What do CIOs do on a daily basis? [ZT]

What do CIOs do on a daily basis?
World Business comments icxo. com (date)

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At present, informatization has been the focus of attention in social applications. WHO is promoting information application? There is an interesting position called CIOs. What is the situation of CIOs as the main character of information application promotion? In fact, CIOs are the product of the development of informatization to a certain stage. They are the "Love crystallization" of the close combination of IT and business ". Even in the United States, it has been applied to enterprises for four or fifty years, But CIOs have not been around for more than 20 years, however, it takes only 10 years for CIOs to "hold their hands again. The application of IT in enterprises has roughly gone through three stages: it supports business, it implements business and it promotes business; as it and business become closer and closer, the position of CIOs continues to increase, the decision location gradually enters the meeting room from the "basement ". The reporter investigated and analyzed some of the audience points of Guan CIOs at various layers.

What does a CIO do?

CIOs are a new type of people who promote social informatization and popularize information applications.

CIO is a senior manager responsible for information resources and IT infrastructure of enterprises. Information resources are composed of data, information, and knowledge assets covering the entire enterprise, while IT infrastructure includes computers, communications, data and information storage, and the security of the entire system. In addition, CIOs are responsible for the evolution and development of the information architecture of the entire organization. That is to say, CIOs are responsible for using information management and information technology (IM/IT) resources to support enterprise goals. Similarly, CIOs are generally responsible for establishing performance evaluation systems for information and communications and related services.

What is the role of CIOs?

According to a recent survey, only a few executives have recognized the role of CIOs in it leadership. The most important thing is to use it to create value.

We advocate that CIOs should participate in the formulation of the strategy. Some CIOs can provide good suggestions for new business applications, and should also promote the creation of business value. Whether the company's it is controlled by CIOs or other executives depends on a variety of factors, including capabilities, reputation, corporate culture, and the company's positioning of it.

What is urgently needed is technical business leaders who must understand how to use it to create value for the business. CIOs should assume such roles. Many CIOs can successfully monitor IT operations, but few CIOs can use IT investment to truly create business benefits. Now we need a new generation of IT leaders who are able to use it to bring changes to the company, rather than simply taking responsibility for IT operations.

For example, CIOs of a large European Bank have introduced management principles and clarified the key points in the IT architecture, reducing it costs and streamlining and upgrading the infrastructure, emphasize the importance of it to business departments. However, from the perspective of an enterprise, the CIO's performance is not very good. First, he focused his IT budget on maintaining bank operations, rather than achieving business value through innovation. Second, technical operations and investment were not combined with the Bank's business strategy.

At present, it has become an integral part of the business in more and more companies. The next it goal is to improve the management of IT requirements. It must be filled by CIOs or other executives willing to respond to the challenge. In some companies, the executive layer has been able to ensure that the company has gained greater value from IT investment. Successful factors include: 1. CIOs must understand the financial requirements of IT costs and potential investment; 2. Managers who understand it financial requirements are more willing to take charge of the value creation of IT investment; 3. Business Owners and it owners carefully study how new technology investment helps a company improve production efficiency and enhance competitiveness. They need innovative initiatives that can help them improve their business.

By serving as a leader, one or all of the three aspects can be improved. CIOs can enable the company to gain more it expenditures and gain trust in itself, this gives you the opportunity to lead more important tasks.

What is the significance of CIOs for information application?

The first is to promote business responsibility change. CIOs can still promote the change of the responsibility system and conduct post-implementation audits independently. However, some CIOs have led large-scale change initiatives, such as restructuring the global IT architecture, once prompted the business department to take more responsibility for it decision-making.

The second is to promote business innovation. It takes time to study how to use IT technology to find new solutions, for example, how to use technologies applied in other sectors to predict future trends in the construction industry, transition to the next-generation CIO that leads business development.

The third is to ensure the effectiveness of it and the effectiveness of transition. The first step in the transition from supply-oriented to demand-oriented is to ensure that the IT department is in good financial and operational conditions. The focus can be shifted from supply to demand. The required management capabilities also shift from operational capabilities to strategic capabilities, from short-term planning to long-term planning, and from it communication to business communication.

We should better describe the performance of basic IT systems from the business perspective, concentrate on solving demand-side problems, and use it to create real business value.

How Should CIOs locate themselves?

As the IT project owner, CIOs have to work hard to persuade their business departments to work with each other to train themselves as process consultants, new process runners, and change trends spokespersons. The business phase of IT implementation is like a bridge filled with flowers. Once the CIO passes through the war, it will reach the ideal kingdom on the other side, but it will not be difficult to understand, it may also fall into the "black hole" of IT investment ".

Which types of CIOs are available?

