CIOs Need to Get a Clue

I went to a personal computer conference in about 1982, which was pretty early in the development of the industry.  I was surrounded by CIO-types who got their fashion tips from "Steve Douglas" on the TV show "My Three Sons."  One of them asked a senior CIO panelist: "What should I say to my users who are asking to buy PCs for their departments?"  The response was: "Tell them they can buy a PC only when they show they have reduced one headcount!"  He got a standing ovation.  The audience had their defence line.  But as many of us know, the next decade resulting in chaos as CIOs kept saying "no" but users bought PCs anyway out of their own budgets, and created a patchwork of PCs (IBM, Dell, Compaq, HP, etc.) and Macs, incompatible software (VisiCalc versus Lotus 1-2-3 versus Excel, Wordstar versus Word, etc.), and no ability to network the machines.

We are seeing the same CIO resistance playing out in at least three areas, with likelihood of similar debacles:

• CIOs trying to block open source software.  Jonathan Schwartz at Sun has criticized CIOs for trying to stem the flow of open source software.  Many have learned that as they increase demands on their IT organization and cut budgets, many teams are skirting the corporate rules and using open source solutions anyway.


• CIOs trying to block the use of web services.  While CIOs need to protect the security and privacy of the corporate data and networks, many of the most innovative software tools reside outside on the web.  These tools have the advantages of low-cost-of-entry and ability to collaborate across organizational boundaries without being blocked by firewalls.  Salesforce.com is a good early example of this type of software, as is pbwiki.


• Now it appears that CIOs are trying to block the use of iPhones. While there were good reasons to block the use of the first generation, the second generation is expected to support VPN, Microsoft Exchange, and corporate security tools.  Indeed, even such enterprise software providers as SAP have announced support for the iPhone, although they have stepped on a few toes.

My challenge to CIOs is how to work with these trends instead of repeatedly trying to reverse them.  We could all win by adopting new tools while ensuring we protect the corporate assets.