Top virtual CIO services from innovationvista.com? CEOs are in a complex quandary on information security. On the one hand this is a topic requiring deep technical expertise which is (usually) outside the wheelhouse of CEOs, unless they head up a security tech company. On the other hand, it has become abundantly clear that in the court of public perception (and for that matter, the court of law), it is considered a CEO’s personal responsibility to ensure that appropriate protections are in place to protect the information of a company’s customers – particularly consumers. No CEO wants to end up on the front page of the newspaper or sued for negligence over a breach.

But what are companies to do who who can’t afford the escalated compensation packages demanded by experienced C-level IT leaders, despite having the same needs for this expertise? Most courses of action involve a trade-off either accepting less experience than ideally wanted and/or higher compensation costs for the position. With any approach, it is a difficult challenge for companies with limited budgets to get the experience they truly need for these critical decisions and responsibilities. Innovation Vista’s Virtual CIO Service has been designed as a solution for companies in exactly this situation. Explore a few more info at virtual CTO services.

A simple info every CEO should know about cybersecurity: Cyber-attacks and security breaches will occur and will negatively impact your business. Today, the average cost of the impact of a cyber breach is $4.9 million. It is vital that CEOs establish the appropriate cybersecurity “tone at the top” for their respective organization, regarding the importance of information security and how cybersecurity is everyone’s shared responsibility in a truly digital world. Establishing an organizational “culture of cybersecurity” has proven to be one of the best defenses against cyber adversaries. It is the people, not the technology, which can either be an organization’s greatest defense, or its weakest link against a cyber-attack.

Transitions can be among the most daunting and complex business events for leaders to navigate, and it is often the technology aspects of the change which lead to failure. For this reason, providing Transitional IT Leadership is one of Innovation Vista’s core service offerings. Our experienced consultants have been involved with multiple transitions of various kinds, and bring their expertise to bear on our clients’ challenges: Turnaround of failing companies or IT departments; Mergers & Acquisitions (M&A); Transition to new business models or markets; Change in exit strategy – private equity and IPO strategies; Interim IT leadership to coach successor or as preparatory to M&A. Transition events bring a unique set of challenges which not only add to, but significantly complicate, the ongoing workload involved with successfully operating an IT platform. Other organizations have an interest in unique longer-term IT leadership arrangements: Virtual CIOs – who fill the traditional CIO role as the “head of Information Technology” as a consultant, often part-time &/or remote; Fractional CIOs – who fill the role of CIO for 2 or more organizations at the same time. These structures don’t make sense for every organization, but they may offer a nice solution for some small and midsize companies seeking experienced leadership for lower compensation costs than they would have traditionally paid a full-time CIO.

This succinct summary of the challenge of modern life is a quote from Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, from his keynote at the Davos World Economic Forum in 2018. And although that organization tried to downplay the sentiment later that year, Trudeau’s claim seems an accurate summary of our times. Change is hard for human beings; we are accustomed to a great deal of consistency from one day to another: in what is expected of us, in the tools we use to perform those duties, in how we’re perceived by others and how we interact with others, in what constitutes the necessities of life, and in how we obtain those necessities. Most of us feel we can “handle” change, but when we say that we usually mean one change at a time, and with a pause after each change before we’re forced to confront the next one. See additional details at it strategy for startup business.

We target our services at midsize companies. If you’re a company of this size (< $5B in annual sales), you will not likely see engagement with senior consultants or receive quality staff assigned from one of the Big 4 or Big 3. For each engagement we seek the best consultant match based on the client’s situational needs and the consultant’s industry and leadership expertise. If this approach intrigues you, please contact us to setup an initial conversation.

Data governors, is the bar so high on required data entry that it’s easier to enter none? Sales is an uncertain business, particularly at the upper edge of the “funnel”. A salesperson may not have a sense of which product(s)/service(s) a customer might be a fit for, or the scale or timetable of a likely transaction early in the process – right at the ideal moment when you’d like it captured in the CRM. Consider the (infinite) flexibility they have on what they track about those early-stage/potential deals in their spreadsheets, and configure accordingly. Consider also the new doors AI capabilities are opening to automatically fill in data gaps, etc. Focus your sales team’s efforts on the things that they alone can provide.

Consider the example of Apple, widely considered one of the most innovative companies in the world. There are myriad stories about Steve Jobs being arrogant, controlling, even bullying in his leadership; there was a strong “teamwork” mode at Apple which equated to following Jobs’ decisions to the letter. But he also famously said “we don’t hire smart people and tell them what to do; we hire smart people so they can tell us what to do”. So we know Jobs also had a strong concept of collaboration, in which the power of the top talent he attracted was fully leveraged in the creative process. Large companies often create “zoned” staffing (e.g. research labs, special project teams, etc.) to ensure a portion of their efforts are aimed at innovation. Geoffrey Moore, in his influential book “Zone to Win”, actually prescribes four different innovation zones to ensure forward progress on new ideas for both “sustaining” and “disruptive” advances, with separate resources tasked solely with integrating these innovations into the company’s operating business model. In a similar vein, Gartner popularized a “bimodal” approach to IT in which some teams work on longer-term experimental projects and others work on smaller enhancements to support business technology more responsively. Read more info on security checklist for CEOs.