CIOs get a bigger role

CIOs are not taking a back seat these days when it comes to technology purchases. With the economy reeling, big companies are getting serious about who's in charge of purchases. Purchases were once in the domain of business-line managers, but now it's becoming the responsibility of CIOs to make sure purchases benefit an entire operation.

"The CIO has a whole lot more power in 2009--and it started in 2008, actually--than they had in the past," said Jeanne Capachin, a research director at Financial Insights Inc., a Framingham, Mass., research unit of International Data Group Inc. "They really have to manage the purse strings of the institution."

CIOs are getting more power especially at banks where financial decisions are the key to an institution's health, and where CIOs are becoming the gatekeepers.

"Over the past year we have elevated the position of the CIO," said Bruce Livesay, the CIO and executive vice president of First Horizon National Corp. in Memphis. He now reports directly to the CEO--a reflection of the "strategic value of technology and technology investments."

For more on CIOs' growing responsibilities:
- check out this InsuranceNetworking.com article

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