CIOs are called "all-round fighters" by many people ". They need to understand technology and management. They are primarily responsible for the selection of major IT products. They also need to find ways to resolve the various obstacles that often come from different business departments in the implementation of large-scale information projects. They are very prone to "ceiling" problems in their career development.

However, there is a special type of CIO who seldom encounters resistance from the business department during the informatization implementation process. They do not need to be responsible when selecting a type of IT product, they may not be the best technically, but they are likely to appear in other CIOs as expert consultants. In the career development, CIOs "ceilings" mean "stepping stone" for them ". Such CIOs are CIOs of IT enterprises.

CIOs of large IT enterprises are undoubtedly very different. They often assume the role of consultant sales as users. In their eyes, the positions of CIOs are mostly a turning point or even a stepping stone, rather than a "ceiling". In the process of informatization implementation, they rarely encounter resistance from business departments, more people will have plans. They do not need reason to choose their own products, and they have strong price cutting capabilities when selecting products from other companies.

A. Consultant sales type

At present, CIOs of well-known IT enterprises have been pushed to the market more and more in recent years, serving as consultants. For example, IBM's global CI orobert Greenberg appeared at the "IBM Forum" in Beijing last year, when talking to users about data maintenance, business process change, use of IBM Business Consulting Services, application of IBM middleware, and IT outsourcing, microsoft's current CIO Ro nmarkezich attended Microsoft's global VIP conference in Shanghai last year, I once told reporters a surprising piece of data: in Microsoft's information system, all Microsoft products deployed on Windows XP SP2, Windows Server 2003, Exchange 2003, office2003, MOM 2005, and BizTalk Server 2004 are worth only 3% of Microsoft's total IT investment .; For example, Intel's CIO Stacy J. Smith is also an outstanding IT Consulting consultant.

B. Cost-saving Model

For CIOs of IT enterprises, there is a common feature in product selection-the products manufactured and provided by the company will be the best choice.

No it enterprise can provide all IT products, so they also need to purchase other IT products while using our products. However, when the CIO of an IT enterprise assumes the role of a pure user, it usually has the ability to make suppliers love and fear: they are big users, but they all have first-class price cutting capabilities, and they can be well adjusted.

C. Alternative and difficult roles

This role is a bit difficult. The reason for doing a good job is that CIOs don't have to spend a lot of time convincing upper-level leaders or ordinary employees that it can bring more value to the company. However, the difficulty lies in that many other employees in the company are more competent than their current CIOs, because they are technically more professional than some CIOs. ″

D. CIO who wants to take it as a stepping stone

For CIOs of traditional enterprises, the saying "stepping stone of employment" has been a long time. Although CIOs of traditional enterprises have now become the top consulting companies, it is not uncommon for CIOs to become leaders from the IT departments of large enterprises to stand on their own, further ", it is easy to encounter the" ceiling "problem. Although it is an indispensable tool for traditional enterprises, it is not the core business of enterprises after all.

However, for CIOs of IT enterprises, the "ceiling" in their job is more likely to become a "stepping stone ". There are many such examples: Stephen M. Ward, the new CEO of Lenovo Group, served as vice president of the IT department of IBM 10 years ago and was transferred to the CIO of IBM. The former CEO of Compaq also experienced the CIO position.

Conversation With CIO

Rick deventi was promoted from CIO to vice president of Microsoft's global service business: "CIO is a very good turning point in my career. In IT enterprises, the capabilities required by CIOs and requirements for CEOs are the same. They all need to influence others' decision making, execution, and business understanding." "It is very important to be a CIO to influence your colleagues or even your superiors so that you can make decisions. This is the most difficult point for CIOs, I also benefited a lot from the growth process. CIOs are actually people who want to influence others. They have such a role. CIOs are people who can influence the entire decision-making process ."

Ms. Barbara, CIO of the American storage company CNT, said: "When I am a CIO in an IT company, I can get a lot of suggestions from many people about how to do this. When I encounter it problems at any time, they will try their best to help me solve them. I can spend most of my time communicating and managing a large amount of information in the enterprise. When encountering a time-consuming problem, I must ensure that the problem can be solved quickly. In non-IT enterprises, I don't have to work at the current pace. Because of the fierce competition of IT enterprises, your actions must be faster than traditional enterprises to avoid falling behind ."

Ms. Zheng Xiaowei, General Manager of the Information Management Department of shenzhou.com, "We can precisely grasp the cost of our IT architecture and solutions ."

Intel CIO Stacy J. Smith "the basic responsibility of CIOs is to make it infrastructure run economically and effectively and contribute to the growth of the company's business. At present, the roles and roles of CIOs are also changing. They have changed from providing support to enterprises in the past to playing a key role in developing new businesses, it can transform an enterprise's business."