Coca-Cola CIO: IT must balance budget and innovation

Over the last two years, the environment has been less than favorable for CIOs trying to bring new technology to their companies. Economic uncertainty has caused many IT shops to play it safe, as CFOs keep a tight grip on their purse strings. CIOs have been opting to focus their energy on maintenance and security, rather than introducing major projects.

Esat Sezer, SVP and CIO with Coca-Cola Enterprises, said CIOs must strike a balance between cost reduction and the need for innovation. He handles the IT needs of over 70,000 employees--50 percent of whom are mobile workers. In 2008, with the recession underway, Sezer transitioned employees to a software as a service communications platform in less than nine months.

Even in tough times, there still needs to be "funding of growth related initiatives that should be shared within business and IT," said Sezer in an interview with MeetTheBoss.tv. For his company, buy-in from top executives was essential to achieving his goals for growth.

"If you look into the end of 2006 timeframe coming into 2007, probably close to 90 percent of our internal resources were occupied to maintain what we have; [to] keep the lights on in other words," said Sezer. "Today...[we reduced that to] 60 percent roughly. So in other words we created around 30 percent capacity of IT resources to get engaged into business transformation enabling activities." 

To Sezer, the process of freeing up IT dollars for new inititives is simple: "Create resources through the efficiencies and productivity initiatives, and fund your growth related activities that business is requiring."

In collaboration with that strategy Sezer recommends CIOs look to other business units and avoid tunnel vision. The IT department's goals should parallel those in other parts of the enterprise.

For more:
- view the full MeetTheBoss.tv interview here (reg. req.)

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