Only a shocking 10% of CTOs will drive value for their organizations, according to a recent Forester prediction. By understanding how the top 10% of CTOs have reshaped their role, this article discusses how aspiring trailblazers can shift their perspectives and priorities to join the elite ranks of tech leaders.
Forrester experts have made a prediction that should be a resounding wake-up call for tech leaders: only 10% of CTOs will actually drive business growth. For the other 90%, the risk is clear—CTOs who fail to demonstrate their value will quickly be replaced by ones who can.
Also Read: Elastic Simplifies Elasticsearch Management with AutoOps Integration
What exactly defines this new breed of tech leader, and what are these elite CTOs doing differently to drive growth? Here are the three essential practices that differentiate the good from the great CTOs today.
- They Focus on Scale
Successful CTOs align their strategies with overall business goals, using automation and integrated technologies to scale other departments. By implementing centralized tools that standardize data, unify analytics, and automate tedious processes like lead scoring, follow-ups, relationship management, and contract management, elite CTOs are empowering RevOps, sales, and marketing teams to optimize every step of the sales funnel, reach more potential leads, and close deals faster.
However, for the top 10% of CTOs, successfully driving growth is not a solo endeavor. They know that leadership buy-in determines future outcomes for any digital transformation initiative.
- They Work Closely with Other CxOs
According to Gartner, by co-leading initiatives with their fellow CxOs, CTOs are twice as likely to meet or exceed expected ROIs for digital technology investments. This involves creating cross-department teams that share responsibilities for technology rollouts, pool resources, and lend vertical-specific knowledge to ensure the most efficient and valuable outcomes. Co-leadership structured engagements also have the potential to uncover new areas for improvement and enhance organizational collaboration and culture.
While working with CxOs unlocks new opportunities within these non-tech domains, elite tech leaders serve as thought leaders and pioneers within their own field. As such, the top 10% of CTOs today focus on claiming competitive advantages through the use of emerging technologies.
- If There’s New Tech, They’re Already Using It
Another prediction from the Forrester report indicates that enterprise AI initiatives will boost productivity and creative problem-solving by 50% in 2024. Similarly, Generative AI has become a popular tool to simplify user interfaces and serve as a digital assistant within complicated tools. CTOs are hurrying to adopt AI before their competitors, and businesses today are quick to announce their implementation of next-gen technologies that claim to improve their products with new, dazzling features—but the top 10% of CTOs have assessed these new technologies well before the rest.
Document generation (i.e., DocGen) and digital signatures are another technology on the radar for many top CTOs. Regarded as a vital tool for automating digital workflows, DocGen empowers organizations to create, share, sign, and retain documents at scale. DocGen tools also help CTOs to automatically meet compliance requirements for security, data privacy, and retention policies across the entire organization with minimal training required.
Finally, for CTOs in retail, finance, cryptocurrency, and logistics, blockchain and Internet of Things (IoT) technology allow for secure, autonomous machine-to-machine transactions that reduce operational complexity and open new avenues for innovation in smart automation.
Join the Elite CTOs Driving Business Growth
Top CTOs drive growth by strategically aligning advanced technologies with business goals through cross-functional teamwork. By evaluating emerging technologies like Generative AI, document generation, automation, and more, the top 10% of CTOs are successfully accelerating the pace of growth, innovation, and collaboration for their organizations.
Also Read: CIO Influence Interview with Eduard Frank, CTO of Scanbot SDK
[To share your insights with us as part of editorial or sponsored content, please write to psen@itechseries.com]
