What Every CIO Wants

Some weeks ago I was fortunate enough to read a preview copy of Stephen O’Donnell’s book What Every CIO Wants: A Guide for Global Technology Sales People. Steve is, amongst other things, the Chairman of the Industry Advisory Board for Violin Memory, as well as being the former Global Head of Data Centre Operations for BT (a company where I spent many years working when I was in Oracle Advanced Customer Services).

Needless to say I think it’s an excellent book (or I wouldn’t be blogging about it!) Aimed at sales people who need to pitch at C-level in the technology industry, it provides an insight into the mindset of Chief Information Officers and other C-level executives. In fact, I wonder if Steve has sold himself short in that it could almost be a guide for budding CIOs, explaining how they should be thinking and what their priorities are.

Without wanting to give away any of the content I strongly recommend reading and re-reading the section on ARC – Agility Risk and Cost. This is absolutely critical to understanding the way that the business of IT is run. In fact I would say that you don’t need to be in sales to need to understand the mindset of CIOs and CTOs – any DBA who is looking to propose any sort of investment would do well to read this and understand the concept of ARC, then frame their arguments accordingly.