Published on the 28/01/2014 | Written by Newsdesk
Australian chief information officers are feeling under even greater pressure than their global peers according to Gartner’s 2014 CIO Agenda…
When technology analyst Gartner analyst asked 2339 CIOS in 77 countries about their preparedness for digital transformation, just over a half admitted they felt swamped. In Australia the figure was closer to three out of five.
Maybe it’s got something to do with the fact that while global IT budgets are tipped to rise very slightly, by 0.2 percent this year, Australian CIOs are expecting their overall IT budgets to decline slightly by 0.1 percent. Admittedly it’s not a huge gap between the two cohorts, but with 40 percent of the 115 Australian CIOs interviewed by Gartner saying their IT budgets would fall and 25 percent expecting them to flatline, there is clearly a swag of local CIOs expecting to get by on the sniff of an oily rag even as management expectations and consumer demand with regard to technology soars.
Already there are signs that IT’s grasp on IT budgets could be slipping. Australian CIOs told Gartner that 26 percent of enterprise IT spending was now coming from areas other than IT – marketing for example spent one in 20 IT dollars.
Asked to respond to Gartner’s statement that; “My business and its IT organisation are being engulfed by a torrent of digital opportunities. We cannot respond in a timely fashion and this threatens the success of the business and the credibility of the IT organisation,” 59 percent of Australians agreed compared to 51 percent of global respondents. And while 42 percent of global CIOs said they didn’t have the talent or skills needed to respond adequately, Australian CIOs had a much higher response rate at 52 percent.
The extent of the challenge facing enterprise IT was made clear by Gartner vice president Dave Aron who noted that while CIOs were still expected to plan, operate and manage IT to support current business models; “Digitalisation raises questions about strategy, leadership, structure, talent, financing and almost everything else. All industries in all geographies are undergoing digital disruption. This is both a CIO’s dream come true and a career-changing leadership challenge.”
