Right this moment’s CIOs see themselves as enterprise leaders as a lot — if no more so — than as technologists.

That’s not shocking, contemplating how important know-how has grow to be for working organizations and serving stakeholders — whether or not clients, staff, or buyers.

CIOs spoke to the criticality of their position in CIO.com’s 2023 State of the CIO survey, with 71% saying that they anticipate to commit a better share of their time to enterprise strategist work three years out. “They plan to deal with driving enterprise innovation, growing and refining enterprise technique, figuring out alternatives for aggressive differentiation, and growing new go-to-market methods and applied sciences,” the report states.

Given such tasks, CIOs say they need to not solely communicate the language of the enterprise but additionally perceive enterprise fundamentals — these key concepts and theories which have grow to be the bedrock classes of MBA packages and company planning.

There are, after all, the administration necessities and the longstanding govt abilities that stay fixed must-haves. However there are, too, a listing of subjects that bubble up and dominate based mostly on present traits and present-day realities.

Talking to that latter level, CIO.com polled analysts, consultants, and CIOs in regards to the must-have enterprise ideas of at the moment. Right here’s what made their record.

1. What drives every practical space

Along with having a broad enterprise acumen, CIOs see worth in understanding the overall workings of every practical space in addition to every space’s drivers and targets.

“It’s a essential basis for a CIO,” says Erica Hausheer, senior vice chairman and CIO of software program firm Teradata. “CIOs need to work with all the C-suite so the challenges of the C-suite are the challenges of the CIO.”

Hausheer, who says she honed her enterprise acumen by incomes an MBA after serving as an officer within the US Navy in addition to by on-the-job expertise, believes it’s important for tech leaders to carry their very own in conversations coping with a full scope of enterprise subjects, whether or not they’re speaking about, for instance, the distinction between direct and oblique procurement, organizational design or tax technique.

After all, CIOs don’t should be consultants in such areas, she says, however they need to know sufficient to observe the movement of thought and contribute to the dialogue.

She provides: “In the event you perceive the ‘why’ behind the corporate technique, you could be within the boat with them and supply choices and alternative ways to consider the implementation plan.”

2. Key enterprise drivers

Equally, as CIOs have moved from technologists to executives over the previous decade or so, they’ve needed to higher perceive how their organizations function and earn cash. In the meantime, the upheaval of the previous few years and at the moment’s financial uncertainties have introduced the necessity for CIOs to totally grasp what drives the enterprise to the forefront.

“By deeply understanding this, the know-how workforce can associate with the enterprise to design and implement know-how options that not solely constantly enhance on the services and products clients depend on, but additionally create larger worth for the purchasers,” says Mark Mintz, company senior vice chairman and CIO of Charles River Laboratories. “That is extra vital than ever now as a result of know-how’s position in creating worth is larger than it ever has been.”

3. Accounting ideas

CIOs have lengthy mentioned they should present the advantages of the know-how investments they’ve made and calculate anticipated and realized returns. To do this, although, they should have some strong accounting abilities.

That’s one cause why Joel Schwalbe, CIO of biotech firm Transnetyx, lists accounting as one of many must-have enterprise ideas for tech leaders.

“And it’s not only for investments, but it surely’s vital for [calculating expense reduction, too, and understanding how we can improve margins,” he says, noting that corporate leaders center their financial health discussions around EBITDA — for earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, making that concept an essential must-know for CIOs.

4. Finance, financial markets

Protiviti, a global business consulting firm, surveyed 1,304 C-level executives and directors to understand the top risks they face in 2023. Those leaders list economic conditions in their markets and their potential to significantly restrict growth opportunities as a top risk, coming in at No. 2 behind staffing challenges at No. 1.

Given the economic uncertainties of today, CIOs should be well-versed in not only how their companies make money but in broader macro and microeconomic ideas — from the workings of corporate finance and financial markets to global economic trends, says Leona Thomas, senior delivery director with the global BAS transformation team at the consulting firm Slalom.

“These should be concepts you know off the top of your head, and not something you have to take a step back for,” she adds.

5. The geopolitical environment’s impact on business

The geopolitical environment is another area that was once foreign to CIOs but is now impacting enterprise operations and, thus, IT.

Consequently, CIOs should have a stronger grasp on the geopolitical landscape and how world events, political decisions, and related actions could impact not only their organizations as a whole but how they deliver technical and digital services, says Jeff Wong, global chief innovation officer with professional services firm EY.

Events over the past few years have illustrated this point.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine disrupted the global economy, impacted supply chains, and affected international work teams — including those working in IT.

COVID and COVID-related safety measures interrupted the global supply of computer chips as well as other technologies, which in turn impacted some enterprise IT initiatives.

And US government concerns over Hauwei and ZTE led to federal bans on the use of their equipment, a move that has both design and cost implications for companies across the United States.

That’s just the start, Wong says, noting that other national policies and geopolitical actions affect how and where organizations can store data, what and where they can use certain algorithms, and even what cloud providers may be used — all of which is information that many CIOs need to track and understand.

6. Business resiliency

CIOs are typically seen as experts in disaster recovery and are key participants in business continuity planning. But some IT leaders say they’re now expected to understand business resiliency at a whole new level.

