A Mismatch Between the IT Industry and CIOs?

I have no doubt those in the IT industry will agree with me that it is hard to find a single piece of industry literature, news story, or speaker that doesn’t have the word “cloud” at least once in every sentence. That’s all we hear about from vendors and the media/press these days – cloud, cloud, cloud.

Last week the Wall Street Journal held their second annual CIO Network conference in San Diego. There were many interesting findings published as a result of the conference, but the one I found most interesting in this context was a survey question they asked attendees (which are made up of 100 or so CIOs and technology executives from some of the world’s largest companies):
“From a technology perspective, which of the following is your highest priority?”

SURELY from everyting we read in the IT industry, cloud must have been the answer of the overwhelming majority of respondents, right?
As it turns out, here was the breakdown:

40% said Business Intelligence/Analytics
25% said Cybersecurity
10% said Infrastructure and Data Center
8% said Mobile
8% said Enterprise Resource Planning
and 10% said Cloud

What!? Only 10% have the cloud as their highest priority? How can this be? Could it be that maybe there is a misalignment between what the technology industry is driving towards and what CIOs are staying up at night worrying about?

Our thinking and consultation strategy with clients is driven by our IT Maturity Model (which has been unchanged for years) and not by what the hot trend of the day is. When it comes to your IT strategy, make sure to stay true to the fundamentals of business. Don’t get caught up in what the industry tells you should be important to you…