It has been said that crisis produces change, and the world of business is no exception. In the face of current political and economic uncertainty, the 2017 Harvey Nash/KPMG CIO Survey found that 89% of organizations are increasing or maintaining their investment into innovation.
The survey, a joint project between the US division of the Harvey Nash Group, a global recruitment firm and IT outsourcing service, and tax, advisory, and audit firm KPMG, is the largest survey of IT leadership in the world, with a total survey size of 4,498 chief information officers from 86 countries.
Of the organizations surveyed, 52% specifically said they were investing into nimbler technology platforms, and 64% stated they were adapting their technology strategies to the existing economic and political climate. Putting even more weight behind these numbers is the 52% increase in organizations with enterprise-wide digital strategies compared to 2015, and a 39% jump in organizations having a chief digital officer on staff since 2016.
Bob Miano, President and CEO of Harvey Nash, said that the chief information officer of today’s organizations is faced with enterprise-wide transitions to digital, and continued, “Digital is without question the CIO’s priority, but especially for legacy organizations, leading this change to a complete, unified digital strategy is top of mind.”
With these changes comes a greater involvement of the CIO in an organization’s day-to-day operations, with 92% of CIOs taking part in a Board meeting during the past 12 months, as well as being nearly twice as likely to lead innovation for the whole business, 41% versus 23% in the prior year.