More organizations have a global reach through customers, employees, and service providers. And as those organizations have stretched around the world, they’ve had to contend with issues such as domestic unrest, international conflicts, and the pandemic.

“Business resiliency has taken on a different connotation today,” says Kristen Lamoreaux, president and CEO of Lamoreaux Search.

Lamoreaux says these events have executives asking: What would we do if supply chains face further disruption, whether a major industrial accident occurred, when the next country implements a lockdown?

“And many have been turning to CIOs to help get them through these questions, to figure out how to do things faster, cheaper, find new routes, and make it more secure,” Lamoreaux says.

7. Strategy as a discipline

CIOs are among the enterprise leaders developing strategy, so experienced executives say they should understand the art and science of it.

“It’s much more of a discipline than many CIOs realize,” says Michael Seals, who became chief digital officer and SVP of business strategy of Hussmann, a subsidiary of Panasonic, in 2022 after seven years as its CIO.

Seals says learning the academics around strategic thinking and formulating strategy allows CIOs to be more effective and influential in shaping their organization’s vision.

“Most CIOs get that technology is a game-changer but many don’t understand how to take that and turn it into a strategy, to make sure what is envisioned is something that’s feasible; that can drive competitive advantage, sustain it or extend it,” Seals explains, adding that without that approach to strategy development “the likelihood of success is pretty low.”

8. The science behind the customer journey

Info-Tech Research Group calls out the importance of customer experience in its list of five CIO Priorities for 2023, saying CIOs should “shape the IT organization to improve customer experience.”

To do that, CIOs need to understand not just CX from a digital perspective but to understand the customer journey from a sales and marketing perspective, too.

“It transcends technology,” says Jamie Smith, CIO of the University of Phoenix, adding thathe has leaned on his undergraduate marketing degree to understand the end-to-end customer journey and key ideas such as journey mapping, charting to moments that matter, and the peak-end rule.

“Customer experience is a discipline and there is a science to it, and understanding that has been really valuable,” Smith adds.

9. Data privacy laws

In April 2022 only four US states had data privacy laws on the books, according to the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP) Westin Research Center. A year later, nine states had such laws with Texas poised to become the 10th. An additional 10 states had proposed laws under active consideration.

That, of course, is on top of all existing international data-privacy laws as well as emerging changes to those laws and proposed new ones.

Although they don’t have to become lawyers, CIOs do need to understand the legal and business ramifications of these laws and how their technology strategies intersect with those, Lamoreaux says.

“It’s often thought of as a purely legal problem, but you [as a CIO] should be an professional on this house within the nations by which you do enterprise. The complexities of at the moment, pulling information from social media in addition to inner streams, the place and the way information is saved, the way you’re utilizing it, cross-border information transfers, signifies that in a click on of a mouse your total repute could be put in danger,” she says.

10. Agility — for enterprise

CIOs have been implementing agile software program growth practices of their IT organizations for a lot of the previous twenty years. Now they should embrace enterprise agility ideas, says Jean-René Rousseau, a vice chairman with the strategic enterprise consulting workforce at CGI.

“CIOs want to know what agile means from a enterprise perspective and have interaction with their govt colleagues to assist improve the urgency of changing into extra agile as a corporation,” Rousseau says, noting that “possessing many agile software program groups doesn’t create an agile group.”

Slightly, he explains, it’s about understanding what “agility means from a strategic planning, enterprise operation, accounting, and cultural perspective.”

Smith concurs, saying the self-discipline of enterprise agility is about how all the enterprise buildings its methods of working, empowering groups to unravel enterprise issues, and “pushing authority to the place the data is.”

11. Lean administration

CIOs are more and more targeted on effectivity.

Analysis from Evanta, a Gartner Firm, decided that growing operational efficiencies and productiveness is the highest mission-critical precedence for CIOs in 2023. And whereas it has been the highest precedence for 3 years in a row, the share of CIOs itemizing it as such elevated by 2 factors in 2023 from 2022.

Given the deal with effectivity, Rousseau says lean administration — a staple of twentieth century enterprise operations — has grow to be an important device within the twenty first century IT operate.

“CIOs want to know the Lean ideas not solely to streamline their very own processes, however to take a systemic view of their group and perceive the entire worth creation system that entails not solely their groups however many enterprise groups as nicely,” he explains. “Utilizing the ‘lean’ language may also help [CIOs] focus on systemic efficiency points with their govt colleagues with out utilizing technology-associated ideas.”

12. Human-centric office

With hybrid workplace environments right here to remain, Tyler says organizations should remodel their workplaces from an office-centric design to a human-centric one.

The idea of a human-centric office goes past enabling digital work and on-line collaboration, he explains. As a substitute, it’s a deep dive into constructing an setting that helps the folks.

“Now as we’re all going again into the workplace, we now have to consider what that appears like. We’ve got to rethink work. We’ve got to understand [workers] are human beings and take into consideration what’s the precise stability of working from house versus the workplace, how will we cope with scheduling, how will we make staff really feel linked, what works, what doesn’t,” Tyler says. “The CIO needs to be a part of these decisions.”