Intelligent CIO Africa Issue 12 | Page 94

////////////////////////////////////// FINAL WORD Five traits of the transformational CIO With a majority of IT budgets currently trapped in maintaining support functions, Niral Patel, MD and Technology Leader for Oracle South Africa, advises how CIOs can shift from simply ‘keeping the lights on’ to driving new revenue and transformation throughout the business. T he transformational Chief Information Officer (CIO) is the talk of the town – a captain of innovation, charting a course toward digital transformation for your business. With a view that stretches beyond the IT department, the transformational CIO is instigating a seismic shift in business that is seeing technology become a defining, differentiating strategic tool that can drive success. Gartner’s 2018 CIO Agenda survey shows that as digitalisation and innovation put more emphasis on information rather than technology, the role of the CIO is transforming from delivery executive to business executive, and from controlling costs to exploiting data to drive revenue. Yet, an estimated 80% of IT budgets still remain trapped in support functions – such as upgrades, maintenance and security patches – that keep the lights on, but don’t bring new revenue to the business. So, what are the key traits that define the transformational CIO? By keeping these five traits top of mind, any CIO has the potential to achieve that careful balance of keeping the lights on while acting as a transformational force for the business: 1. Stay aligned with the overall business direction The transformational CIO understands that winning buy-in from the top is key to justifying and paying for new IT projects, and 94 INTELLIGENTCIO www.intelligentcio.com