To be an effective CIO, you need to do six things:
1. You must be on the executive team.
2. You have to engage senior business managers in IT projects.
3. You must also include users in the same projects.
4. You need a high-level group to make IT decisions.
5. You must communicate regularly with end users.
6. You have to assign IT staff as liaisons to business units.
That's the conclusion of leading CIOs who participated in our "State of the CIO 2004" survey. From among the respondents, CIO editors and staff culled a subgroup that we judged to exemplify best practices for IT executives based on their responses to particular questions. Those best practices CIOs then ranked the actions they deemed most critical to successfully leading IT in their organizations. According to these top-flight CIOs, there are six - and only six - essential practices that CIOs must undertake to be effective in their jobs and ensure that IT is adding maximum value to their organizations.
But it's one thing to know what you need to do to be successful; it's another to do it.
In interviews, more than a dozen of the best practices CIOs share the techniques that make them successful. Some of them you may already be doing. Some of them you may want to enhance with the suggestions that follow - while others may be impractical or too costly, but they are all worthy of consideration.
BEST PRACTICE 1
78 percent of CIOs say: Get on the executive team
The Buck Starts There How to get the executive committee on your side
The single most important management practice, according to best practices CIOs in "The "State of the CIO 2004" survey, is participation in the executive team.
But simply having a keycard to the corner suite won't necessarily make a CIO more effective. Leading CIOs said it's how they use their access that provides the advantage. Here's what they said to do.
Join the Team Just over 50 percent of CIOs are already members of their companies' executive teams, according to our survey. These CIOs already have a CEO who views technology as strategic and understands that technology can help the company grow. The other 49 percent needs to find a way to get in the club. So what's the key that opens the door? You need to convince your CEO that technology is central to building and maintaining the company's competitive advantage. It's logical to include the CIO on an executive committee, which typically encompasses marketing, sales, finance, human resources and other business enablers, so that every aspect of running the company is represented.
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Process Trip 04 February, 2008 13:07:03
Why Maritz Travel revamped key business processes — and how business and IT came together to make it workWhen Rich Phillips became COO OF Maritz Travel about two and-a-half years ago, he sat down and took a hard look at the big industry picture - +
Ticked Off at Tick the Box Mentality 04 February, 2008 13:01:15
Does your executive search firm know the difference between an MIS manager and a CIO, and if it does, can it explain that difference to its corporate clients?Does your executive search firm know its MIS managers from its elbow? Does it even know the difference between an MIS manager and a CIO, and if it does, can it explain that difference to its corporate clients?
Read up on the latest ideas and technologies from companies that sell hardware, software and services. - White PaperJoin industry expert Martin Tuip to discover best practice strategy for the archival and removal of .PST files using email archiving. Learn how to ensure long-term email records are there when needed, and reduce the risk to your business and clients.
- White PaperJoin Lee Benjamin, a Microsoft Exchange MVP and Ryan Shipkowski, network administrator for Matthews, to discuss the process and ROI of implementing an email archiving solution, with emphasis on a case study from Matthews International.
- White PaperView this webcast and discover the drivers for changing network design practices, why many organisations are changing their approach to network architecture and how enterprises should be moving forward with open architecture multi-vendor network solutions. Register now and learn how your business can maximize the business value of the enterprise network.
Discover how SOA can create smarter outcomes for your business.
Attend and learn:
- How SOA is helping leading companies to become more agile
- Where you should be applying SOA processes in your company
- The top SOA implementation mistakes to avoid
Click here for more information.
