Advice for the CIO on how to stay relevant

So you have the title and the job of CIO. Now do you just roll up your sleeves and do the job by the book? Chances are you will, and you may be shown the exit door sooner than you ever thought. CIOs today must stay relevant, according to Vince Kellen, CIO at DePaul University in Chicago. His resume is long on successes as a technology expert. He's also an international speaker on customer relationship management and the Internet. He's written four books on database technology and is completing a Ph.D in computer science at DePaul.

According to Kellen and many other IT executives, IT needs to move into a new role, and it also has to continue its traditional responsibilities. The key is being receptive to allowing business segments to improve productivity through Internet applications, social networking and other Web 2.0 technologies. Anthony Bradley, an analyst at Gartner, foresees "a significant shift in power that IT ignores at its own peril." He told ComputerWorld that "the consumer side of the world is driving most technology advancement, not enterprise IT."

And that's why CIOs and other IT executives have to figure out how to stay relevant, to learn how to balance control with user-inspired innovation. Kellen's recommendations are to build an innovative agenda and staff it. It may not be immediately relevant, but its value will compound and grow in a very short time frame. Ian Patterson, the CIO of Scottrade, puts it another way. Take the word ''no'' out of your vocabulary, he said, and start thinking in terms of "That's a possible idea; let's see what we can do with it."

For more on the CIO's changing role:
- See this ComputerWorld article