A survey conducted by PA Consulting Group in partnership with recruitment consultancy Harvey Nash has found that the strategic influence of chief information officers (CIOs) is declining as 'churn' in the sector hits new heights.
The survey of over 650 UK CIOs and senior technology professionals revealed that one in ten felt their role was becoming less strategic and over half (58%) expect to have moved jobs in the next two years.
The survey, now in its ninth year, revealed that roughly half (46%) of CIOs are on the board, and only a third (35%) report direct to the CEO. Belief in the strategic value of IT has dropped year-on-year – only 61% of respondents thought the role of the CIO was becoming more strategic, down 15% on last year.
This drop in confidence is shared by board-level peers with half of CFOs (47%) viewing IT solely as a support function with no need for board representation. A perceived failure to deliver on innovation is one of the contributing factors – 65% of businesses have no structured approach to IT innovation and, when they do innovate, the majority (78%) reported only reasonable or limited success.
As a result more and more senior IT professionals are on the move – over a quarter (28%) claim they would leave their current role in order to have more hands-on involvement in business strategy and a similar number (29%) are already actively looking.
With so many technology leaders looking for greener pastures it could certainly be argued that, as leaders of the technology function, CIOs also need to look closer to home and focus on the challenges of demonstrating the value of IT to the business. If this can be achieved, the opportunity exists not only to halt the declining importance of IT, but to turn it around, making IT a force driving growth and improvement.
To request a copy of the full report, please contact Itmarketing@paconsulting.com.
