New Roles, New Responsibilities: Today's CIO

WHO IS A CIO?
The chief information officer (CIO), or information technology (IT) director, is a job title commonly
given to the most senior executive in an enterprise responsible for the information technology and
computer systems that support enterprise goals. The CIO typically reports to the chief executive officer,
chief operations officer or chief financial officer. In military organizations, they report to the
commanding officer.
New Responsibilities
While it is important that CIOs exhibit leadership authenticity in the change-agent role,
respondents stressed that transformation success will not be realized without commensurate
leadership from key business executives.
In addition to serving as an effective catalyst for change, CIOs must also play a key role in
seamlessly integrating the key components of business transformation: technology, processes,
and people.
"Leading CIOs are now entering an era filled with great promise, whereby there is a growing
opportunity to partner closely with the business and drive transformational capabilities," said
Waller. "However, the role of the change-agent is dense with both opportunity and risk. To
mitigate risk, CIOs must ensure that success factors are entrenched in the organization before
spearheading change initiatives. Perhaps more important, smart CIOs will also prepare for and
guard against transformation barriers."
Institutionalized Barriers
Study respondents repeatedly cited three primary obstacles to transformational success: an
internal culture resistant to change, organizational politics, and the existence of too many
conflicting priorities.
Many CIOs also cited the relative immaturity of business process and the people aspects of
change management as significant hurdles. Indeed, 79% of those surveyed indicated they will be
targeting business process capabilities as a focal point for improvement over the next two years.
The recently completed study also provides CIOs with recommendations for serving as an
effective change-agent in the years ahead. The recommendations are meant to help the CIO
navigate the complex transformation waters while still being attentive to his or her core IT duties
and mindful of the common change-agent pitfalls.
These recommendations include:
Ensuring the "IT house is in order."
 Respecting the difficulty of behavioral transformation.
 Leveraging the CIO's unique position to create business value.
 Becoming an expert on your industry's value chain and competitive dynamics.
 Influencing your CEO to create the proper climate for change.
"In this new market reality of rapid change and ruthless competition, CIOs have been given the
opportunity, and in some cases the mandate, to take on increasingly business-centric
transformational roles, concluded Waller.
"In accepting this challenge, CIOs must proceed with caution, understanding the risks inherent in
major transformation. However, they must also embrace the opportunity, since it provides a CIO
with a means to underscore the value of IT to an organization and contribute to breakthrough
business performance."
Following are the Most Important Skills Required for an effective CIO

1. Thorough understanding of technology

2. Business acumen/ acuity
3. Intellectual capacity
4. Patience
5. Diplomacy, influencing and negotiating
6. Relationship building and sustaining
7. Effective decision-making
8. foresight and Strategic Awareness
9. Mentoring and team-building
10. Commitment to learning

Role of CIO
The role of the CIO is changing as more enterprises more towards a "Value Added" role for the
Information Technology function. Those changes are depicted in the detail job descriptions that
have been created for all of the functions with IT -- especially for the CIO. The table below
depicts several of those changes.

Responsibility CIO Traditional CIO Value

Role added Role

Define, update, and Align IT

implement IT objectives and
Strategy and strategy programs to
Planning enterprise
Manage IT across objectives and
the enterprise strategies

Control Align the IT team Define metrics

with enterprise based on
performance overall
objectives business
objectives
Control
 performance
objectives and
overall IT budget

Acquire Maximize the

software/hardware mix of in house
versus out
Select, manage, and sourced
control IT providers services
Service
Establish
strategic
Manage outsourced service
services provider
partnerships

Align IT risk Align IT risk

management within management
Risk IT productivity with
Management objectives enterprise-wide
risk
management

Defer to enterprise Optimize and

requirements design
enterprise
Follow IT System processes via
Business Development IT
process Methodology
(SDM) Define and
adjust IT
standards and
technologies

Strategic IT Plan and manage Shift decision

Initiatives strategic IT making to
initiatives enterprise
operations
Manage IT
applications Include
portfolio governance
 with business
Manage IT projects process
executives

Define standards Optimize costs

Enterprise and architectures of services
infrastructure through a mix
and Consolidate the IT of internal and
applications process across the external
enterprise resources

CIO Responsibilities
The Clinger-Cohen Act of 1996 created the Chief Information Officer position and assigns to the
CIO these responsibilities:
1. Provide advice and assistance to senior managers on IT acquisition and management;
2. Develop, maintain, and facilitate implementation of a sound and integrated IT architecture*;
3. Promote effective and efficient design and operation of all major IRM processes for the
agency, including improvements to work processes.
In addition, this position has primary duties annually, as part of the strategic planning process,
a. to assess requirements for personnel regarding knowledge and skills needed to achieve
performance goals that have been established for IRM;
b. to assess extent to which all managers at the agency meet those requirements;
c. to develop strategies and specific plans for hiring and training;
d. to report to the Division head on progress made in improving IRM capability.
The Federal CIO Council has defined ten competency areas for the CIO. Although it is simply a
list, these areas are commonly illustrated in the form of the 'CIO Wheel:'
It is no insult to acknowledge that the CIO's scope of competencies is so wide that it is
unrealistic to expect most individuals (at government pay scales anyway) to have all these skills,
and to keep up with the latest technology, and to manage the IT infrastructure of an agency, and
to guide decisionmaking and planning, etc. etc. Hence, the law clearly implies that the CIO will
retain a staff of people that together have this set of required competencies, and create an office
environment where they can work together on a daily basis. The challenge for government CIO's
is to carve out a budget for themselves and their staff that is appropriate to their responsibilities
-- the Clinger-Cohen Act does not appropriate funding.