Majority of CIO and CFO relationships ineffective, research shows
CFOs must strengthen their relationship with CIOs with only three in 10 stating they currently have an effective relationship, says Gartner.
Relationships between chief financial officers and chief investment officers are generally in a weak position at a time when they must have transparency over each other’s priorities, according to Gartner senior director and analyst, Clement Christensen.
Mr Christensen said digital investments for companies are “exploding” at the moment with IT budgets as big as they’ve ever been in many cases.
“Yet, from a human perspective, the state of the CFO and CIO relationship is not great,” said Mr Christensen.
“Typically, the relationship is polite, arm’s length, but it's not grounded in empathy or authenticity. CFOs and CIOs are cut from a pretty different cloth and live in very different worlds.”
A recent survey conducted by Gartner found that only three in 10 CFOs stated they have a truly effective relationship with their CIO.
“I’ve done enough couples therapy calls to know that those numbers are true,” said Mr Christensen.
Mr Christensen said CIOs and CFOs need to ask themselves whether they have “the reciprocal candour that creates transparency into each other’s personal priorities”.
“That’s another way of saying do you know your CIO’s objectives for the year and how they’re tracking? Do they know yours? Are you part of the IT roadmap process, not just as the owner of the finance piece but as a partner to the CIO and their overall strategy?” he questioned.
“Do you actively role model co-operation with the CIO for everyone else to see?”
Analysis by Gartner has found that where the CFO and CIO have this kind of relationship, the organisation is significantly more likely to deliver full performance on their digital investments and are significantly more likely to keep spending in line with budgets.
“That’s the financial discipline we want as CFOs and by being a human CFO we can get that performance from IT,” said Mr Christensen.
Gartner VP analyst Nisha Bhandare said CFOs will be making hard trade-offs in the months ahead about where they’re going to be making investments and where they’re not going to be.
Ms Bhandare said adopting a human leadership style where CFOs drive financial discipline through adaptivity, empathy and authenticity can help them to navigate some of these hard decisions more effectively.
“As you get closer to your financial year end, you're going to be reviewing business performance, and pushing your team to achieve the plan. You're going to be in big executive meetings with these strategic and challenging choices in front of you,” said Ms Bhandare.
“As you navigate those core CFO responsibilities, let's look at human leadership, not as a part time job or a hat that you're just wearing team meetings, but use human leadership as the path to greater financial discipline. It's our path to being a better, more effective finance leader.”
