The evolution of IT in business: the CIO as a leader of innovation and growth

By Edgar Matamoros, IT Services Solutions Manager at Ricoh Latin America

In the past, the IT department was an area without a recognized prominence in companies. Although ensuring that an organization's technological infrastructure functions correctly; while providing ubiquitous support to the possible circumstances of employees is a feat, the area and its leader were seen more as an important part of the operation of the business. However, the game has changed, and the technological present is demanding the emergence of a missing figure, someone who consolidates business intuition, operational sensitivity, and technology mastery to play the role that brings innovation to the strategy and direction of the company, making the possibilities of this new technological era a reality.

Undoubtedly, technology has experienced an exponential evolution and growth that has automatically impacted the role that a CIO must play within an organization. This new era of constant digital propositions that assemble, complement, and reinforce each other daily has introduced many organizations to explore innovative and unfeasible options made possible with the help of artificial intelligence, big data, IoT, cloud computing, the software-defined data center, mobility, augmented reality, process automation or robotization and others. This rapid and obvious evolution of IT in business has highlighted the CIO's ability to directly impact the growth of enterprises by shining an ever-increasing spotlight on it. Digital innovation has become a key enabler for CIOs and other IT leaders to actively participate in meeting overall business objectives. According to the 2018 Harvey Nash / KPMG CIO survey, he noted that: "No other executive role is changing as much as that of the CIO. It is a position with the opportunity to be truly transformational, both for the organization and for the person who fills it."

Business alternatives, customer care, and knowledge and production processes are becoming increasingly digital. Moreover, the corporate environment is becoming increasingly mobile, remote, social, geolocative, and real-time, we confirm that the CIO, this historic technology strategist, has the capacity and responsibility to suggest and spearhead important proposals that will shape the company's digital strategy, vision, and training.

Therefore, the CIO is expected to fill many of the gaps that are opening up in this reality and thus become the driver of innovation. Not an easy task, but not an impossible one.

These are difficult changes and the transition is not likely to be entirely clear or smooth. How can CIOs answer the call?

Possible alternatives for successful development.

At Ricoh, we share some ideas that we see as possible avenues for exploring the big transformation challenge:

1) Exercising digital leadership: For a CIO to get the organization to get the most out of technology alternatives he or she will need to get and follow through on an agenda with all C executives, starting with formal and informal one-to-one meetings around innovation ideas. The goal is to bring each executive into the ideal world and, through listening and not using the filter of technological or economic feasibility, create a list of possible digital transformation projects that should be shared and, by way of concession, prioritized in a general meeting. Obtaining the enthusiasm (to begin with) of all or the majority for one or more of them and the approval to explore alternatives will be the start of an obligatory route. Subsequently, it will be very important to maintain these meetings by presenting the progress of the research or development.

It is important to achieve the organization's general approachability towards the technology area, its credibility and good participation in future digital transformation projects will be a valuable component of success. To achieve this, it is advisable to communicate the positive impacts that the technology area is achieving and to offer constant help and training on the use of the tools to obtain the maximum results and return on investment.

2) Expand your capacity beyond your current boundaries: Once the project is secured the transformation analysis must go deep. Getting C-level approval to have working discussions with all levels of employees within your area is key. It is common for innovation projects to break down boundaries between areas and hierarchical levels, and the talks will release vital and unfiltered information from higher levels. In order not to lose the objective, it is important to always focus on a subject of analysis, i.e. around whom or for whose benefit we want to carry out the project: the customer, the supplier, the process, etc.

In some cases, the IT department will have to take up the challenge and go further by contacting the subject, be it the customer or the supplier. There is a high probability that the perfect and constant knowledge of these actors will be a critical part of the innovation project. There the CIO will find already developed analysis tools with which we can have 360-degree profiles of the subject (natural or legal person), know who they are, evaluate their needs, and understand their cycles, emotions, states, contexts, KPIs, etc. This information will lead to practical actions to know where to start.

Another limitation to overcome is the internal divisions between systems and databases. The CIO can consolidate all information in a Data Lake (Datalake) or Enterprise DataWare House (EDW). Robust, scalable, and more cost-effective options are now available than were available just a few years ago.

3) Investing time seeking, receiving, and listening to suppliers: A CIO must then add into his or her routine an openness to knowledge about new ways of how the world is solving different use cases with technology, as integrators are now empowering organizations with technology to perform functions such as using sensors and IoT platforms to improve production or implementing powerful and cost-effective platforms for mass data analytics that in the past were considered incompatible or unfeasible. They also value programming a software robot to perform repetitive tasks that one or more humans perform or allowing artificial intelligence to use natural language to attend 24x7 to anyone interested in products or services, in some cases processing millions of documents.

The CIO should attend trade fairs, events, and exhibitions, both of the vertical and of technology manufacturers, approach those who he/she considers can provide practical solutions to what he/she is looking for, open the doors to suppliers who show experience and capacity to ask them what they have done for companies in the sector, or share the organization's current challenges and explore alternatives with them. Thanks to these openings, scenarios have been consolidated where the supplier adds to the risk of the bet, proposing a charging model according to the improvement in results, that is to say, sharing the profits (Revenue Share).

4) Having a technology infrastructure capable of responding to rapidly changing and specialized demands: The CIO's next steps will not only be with an eye to the next stage of consolidation, cost savings, IT security breaches, automation, outsourcing, and cloud migration; but terms such as big data, analytics, and artificial intelligence will become a reality that is closer to home, understood and leveraged.

Instead of using technology and information just to save the company costs, today's CIO is charged with making the company take advantage of market opportunities to achieve maximum agility. In the words of Bloomberg Businessweek, "The CIO's job is akin to a circus ringmaster, balancing business needs with an incoming flow of opportunities and risks".

Digital technology changes very quickly, and within the enterprise, it will be IT's job to identify those changes that present opportunities and take advantage of them, even if that involves some risk.

5) Guarantee the security and confidentiality of information: Make correct use of the information obtained by the different points of contact of clients, suppliers, collaborators, and executives, and the correct safeguarding and backing up of the company's critical information. This is currently the minimum expectation that will allow us to create trust both internally and externally. The more we advance in the knowledge of our subjects of transformation, the more we will realize that we require more information from them, the more we will need to constantly review and monitor the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of the information collected, as well as the design, implementation, and testing of recovery and risk mitigation plans.

In conclusion, the continuous evolution of technology will keep CIOs on their toes for a long time to come. Digital transformation is inevitable in most industries and companies. Organizations are looking for IT leaders to navigate through this dynamically changing business environment. Ricoh IT Services, an experienced business partner can help bring about change in every organization by formulating a digital transformation roadmap and proposing solutions that practically address the stages of this mandatory and desirable journey.

For further information, please contact

Edgar Matamoros

IT Services Solutions Manager

Edgar.Matamoros@ricoh-la.com