Are CIOs Becoming "Internal Service Providers"?
By Ally Kutz, contributing writer
Shadow IT is putting more pressure on tech departments according to Logicalis US’ third annual Global CIO Survey. The survey of more than 400 CIOs worldwide revealed a trend of line-of-business (LOB) executives bypassing the CIO and IT department when making investments in technology.
Vince DeLuca, CEO of Logicalis US, says, “When you analyze the reasons shadow IT exists, it’s clear that LOB executives are simply looking for better, faster access to IT services; they want an at-work experience that emulates the on-demand services they have access to in their consumer lives. The consumerization of IT and the widespread availability of as-a-Service cloud options have, therefore, made it both easy and, in many cases, practical to bypass the IT department. These actions, however, have yielded significant consequences for the IT professionals tasked with corporate IT governance and security measures — a fact which has forced many CIOs to redefine their role from that of technologist to what is fast becoming known as the ‘internal service provider.’”
The survey also found that 90 percent of CIOs are bypassed at least some of the time in IT purchasing decision, even though 66 percent of CIOs make over half of their organizations’ IT purchasing decisions.
Although this continues to be a problem, CIOs are not taking the blow silently: the survey shows that 42 percent are now embracing a new internal service provider model that will allow them to provide increased business value and relevancy to their LOB colleagues and internal IT users.
These CIOs are also putting forth their efforts in other ways: 38 percent are now spending at least half of their time on more strategic activities, and 47 percent are attaining about one third of their IT services from external providers.
“By recognizing what the LOB wants — better, faster access to technology services — and realigning their departments to meet those needs, CIOs worldwide have made significant progress toward regaining control of the IT spend in their organizations,” DeLuca says. “And by transforming themselves into internal service providers, they are ensuring their relevancy to the organization and setting the stage to take a more strategic, creative role that will lead to an overall competitive advantage for their organizations.”
To download a copy of Logicalis’ 2015 CIO Survey, click here.