The Making of the CIO Looking Beyond the End of the Year

We’ve spent much of this past year trying to better profile the CIO. In our many travels and conversations, it quickly became very clear to us how little we knew about our IT Departments. So it was with this objective in mind that we launched the State of the CIO survey to actually start documenting exactly who our CIOs were and what our IT department heads were doing in their respective organizations.
We threw the canvas far and wide and started off with a very small sample of 100 respondents. The majority of the companies we spoke with during the survey made up the SME sector, which is one area that has largely been ignored in terms of the growth potential it holds. Over all, the results were a little staggering, some a little difficult to believe while others were eye openers. Though there were very few IT heads that actually have the CIO designation on their business cards, almost 97% knew what a CIO was; almost 82% had heard of CIO magazine and 100% said that they had never been approached by any media prior to this effort. It may not be the most ideal survey but it was a start. I’d like to thank the 5 CIOs/IT Heads who took the time out to be part of our Cover Story along with the 100 respondents who participated in the survey. Over the course of the next several months, we’ll be focusing on specific sectors so as to develop the kind of data that vendors and businesses can use to base their business strategy decisions on.
In addition to working our way towards drawing up a more accurate profile of the CIO in an emerging market such as Pakistan, we’ve highlighted one of the first Green Technology initiatives in Pakistan to formally use Wind Power where it matters most. We’ve got some great stories to share with you through our contributing writers – Farzal dives into the depths of ePayment models and Nauman Sheikh lets you know more about how essential it is to know your customer, especially since you have the analytical tools at your disposal. Kamran Meer shares his multiple years of experience working in the local industry to talk about strategy that will take the Pakistani IT industry into a sustainable future and our featured CIO segment brings Pakistan’s most aspiring logistics company, TCS, to the forefront. Supply Chain Management and Logistics depend on cutting edge technology and TCS talks to us about how they manage their phenomenal tasks.
And we’ve got just as much content packed into the second issue of CMO this month. In addition to all the stories, be sure and check out all the case studies we’ve put together for the PASHA ICT Award Winners 2008, where CIO Pakistan was a media partner.
The coming year is packed with CIO events and the introduction of our 2009 Honorary Editorial Board made up of industry stakeholders, which will be an interesting addition to the publication’s roadmap.
We’d like to take the opportunity wish you all Eid Mubarak and Merry Christmas and safe preparations for the holiday season. Be safe and keep wearing the technology and business hats to see how we can use our experiences in running successful enterprises, and replicate our learnings to better support our communities.
See you next year!