Top 5 priorities for CIOs in 2024

Although GenAI may be the latest focus of the senior leadership across all forward-looking organizations, CIOs must not lose sight of the key fundamentals such as Cybersecurity and Sustainability.   

The priorities that Chief Information Officers (CIOs) set for themselves always have a far-reaching impact on the present and future of their organizations. Therefore, the technology leaders must be very cautious about the vision they have for their companies and must be ready to step back to see how aligned their actions and priorities are with the overall goals of their companies. 

Although the priority list of 2024 for these leaders can not be said to be complete unless they include finding more and more use cases where Generative AI can be applied, CIOs  must not forget the key technology areas that are imperative for the sustainable progress and continuous innovation. 

Although each organization will have its own list of tech priorities (and this is perfectly fine), in this blog, we will explore five key areas that must find a place in a CIO’s priority list for 2024. 

Five top priorities for CIOs in 2024

Setting priorities for the year ahead helps with better planning and successful execution on those plans. For the year 2024, to help keep their enterprises stay ahead of the competition, CIOs must prioritize the following 5 areas including a renewed focus on security and building more robust data platforms.  

1. Enhancing cybersecurity

The first priority for CIOs revolves around cybersecurity. According to a Deloitte report, there are 14 impact factors that magnify the overall cost of a cyberattack. And the effects of an attack can ripple for years. Therefore, one of the most critical tasks for a CIO is to protect its people and IT assets. 

To stay protected while also complying with regulatory regulations, such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR,) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), CIOs have to stay focused on improving the agility, scalability and resiliency of their IT infrastructure. 

Here are a few actionable steps for building a more secure and resilient organization: 

• Conduct regular cyber security awareness training to help build a vigilant culture 
• Implement multi-factor authentication across all systems and apps 
• Establish clear protocols for teams to respond to cyberattacks (If it happens)
• Encrypt data both at rest and in-transit 
• Conduct vulnerability assessments and penetration testing from time to time
• Foster partnerships with reputed cybersecurity vendors 
• Monitor your network traffic and user behavior for anomalies
   

2. Gaining stronger control over data

Tech transformation requires a robust data foundation. Large enterprises have vast amounts of data residing in disparate sources such as databases, IoT devices, social media channels, web, CRMs, etc.  To capture value from this massive amount of data, tech leaders need to invest in modern data storage and integration solutions to reshape their companies into more connected and collaborative work places. 

The need is to regain more clarity and control over IT assets and effectively address critical issues related to data governance, management, and privacy, and tech leaders can help build more connected and empowered enterprises and pave the way for increased innovation, collaboration and business revenue. 
 

3. Driving innovation through the Cloud

It’s good that you are on top of everything Cloud. But this does not mean that you should relegate it to the back burner. In fact, you must continue to invest in building and optimizing your cloud capabilities to help your business stay agile, competitive, and well-positioned to better serve your customers via the cloud. 

In order to generate meaningful ROI from your cloud investments, you need to continue to look for opportunities to strengthen your cloud engineering capabilities. And you can do this all in-house with your cloud team or engage a reliable Cloud partner to help accelerate the process. 

Here are a few steps you can take to get started: 

• Implement robust governance frameworks and cloud management strategies. This will help you regain visibility into cloud usage, mitigate risks, and drive accountability across the organization.
• Build a mechanism to continually assess and optimize your cloud architecture, resource utilization, and cost management practices. By leveraging automation, analytics, and best practices, you can unlock greater efficiency, scalability, and agility, ultimately driving greater ROI and business outcomes from your cloud initiatives.

4. Integrating sustainability into everything IT

Sustainability is again making waves in the Tech space. And in 2024, CIOs are expected to deeply embed sustainability into the very core of organizational operations. Beyond mere environmental consciousness, ensuring sustainability for CIOs is now more about ensuring a strategic alignment of sustainability endeavors with compliance mandates, such as net-zero emissions targets and a range of other regulatory obligations. 

Leaders across all forward-looking organizations are increasingly investing in modern technologies such as smart grids and carbon removal solutions to drive sustainable practices throughout the organization.

Actionable steps for CIOs: 

• Embrace Green IT Practices: You can ensure sustainability by implementing green IT practices such as virtualization, energy-efficient hardware, and data center consolidation. By reducing energy consumption and carbon footprint, organizations can contribute to environmental sustainability while also realizing cost savings.
• Track inefficiencies: Leaders can build and optimize systems to monitor and report on key sustainability metrics such as energy usage, carbon emissions, and waste generation. By tracking and analyzing this data, organizations can identify areas for improvement and demonstrate compliance with environmental regulations and sustainability initiatives.
• Implement sustainable Data Storage Practices: CIOs can adopt sustainable data storage practices such as data deduplication, compression, and tiered storage to optimize storage efficiency and reduce energy consumption.

5. Developing a work culture that is aligned with these priorities

A top priority for CIOs today is fostering a cultural shift within their organizations. This culture should empower employees to be data-driven by providing them with the education and tools they need.  It must also prioritize cybersecurity vigilance across all levels. Cloud adoption should be strategic, requiring a cloud-native development mindset to ensure its success. Finally, building a culture of sustainability is crucial, considering the environmental impact of IT practices. By focusing on these elements, CIOs can create a foundation for a future-proof and responsible IT department.

Other key priorities for CIOs 

Tech leaders are busy guiding their organizations navigate today’s highly dynamic and challenging world. And what we discussed above is just a tip of the iceberg. Here are some more to-dos for CIOs to keep them on their toes throughout 2024 and beyond.

• Delving deeper into AI: Artificial Intelligence(AI) is impacting different business lines more than ever. Tech leaders, in 2024, should therefore invest more in harnessing the power of AI to drive business innovation and process efficiency. They should identify current AI use, define use cases to test and validate, and scale AI use.
• Digital acumen: To keep their organizations stay ahead of the market competition, tech leaders need to build and run more and more programs and initiatives to increase digital acumen across the enterprise.
• Talent development: Companies can not function on their own; they need talented resources such as developers, data scientists, and strategists. Therefore, CIOs must build and optimize a talent development plan that is well-aligned with the business needs and ever-changing market dynamics. 
• Control costs to fund innovation: Tech leaders can prioritize IT cost optimization to strengthen their position with stakeholders and the CEO. They can do this by establishing a proactive culture of IT cost optimization, and prioritizing investments that maximize impact on corporate objectives and outcomes. Several other steps can be planned to keep the IT costs under control while also driving process efficiency and productivity. 
• Vendor management: Managing relationships with IT vendors and third-party service providers effectively, ensuring that vendors deliver value, meet SLAs, and adhere to contractual agreements.

Conclusion

It is becoming increasingly imperative for CIOs to keep their ears to the ground in order to build a truly dynamic and resilient organization. In 2024, the tech leaders are increasingly tasked with the responsibility to think clearly about their priorities. 

Whether it is regaining control over data or optimizing their cloud infrastructure or delivering deeper into AI, CIOs have a lot on their plate this year. 

Engaging a reliable digital and technology partner, such as Kellton, can help ease and simplify the process. Over the years, Kellton has helped numerous organizations across various industries, such as Insurance and Manufacturing, excel in their digital aspirations with its ever-expanding suite of services and solutions. And we’d be happy to help you too! 

Explore our Cloud Engineering, Data Science & Engineering, and Product Engineering capabilities!