|
Overview: Title Matters
The top IT executive at a midsized company might hold one or more of these titles: CIO, vice president of IT, director of IT. Which one(s) often depends on several factors, including company size, the preference of management and how strategic to the business IT really is. But if there was any doubt that the CIO title trumps the others, read on for the results of the 2006 CIO Decisions Midmarket Salary and Careers Survey.
Our 457 respondents, all CIO Decisions subscribers, represent more than a dozen industries. Some 70% work at companies with $500 million in annual revenue or less. Their average age is 46. Across all titles, nearly half have 20-plus years in IT.
Yet in many ways, the CIOs stand apart. Some 66% of the 128 CIO respondents bring home $150,000 or more in salary and bonus, compared with 56% of the 61 vice presidents of IT and 16% of the 210 directors -- and differences grow only more extreme at higher compensation levels (see "Salaries").
Almost half of CIO respondents say they report directly to the CEO, compared with 26% of VPs of IT and 16% of IT directors. And a whopping 70% of CIOs hold a seat on their organization's executive committee. Just 57% of VPs and 24% of directors do.
Even respondents without the C title acknowledge that it makes a difference. "When executive management of a company assigns the CIO title to someone, it shows an awareness [in] the executive suite that IT is a critical component within the associated business," says Bill Wade, VP of technology solutions at $125-million Texas Capital Bank in Dallas. He hopes to gain the CIO title once he completes an IT restructuring at his company. Then "the title should have more meaning to the executive management, and the role will be more defined," he says.
Heather Liddell, an analyst at Forrester Research Inc. and the author of a 2005 report on the CIO role, attributes the executive presence of many CIOs to companies' changing view of IT from cost center to innovation enabler. "This shift of priority undoubtedly elevates a CIO's strategic importance in the firm," she says.
And the shift is happening faster in the midmarket than in larger firms, says Karen Rubenstrunk, a senior partner in the CIO practice at executive search firm Korn/Ferry International. "I'm finding this trend to be stronger in the medium-sized companies because the CIO has a tendency to be a little more active in the overall business," she says.
That's certainly true for Neal Guernsey, vice president and CIO of Feld Entertainment Inc., the parent company of Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus and Disney on Ice. Guernsey says he was hired because he can work as a peer among C-level executives. "I'm bringing something to the table from every job I've had," says Guernsey, who, like 62% of CIOs surveyed, has more than 20 years of IT experience.
On the tenure front, executive turnover remains high, with a majority of respondents reporting that they've been in their job for five years or less. But half of CIOs have held their job for more than five years, an improvement over the oft-cited average of 18 months, published in a Meta Group survey in 2000.
Overall, the survey shows that many respondents receive the acclaim due an IT leader. But there is room for improvement.
|
