond IT and add value to other CXO functions. This will be essential for staying relevant, and IT professionals realise that they cannot work in isolation in a standalone IT business unit. Ideally, they must be integrated into the LOB and be able to contribute to the organisation's success.

The technology and digital functions get integrated into LOBs, they will be responsible for driving strategies and delivering digital products and services. Consequently, IT teams will become smaller as a majority of their members move to LOBs. The role of IT will evolve to focus on maintaining infrastructure, communications, and cybersecurity. Additionally, cross-functional teams will become essential for success in a digital world. These changes will significantly transform the CIOs role.

Being a part of the business is more effective in driving digital adoption than trying to drive it from IT. CIOs should consider taking on roles in LOBs with titles such as chief translation officer, chief digital advisory officer, or chief innovation officer. 

There is an evolving role of CIOs and the need for them to adapt to stay relevant in the future. With the push for digital transformation and the increasing importance of technology in business, CIOs require to take multiple roles beyond IT functions. They must have excellent interpersonal skills, be able to lead cross-functional and cross-geographical teams and leverage emerging technologies to give businesses a competitive edge. To stay relevant CIOs must evolve to become a chief business technology officer role, partnering with companies to deliver new digital business and operating models while building and strengthening relationships with business counterparts.