Capturing Opportunities from the Next Wave of Technology Innovation

Every decade or so, business technology passes through a meaningful inflection point that changes the way companies manage their information and do business. For CIOs, these are career-defining moments. For the companies they serve, their choices can determine market leadership.

The last shift introduced cloud computing at scale, mobile interfaces, modern application programming interface–led architectures, software-as-a-service platforms, and Agile ways of working. Companies digitized their business, and tech went from a support function to a creator of new value.

Today, we’re seeing another shift hastened by the maturity of a set of technologies that help companies make better use of all that data. Generative AI, natural language processing, event-driven architectures, real-time data processing, and integration with the Internet of Things all combine to help companies better understand, synthesize, and create value from data.

This combined wave of innovation is already changing the way companies do business, prompting technology function leaders to ask a lot of important questions.

• Talent: Do we have the right people to envision and execute this future—and if not, where do we find them?
• Architecture: Can we store and access the data we need reliably and in real-time? Are our systems Agile, modular, and interconnected? Can we easily integrate data outputs into applications and user workflows?
• Governance: Is our data quality robust enough to trust?
• Security: Are we investing and developing where we should be to address data privacy and ownership? Are we building up our reliance against (and our ability to recover from) cyberattacks?

For CIOs, getting ahead of these changes can mean the difference between being ready when company leaders start asking for these services or being surprised by competitors. With technology driving value, the CIO’s role becomes much more strategic (see Figure 1). They need to be leading the dialogue with business leaders while also delivering change quickly and at scale.