Support your CIO!
The role of the CIO is at an all time low in terms of strategic influence. Their decision making powers, even over their own budget, have been reined in.
Some ‘score on the doors’ sales-focused vendors will be tempted by bypass the CIO in order to try to deal direct with the CFO, COO or whoever actually is making IT-related decisions these days.
In my view that would be a mistake. The CIO is likely to be the person who best ‘gets’ the features and benefits of your offering. And thus is best placed to sell your solution to the decision makers.
The problem is that often CIO lacks the skills to get into the boardroom. High value (and thus big ticket) vendors will invest in their CIO relationships, where necessary supporting their personal development. When you realise that the CIO is fundamentally no longer the buyer but your vendor’s chief sales officer for that account then this starts to make sense.
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What is the basis for your asserion that “The role of the CIO is at an all time low in terms of strategic influence”?
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Will,
Thank you for commenting.
The credit crunch was the perfect opportunity for the CIO to take charge in terms of cost management across the organisation. Unfortunately the opposite happened and CIOs had their budgets cut. And cut without much input from the CIO in many cases.
This is based on my experience of engaging with literally hundreds of CIOs over the last 12 months.
Very few CIOs are buying anything that has a ROI of greater than a few months.
Great if you are seeing a different trend. If so I’d like to hear about it.
Ade