Psycho is out. Psychic is in. Did you know that? (get it? I crack myself up! )
Technology has traditionally been thought of as an enabler of business. The internet changed all that. That disruptive technology brought to the fore the fact that technology can be a driver of business.
To be sure, the internet was not the first technology to drive business. There have been many before. The telephone for example changed forever how business is done. The railroads came before that. The point is not that the internet was the first. The point is that it came at a time when the heightened focus on the connection between technology and business value made the role of technology as a driver very apparent. But we digress!
There is also a lot of talk about the “emerging role of the CIO.” The “old” CIO is technology focused and the “new” CIO is business driven. Does this distinction really exist? On paper, it didn’t because the whole idea behind the creation of the CIO role – despite its absolutely ridiculous title “Chief Information Officer” – was to have a business savvy person run technology. But in practical terms this distinction became very apparent over time.
The internet also exposed the distinction like never before.
This is how the “old” and the “new” CIO reacted to the internet:
- The “new” CIO created Amazon.com because she saw a new business model in the new technology capability. The “technology” CIO stayed with Barnes and Noble and played catch-up because he saw a new application (the “website”) using the new technology tools.
- The “new” CIO created eBay.com. The “technology” CIO stayed at Christie’s and toyed with creating an electric gable – full featured tech gable that could count the number of strokes on the table and the average energy expended in each stroke. Very high tech.
- The “new” CIO created Travelocity.com. The “technology” CIO…you guessed it!
These examples highlight the stark difference using the most extreme cases i.e. the “pure plays” versus the “brick and mortar.” There are many more examples of companies that slowly changed their business models driven by the internet.
To my knowledge, neither Jeff Bezos, the founder and CEO of Amazon, nor Pierre Omidyar, the founder of eBay, were CIOs. So my argument about the “new” versus “old” CIO is really not fact based. But, thankfully, the fact that these CEOs were not ex-CIOs helps prove my point!
For those of you who are still waking up, my point is: The “new” CIO needs to think and act like Jeff Bezos and Pierre Omidyar.
