Focus on CIO

Different focuses, different opinions, different skills and tools portfolio's... By reading different books, articles or blog-posts you might create a strikingly different image of the position and role of a CIO.

The information technology is evolving on and is becoming less of something complex, strange and specific which only techno-geeks could understand. It resembles more of inherent and inevitable part of any business where every manager or executive must know at least a little bit about.

In the same way the clear trend can be seen in articles and opinions (and of course in reality as well). The role of a CIO is becoming less and less of something like a back-office function and more about strategic thinking, vision, understanding the drivers of growth and value. Technological knowledge and related skills might still be considered as a plus, but only if they don't interfere with the really valuable competencies of C-level position. Competencies like leadership, ability to think strategically, to convey and defend your vision, to sift out really promising innovation trends come to the forefront.

A nice recent article by Harvard Business Review "Should Your Next Job Be CIO?" illustrates the situation by referring to other studies, examples and self-explaining numbers.

"Gartner Inc.'s 2008 worldwide survey of more than 1,500 CIOs showed that over 50% held responsibilities in their companies outside IT, including strategic planning, operations, and shared services."

"almost 26% of the CIOs responding were executives who had never served in IT before becoming CIO"

Another example from the same HBR article shows that the current job of a CIO is not that much different of the one of CEO. Even though the transition from the CIO position to the one of a CEO are still rare in large successful companies (see examples here and here), it might not be the case in 5 or 10 years. And the responsibilities and values for both positions have very much in common already today.

So, whether you just consider a CIO carreer or have been working at this position for somewhile, don't forget to revise your skills and competencies once in a while and make sure that "soft" ones make a large enough part of them.