New IT Trends Too Hot to Handle for CIOs?

Bangalore: It is a classic case of catch-22 situation for CIOs who are caught between the dilemma of whether or not to provide the latest trends in the consumer world to its employees. But there is a growing belief that CIOs will not last long as dictators and has to eventually give  the employee’s demands, reports Barb Darrow of Gigaom.

According to speakers at Structure Europe, a CIO stands on the precipice and their fate will be decided based on their stand with respect to the emerging trends at the workplace. Moreover, it seems like a losing battle for the CIOs anyway which is evident from the rebellious attitude the employees have adopted as they would very much love to have a piece of  cake the consumers seems to be relishing.

On top of that, forbidding employees from using the latest offerings from  technology sector might result in  CIOs losing credibility as well as control. CIOs don’t want that.

Chris Swan, CTO of user experience for UBS, was of the opinion, “If the CIO stands in the way, it probably hurts the business. It’s better to try to understand what’s making people go rogue and address [their needs].”

But one should also feel for the CIOs who already have so much in their hand and making these neoteric trends such as BYOD and CoIT available to the employees, will only add to the headache as it will make it immensely difficult for them to monitor each and every employee.

But is a CIO willing to risk employee productivity and job satisfaction on which the fate of the IT so delicately depends? Are the CIOs ready to compromise customer satisfaction and the revenue of the organization in the long run?

That remains the big question that has yet to be answered.