The Society for Information Management (SIM) recently released their 2017 trends analysis. They reflect the continuing evolution of business trends being information technology trends. Moreover, IT has increasingly become a priority for most businesses. SIM notes that IT budgets have increased this year by an average of 4.15%, short of last year’s increase of 4.6%, but positive nevertheless.

The report also notes that IT professionals’ salaries have risen by 3.5%, and  IT staff hiring has also increased. The shift of budgets to cloud computing from hardware and software continues, and are likely to increase again in the year ahead.

IT executives highlight three top concerns:

Business alignment

This has been the top priority for four years running. It was listed as the top priority for IT leaders among 41.7% of those executives polled.

Security

36% of IT leaders noted security as their top concern. Remarkably, just four years ago, security was listed as the ninth area of concern. Higher profile security breaches and increased emphasis on the topic by the executive teams and boards of companies will mean that this concern is likely to remain high for IT executives.

IT skill shortages

24% of IT leaders indicated that skills shortages were the top concern. The concern center around technical skills like analytics, software development, cybersecurity and cloud-centric skill, but increasingly, there is concern regarding the paucity of soft skills.

IT leaders are increasingly taking on more strategic responsibilities. This is aided by the fact that 46.3% of CIOs now report to the CEO, according to the SIM report. This is compared to 28.6% who report to CFOs and 16.8% who report to COOs. CIOs now meet with various members of the C-suite on a weekly basis. This represents great progress for the function.

SIM concludes that other than the CEO, the CIO has the most complex, broad, and diverse set of responsibilities. This is demonstrated by the need to think to the future in aiding the strategies of every division of the company. CIOs must also help drive the innovation agenda for the company while also focusing on risk mitigation associated with security investments. The simultaneous focus on risk taking (a necessity with innovation activities) and risk mitigation is but one demonstration of the complexity of the role. The progress made in the function suggests that more CIOs are up to the challenge.

Source: http://www.forbes.com/sites/peterhigh/2016/11/21/cios-top-three-concerns-for-2017-alignment-security-skill-shortages/#1b370e944f0a