The worldwide CIO agenda for digital-native enterprises

Become the disruptor of your industry's status quo, or face the consequences. To succeed, CEOs need to know the answer to a key question in 2018 and beyond. Does our CIO and/or CTO have what it takes to contribute to a meaningful and substantive digital transformation agenda?

As digitally-fuelled disruptors reshape industries, the clear mandate for every enterprise is to re-imagine itself to compete in the increasingly digital economy that's platform-powered and ecosystem-enabled.

To help CIOs and CTOs through this period of multiplied innovation, International Data Corporation (IDC) published its Worldwide CIO Agenda 2018 Predictions.

Top 10 strategic IT planning changes

They outline IDC's vision for the ten most important shifts that will happen in IT organizations over the next 36 months, and will guide IT executives in the formation of their three-year strategic IT plan.

According to the IDC assessment, lines are being drawn that separate industry laggards from "digital-native enterprises" that can harness the power of technology to accelerate their business development.

In the context of continuous emergence, IDC asserts today's business technology environments must adapt at an accelerated pace to the scale, scope, and speed of progressive digital transformation.

"For CIOs and senior IT executives, the challenge is to think and operate like a digital-native enterprise in the face of the emergence of platforms, innovation accelerators, machine learning, augmented skills, micro-personalization, new partnerships, and new relationships," said Serge Findling, vice president at IDC.

The IDC predictions for the Worldwide CIO Agenda are:

  • By 2018, 75 percent of CIOs will put experiential engagement, data monetisation, or digital business at scale at the top of their agenda.
  • Through 2019, dragged down by conflicting digital transformation imperatives, ineffective technology innovation, cloud infrastructure transition, and underfunded end of life core systems, 75% of CIOs and their enterprises will fail to meet all of their digital objectives.
  • By 2020, 60% of the CIOs who have crossed the digital divide will prevail in C-suite turmoil and competition to become digital business leaders for their enterprises.
  • By 2019, 60% of CIOs will complete infrastructure and application replatforming using cloud, mobile, and DevOps, clearing the deck for accelerated enterprise digital transformation.
  • By 2019, 60% of IT organisations will deploy DX platforms supporting new customer- and ecosystem-facing business models.
  • By 2019, 75% of CIOs will refocus cybersecurity around authentication and trust to manage business risks, initiating the retirement of systems that cannot ensure data protection.
  • By 2020, 40% of CIOs will leverage vision- and mission-driven leadership to inspire and empower their organisations to create digital transformation capabilities.
  • Recognising the failure of existing IT governance and the need for a shared digital transformation vision; by 2020, 40% of CIOs will adopt new digital governance models to accelerate innovation and speed.
  • By 2018, 70% of CIOs will take agility to the next level, gearing up to a product model using design thinking and DevOps.
  • By 2020, 60% of CIOs will implement an IT business model and culture that shifts focus from IT projects to digitally-oriented products.

"As the new digital economy emerges from disruption, CIOs are seeing their last opportunity to cross the digital divide and earn their right to play in the next phase," concluded Findling.