Four Questions for the Business CIO

One issue that comes up these days at every forumeven if the topic is hosted
model or data center optimizationis the role of the CIO within the enterprise.
Obviously, it is topmost on the CIOs mind. In fact, at present, it is being
actively discussed in an online forum of Dataquest. All CIOs seem to agree that
the CIO is yet another business executive at the C-level and like others,
his/her role should be to assist the CEO in achieving the companys business
objectivesthrough better leverage of information. The debate is actually on how
to meet the new challenges and leverage the new opportunities.

Here are four simple questions for the CIOs who want to take up more of a
business role.

#1 Are you ready?

It is not a question about your capability. It is more of a question on what
is your comfort level. Are you comfortable with looking at IT from a business
requirement side? Can you take a decision or be part of one that sets a business
goal, which you feel cannot be done with the current level of IT, without
getting dissatisfied? Simply put, can you distinguish between the "how to"s from
"what to"s? Can youin your mindsegregate the demand side and supply side of
IT? All these are required for a business manager. And as they say, a new
convert is often put to a more rigorous test, sometimes unintentionally. Can you
cope with that?

#2 Is the organization ready?

Not all organizations are ready in terms of maturity to leverage information
to compete. They may be great in deploying breakthrough tactical tools using
technology and would value the contribution made by a good CIO (actually a chief
IT officer) and would acknowledge that willingly. But they may not require him
to be at the top level, part of major business decisions. In that case, some
appreciation of business issues is still required, but the organization may not
require the CIO to have a thorough understanding of business; in fact, they may
even prefer a tech guru. If your organization fits the descriptionand you are
getting good perks and acknowledgements but not a say in the business
decisionsare you willing to walk away to have a more business role?

#3 Would you part with your tech role, if necessary?

This is a more sensitive questions that flares up quite a few CIOs.
Traditionally, IT has been a cost center. And in terms of cost, about 70% of the
IT budget goes to the back-end infrastructure like data center and networks,
along with the end user terminals. Much of the CIOs power comes because he is
the owner of the entire IT budget. Many companies are today looking at splitting
that role: a CIO who would work with business on aligning IT and creating
solutions, and one CTO who would manage the technology infrastructure. In this
model, the CIOs role would be reversed from a technology role with business
understanding to a business role with technology understanding. And that is a
business role. On the other hand, the CTO role is also getting important as the
back-end infrastructure is getting complex and managing that through a
combination of in-house and outsourced team is itself a big challenge. Are you
ready to get that out of your hand, if the organization is planning to go ahead
with a split-role model for CIO and CTO?

#4 Are you ready to share power?

Many organizations are now splitting the demand and supply side of IT. While
the supply side may or may not remain with CIO (it may go to a CTO), the demand
side would definitely work closely with the business managers. So, instead of a
centralized IT team, there would be CIOs team members in all these departments,
which essentially means the CIO would have to share the power. Are you
comfortable with the idea?

Shyamanuja Das

The author is Editor of Dataquest.
shyamanujad@cybermedia.co.in