FEATURE : CIO was necessary to address the immediate needs of a ‘ COVID world ,’ whether enabling a remote workforce or accelerating cloud adoption and , more importantly , enabling a ubiquitous channel for customer and employee interactions ,” he said .
Wael Abdoush , General Manager and Technology Leader – Gulf , Levant and Pakistan , IBM , agreed with the Gartner findings and said : “ We ’ ve found that the CIO ’ s influence on business strategy and operations is growing rapidly as technology pervades enterprises across every sector of the MEA economy . In particular , the value of AI-driven and cloud-delivered applications and services has continued to swell .”
Abdoush said as these technologies now power critical business processes , the role of the CIO has never been more vital to breaking down internal silos and spurring innovation in every part of an organisation . “ Even during uncertainty , CIOs are driving transformation and business value at an astonishing pace . It is perhaps no surprise that when reflecting on their increasingly strategic role , 52 % of the CIOs in our latest IBM Institute for Business Value ’ s report ‘ The CIO Revolution ’ reported engaging with their CEOs more than they do with any other C-suite leader ,” he said .
Ram Narayanan , Country Manager , Check Point Software Technologies Middle East , said CIOs are facing an array of cybersecurity challenges that impact their ability to protect the enterprise , and two of the biggest challenges are the security implications of increased telework and the cybersecurity skills shortage . Narayanan said the cybersecurity industry is experiencing a massive skills gap , meaning that many organisations lack the staff and expertise required to effectively protect against cyberthreats . “ As a result of
Sumeeth Singh , Cloud Provider Business Head , VMware Sub-Saharan Africa
www . intelligentcio . com INTELLIGENTCIO MIDDLE EAST 49