The Inevitable Union

Bangalore: CIOs and CMOs have concurrently agreed that it was high time to seal the ‘pandora’s box’ that was unceremoniously opened resulting from the feud between the same. With the advent of Smart phones, tablets and cloud services, not to mention the growing inquisitiveness among the consumers, it has become imperative for CIOs and CMOs to bury their hatchet and work hand-in-hand for the comprehensive growth of the organization, reports Bryan Eisenberg in his blog.

A recent study by Forrester shows that even when these two executives reach an accord on something like an e-commerce re-platforming project, the average time for completion is around 3.9 months. This is alarming considering the fact that such a delay can inadvertently have negative effects on consumer experience as well as business profitability.

Therefore, it becomes crucial for CMOs to probe the hurdles in place for CIOs before entrusting them with technologies pertaining to marketing and expecting them within a stipulated time-frame. Even the CIOs need to provide the adequate space as well as time to CMOs to execute suitable digitalized marketing campaigns.

As John Quarto-vonTivadar, a former CTO, gives us a peek into the mindset of a CIO, states, “A CTO is near the top of the local technology food chain. These are intelligent people, although they may not always display deep business savvy. But by and large, they are smart and aware of being smart. Often their self-value is tied to an evaluation of their smarts, especially vis-a-vis other technology people.

Further, they have become used to meeting a wide variety of business people, some of whom are smart and some of whom are more challenged in that regard, at least perceived by the CTO. From the tech perspective, the ‘standard deviation’ of smarts on the business side of the equation is far wider than it is on the tech side.”

True. Gradually but surely, even the CMOs have began comprehending the cardinal role of technology in the marketing scenario with regards to channels such as digital, websites and social media which has become radical in surviving the cut-throat competition prevailing in the corporate arena.

Thus, we can come to the conclusion that CIOs who are known to be analysts, understand the implications of technology and CMOs who are growth- and market-driven pundits, focusing on the external environment, can together overcome all the barriers that technology has posed before an organization.

It seems the phrase, “United we stand, divided we fall,” was coined for the situation in which we witness the CIOs and CMOs of today.