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CIO Live Podcast #79: Brent D Taylor, author of The Outsider's Edge: The Making of Self-Made Billionaires Part II 05 October, 2007 06:00:00
For his new book, The Outsider's Edge: The Making of Self-Made Billionaires, social researcher Brent D Taylor spent four years of intensive research investigating the psychological make-up and backgrounds of some of the world's richest men and women, including IT luminaries Bill Gates, Larry Ellison and Steve Jobs. Taylor discovered that, despite working in different industries and coming from different upbringings, they all have one thing in common -- they are all outsiders. - +
CIO Live Podcast #78: Brent D Taylor, author of The Outsider's Edge: The Making of Self-Made Billionaires 28 September, 2007 17:34:25
For his new book, The Outsider's Edge: The Making of Self-Made Billionaires, social researcher Brent D Taylor spent four years of intensive research investigating the psychological make-up and backgrounds of some of the world's richest men and women, including IT luminaries Bill Gates, Larry Ellison and Steve Jobs. Taylor discovered that, despite working in different industries and coming from different upbringings, they all have one thing in common -- they are all outsiders. - +
CIO Live Podcast #77: Panasonic Speeds Up Trans-Pacific File Transfers, Part III 21 September, 2007 07:00:00
Part three in our three-part special report from CIO's sister publication Network World in the US, as Paul Desmond reports from the Network World IT Roadmap Conference in Santa Clara, California. With development teams in the US and Japan, Panasonic needed a more efficient way to move very large files between the two locations. Iben Rodriguez, IT consultant for Panasonic Research and Development, explains how a storage-area network and virtual server technology helped speed up WAN performance. - +
CIO Live Podcast #76: Panasonic Speeds Up Trans-Pacific File Transfers, Part II 14 September, 2007 07:00:00
Part two in our three-part special report from CIO's sister publication Network World in the US, as Paul Desmond reports from the Network World IT Roadmap Conference in Santa Clara, California. With development teams in the US and Japan, Panasonic needed a more efficient way to move very large files between the two locations. Iben Rodriguez, IT consultant for Panasonic Research and Development, explains how a storage-area network and virtual server technology helped speed up WAN performance. - +
CIO Live Podcast #75: Panasonic Speeds Up Trans-Pacific File Transfers, Part I 07 September, 2007 07:00:05
Part one in our three-part special report from CIO's sister publication Network World in the US, as Paul Desmond reports from the Network World IT Roadmap Conference in Santa Clara, California. With development teams in the US and Japan, Panasonic needed a more efficient way to move very large files between the two locations. Iben Rodriguez, IT consultant for Panasonic Research and Development, explains how a storage-area network and virtual server technology helped speed up WAN performance.
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Chris Hoff on Virtualization and Cloud Computing 20 November, 2008 10:55:00
Chris Hoff, chief security architect for the systems and technology division at Unisys and an advisor on the Skybox Security customer advisory board, is one of the biggest critics of virtualization security out there. Not because it isn't important - but rather because it is vital and needs to mature rapidly. - +
Cybersecurity is focus of new start-up incubator 20 November, 2008 07:19:00
Texas uni announces the Institute for Cyber Security.The University of Texas at San Antonio Tuesday announced a technology incubator aimed at fostering IT security-based start-ups within the state. - +
Dilip Sarangan on Physical Security M&A 20 November, 2008 11:18:00
Dilip Sarangan tracks physical security companies for Frost & Sullivan. He expects the industry's "need to have" products to weather the economic storm well, with the big players (now including IBM and Cisco) looking for value-priced acquisitions. - +
International Challenges in PCI Security 20 November, 2008 09:15:00
In a country that's seen many regulatory compliance challenges this decade, the headaches of PCI security tend to be analyzed from a largely American perspective. - +
PCI council sharpens oversight of security auditors 19 November, 2008 10:53:00
Quality assurance plan targets security assessors and scanning vendorsThe PCI Security Standards Council Monday unveiled a plan to sharpen oversight of the hundreds of security-service providers now authorized to evaluate merchant networks under the organization's Payment Card Industry data standards.
Vignette Announces 2008 Excellence Awards 21 November, 2008 10:50:00
PGP and Ponemon Institute Unveil Inaugural Australian Data Breach Study 2008 20 November, 2008 17:34:00
Symantec Cloud Services Transform Data Centre Operations Through Proactive Management 20 November, 2008 12:06:00
Verizon Business Offers Tips to Building a Successful Unified Communications and Collaboration Plan 20 November, 2008 12:04:00
AARNet Brings 4K Digital Cinema to Australia: First 4K HD Video Signal delivered into Australia by AARNet 20 November, 2008 12:02:00
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Gaining Competitive Advantage Through Enterprise Planning
No matter how good its products or innovative its services, no organization can perform to its full potential without an adequate planning structure in place. Discover how this can be done by reading on.
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