FINDING 5
Creating New Revenue: The Overlooked CIO Role

CIOs confuse operating a business with running a business. CIOs take any role they play in business strategy seriously. But more than anything else, CIOs believe their job is to advise executives on how to improve their company’s processes, serve as the point person to understand technology trends and opportunities and what they mean for the organization, and make sure the business isn’t tripped up by IT problems.

However, few CIOs count innovation or uncovering new business opportunities among their roles—and therein lies the lost opportunity for CIOs to be movers and shakers, and to earn higher incomes (see Finding 4).

That’s also why business-IT alignment is still a problem: These CIOs haven’t made the company’s raison d’être one of their top responsibilities. Many CIOs think being business-minded means running business operations and processes, when it really means devising new ways to put more money in shareholders’ pockets.