CIO – 5 Compelling Reasons Why CIOs Should Pursue Board Seats Now

Interested in joining a board? Don't wait for retirement. "A CIO's abilty to ‘demystify’ IT for the board means greater opportunities to influence business strategy," says Charles Gray, who leads Egon Zehnder's Technology Officers Practice in North America. While the strategic importance of IT in the business has been developing for years, the pandemic opened another window of opportunity for CIOs. “Over the course of the last several months, CIOs are much more core to the business strategy and to winning in the future,” he says. “Now is the time to be truly strategic and talk about the future. Don’t waste that seat at the table. Be prepared for that conversation.”

Gray is one of the authors of a recent Egon Zehnder report (The Great Digital Opportunity: Technology Officers in the Age of COVID-19), which pulled from several interviews with more than two dozen CIOs and CTOs about the changing attitudes of senior business leaders and boards. He found that “boards have been much more engaged with IT than usual since the onset of the pandemic.”

CIOs-turned-board members bring depth of understanding to those conversations.

Full story: Maryfran Johnson: 5 compelling reasons why CIOs should pursue board seats now, on CIO.com (1 October 2020).