Opinion

The end of cloud-first: What compute everywhere actually looks like

The decade-long assumption that everything belongs in the cloud is quietly breaking. Not because the cloud failed — but because the constraints changed.

By Prithviraj Shome

23 Mar 202610 mins

Edge ComputingHybrid CloudMulticloud

SharePoint Premium highlights the hard road CIOs face with generative AI

Microsoft’s newly transformed content and collaboration platform depends on more capable artificial intelligence capabilities. But it won’t be successful without more capable human beings.

By Bob Lewis

6 Feb 2024 7 mins

Change Management Generative AI Microsoft

Today’s best CIOs are strategy wranglers

CIOs must be very intentional about where resources and attention are focused. That means orchestrating myriad strategies in concert — and doing so in a way rooted in the true definition of strategic.

By Thornton May

30 Jan 2024 5 mins

IT Leadership IT Strategy

Digital KPIs: The secret to measuring transformational success

Selecting the right metrics for measuring the impact of digital initiatives can be a complicated mess. Here’s how to simplify the process of aligning KPIs with what digital transformation aims to achieve.

By Isaac Sacolick

23 Jan 2024 9 mins

Digital Transformation IT Strategy ROI and Metrics

What is your data strategy for an AI future?

Access to sufficient, reliable, and timely data will be a key determinant of success for enterprises over the coming years as AI transforms business workflows.

By Martin De Saulles

22 Jan 2024 4 mins

Artificial Intelligence CIO IT Strategy

Mastering the art of motivation

Effective leaders don’t do. They motivate those who do. And the trick to fostering a motivated staff lies in the subtleties of motivation itself.

By Bob Lewis

16 Jan 2024 5 mins

IT Leadership IT Management

Managing CEO expectations is this year’s Priority No. 1

What’s the key to meeting your CEO’s IT expectations? Managing those expectations so your CEO’s disappointments aren’t blamed on you and your IT organization.

By Bob Lewis

9 Jan 2024 6 mins

Business IT Alignment IT Leadership IT Strategy

Want to tackle technical debt? Sell it as business risk

Why is upgrading IT infrastructure still a ‘tough sell’? Likely because you haven’t adequately tied tech debt to tangible business consequences.

By Mary Shacklett

2 Jan 2024 5 mins

Business IT Alignment IT Strategy Infrastructure Management

The only CIO resolution that matters

CIOs need to paint a clear and positive picture of the 2024 technology landscape by establishing a periodic briefing strategy based on real-time learning processes.

By Thornton May

26 Dec 2023 5 mins

Business IT Alignment IT Leadership IT Strategy

3 key digital transformation priorities for 2024

Generative AI is not the only initiative that can transform your company in the coming year. Addressing operational gaps and building up new digital leaders can also be force multipliers.

By Isaac Sacolick

19 Dec 2023 9 mins

Digital Transformation Generative AI IT Skills and Training

The art of selling: IT budget approval made easier

When it comes to budget proposals, you must be able to sell to secure funding. But the secret to what is often an IT leader’s least favorite activity is more straightforward than you think.

By Mary Shacklett

12 Dec 2023 6 mins

Budgeting IT Leadership

Workplace griping: The key release valve your culture lacks

Chronic complainers are annoying. But when employees can’t complain? That can be a whole lot worse.

By Bob Lewis

5 Dec 2023 5 mins

Hybrid and Remote Work IT Leadership IT Management

Fortifying the bridge between tech and business in the C-suite

To be considered a tech-forward company today, there has to be a focus on tech fluency across the C-suite, which creates a unique opportunity for CIOs to uplevel their roles and expand their footprint across the enterprise.

By Diana Bersohn and Rachel Barton

4 Dec 2023 7 mins

Business IT Alignment CIO IT Strategy

What you don’t know about data management could kill your business

Organizations without a solid data management strategy are on a collision course with catastrophe. Unfortunately, that’s most businesses, judging by the fundamental disconnect on the importance of strong data foundations.

By Thornton May

28 Nov 2023 6 mins

Data Architecture Data Governance Data Management

Turning the tide in STEM career roadblocks at Synchrony

By providing programs and services that build on STEM education and interest in tech fields, Synchrony Financial has developed a culture of support and learning for women that feeds its increasing need for technology talent.

By Bess Healy

27 Nov 2023 6 mins

Diversity and Inclusion Financial Services Industry Hiring

7 steps for turning shadow IT into a competitive edge

By taking a programmatic approach to addressing the root causes of shadow IT, CIOs can reduce the risks of shadow programs and empower more business people to serve their own workflow and data needs.

