CIOs that Report into CEOs Hold More Influence and Are More Content

The number of chief information officers (CIOs), IT directors, reporting directly to their CEOs has risen considerably in the past one year, with CEOs increasingly using IT projects to make money rather to cut cost. According to the 2016 Harvey Nash/KPMG CIO Survey, the proportion of CIOs reporting directly to the CEO has risen 10 per cent since last year to 34 per cent.
The study has found 57 percent of CIOs sitting on executive board or senior leadership committees – up by half over 11 years. CIOs are expecting the strategic influence of their role to grow further this year.
Considering the report, today the role of the CIO is recognized in more organizations than ever. The increased value in their role seems to have motivated many CIOs, with nearly 87 percent of IT directors surveyed expressing happiness at reporting directly to the CEO.
As many as 84% of CIOs report they are ‘fulfilled’ or ‘very fulfilled’ in their role. But the happiest CIOs can be found in charity and non-profit sector.
But today’s CIOs need to be masters of all trades and focused on projects that generate revenue rather than reduce costs, because the research showed that 63 per cent of CEOs now focus on IT projects that make money, compared with 37 per cent focusing on projects designed to save money.
According to the report, 15% of CIOs moved job last year, and 31% of CIOs have been in their current role for less than two years. As their value increased so did their salary. Nearly 35% of CIOs benefited from an increase in base salary last year, up 10% on 2015.
In fact, some of the traditional top CIO priorities have seen the biggest drop in importance over the last four years. Increasing operational efficiencies has dropped 16 percent, and delivering stable IT performance has dropped 27 percent.
There is even more significant change happening with CIOs in smaller businesses, where IT directors are more than five times as likely to spend the majority of their time working on external-facing projects such as developing stakeholder relationships and growth strategies, instead of traditional IT functions like systems and infrastructure.