CIOs, another kind of PHB or a eunich ?
Who has power to spend money in current largeish organisations ? (say > 5000 staff)
HR ? not really
IT: nope
Senior PHBs ? often
Finance sharks ? rarely
Which area is mostly permissions withholder ?
HR: yes
IT: over-ridden at drop of a vendors lunch or this weeks feature article; no
PHBs: definitely
Finance : Yes !
Where do most PHBs come from? (using 3 big IT firms as examples)
sales weasels.
So the big corporations have management consisting of those with big influence and generally lowest knowledge of the organisation,,who dont manage people, more used to manipulating them, usually with a weak grasp of return on investments, and a raging ego.
Conclusion: whatever is going on, the CIO title was always a scapegoat. Any control they have is white-anted by finance, who dont carry responsibility for destroying productive areas, overridden by sales weasels at all levels and made futiile by the bastard offspring of finance, control freaks ffrom change control, quality and related wastes of oxygen.
Summary: The CIO never really existed as specifiied, and will probably vanish as a concept.
I suggest this is a cultural rather than a business inspired development, as the ruins of western thought seem to think that the only activities humans do can be scripted in a spreadsheet or data model
Biting the hand that feeds IT