By Isaac Sacolick

21 Nov 2023 9 mins

Business IT Alignment IT Governance IT Strategy

Can developer productivity be measured? Better than you think

After decades of debate over whether developer efficacy can truly be measured, we believe we’ve found the developer productivity metrics that matter most. Here’s why it matters.

By Chandra Gnanasambandam and Martin Harrysson

20 Nov 2023 5 mins

ROI and Metrics Software Development

Relationship management: The unsung art of optimizing IT teams

IT departments are composites of diverse personalities. Getting them to work together in ways that unlock hidden synergies is a skill every IT leader must master.

By Mary Shacklett

14 Nov 2023 6 mins

IT Leadership IT Management

10 digital transformation roadblocks — and 5 tips for overcoming them

Aspiring transformational leaders can learn a lot from what most often derails digital success. Here’s a roundup of challenges you’ll want to anticipate and ways to help prepare your organization for the journey ahead.

By Supantha Banerjee

13 Nov 2023 7 mins

Digital Transformation IT Leadership IT Strategy

The CIO’s fatal flaw: Too much leadership, not enough management

Compared to management, leadership is what has the mystique. But mystique isn’t what gets work out the door.

By Bob Lewis

7 Nov 2023 5 mins

IT Leadership IT Management

Ethics in IT: The CIO’s new business imperative

To date, corporate ethics has been reduced to compliance with pre-existing, created-by-others rule sets. The ethical IT organization of the future will require a new path — and business viability will depend on it.

By Thornton May

31 Oct 2023 5 mins

Business IT Alignment IT Governance IT Leadership

Why adaptability is the new digital transformation

As disruption in all its forms increasingly becomes the norm, IT leaders must rethink their approach to digital initiatives in favor of strategies that build adaptability into the way their organizations operate on a daily basis.

By Nicholas D. Evans

30 Oct 2023 7 mins

Digital Transformation Government IT Innovation

7 sins of digital transformationdriving efficiencies through automation

Even as business drivers for transformation evolve, some things stay the same — and that includes the outcome-derailing habits CIOs too often fall prey to. Here’s how to right yourself for the next wave.

By Isaac Sacolick

24 Oct 2023 11 mins

Business IT Alignment Digital Transformation IT Strategy

5 steps for making tech ethics work for your company

Accelerating AI capabilities underscore the need for ethics frameworks to help guide the design and development of all technologies. Here’s how to put ethics into action and ensure your efforts have an impact.

By Ann Skeet and Brian Green

23 Oct 2023 6 mins

IT Governance IT Strategy

How to get internal employee poaching right

With tech talent markets tight, internal hires and transfers of promising IT hopefuls from other business units can be a great answer. But a respectful win-win approach is the best way to poach.

By Mary Shacklett

17 Oct 2023 6 mins

Business IT Alignment Hiring

The CIO’s primary job: Developing future IT leaders

IT has not traditionally tried hard enough to develop strong managers from within. That must change, with both formal and informal training — and an eye on those who could make the leap.

By Paul M. Ingevaldson

10 Oct 2023 6 mins

IT Leadership IT Management

7 sins of software development

From choosing the wrong methodology to falling too hard for the latest trend, the output of even great app dev teams can suffer due to tendencies, temptations, and habits that can at times be our own undoing.

By Peter Wayner

5 Oct 2023 8 mins

Software Development

Why all IT talent should be irreplaceable

Forget the conventional wisdom about firing irreplaceable employees. Because if your employees aren’t irreplaceable, you’re doing something wrong.

By Bob Lewis

3 Oct 2023 5 mins

Hiring IT Leadership IT Skills and Training

Rediscovering the value of information

By emphasizing information technology over information management, we have exposed ourselves to what poor information practices can cost us, not what robust information strategies can create.

By Thornton May

26 Sep 2023 5 mins

Data Architecture Data Management Privacy

6 deadly sins of enterprise architecture

EA is a complex endeavor made all the more challenging by the mistakes we enterprise architects can’t help but keep making — all in an honest effort to keep the enterprise humming.

By Peter Wayner

21 Sep 2023 9 mins

Enterprise Architecture IT Strategy Software Development

5 signs your agile practices will lead to digital disaster

Digital transformation is often an organization’s big bet for changing its business trajectory. Agile can help IT leaders get there — but only if undertaken in service of digital objectives.

By Isaac Sacolick

20 Sep 2023 10 mins

Agile Development Digital Transformation