Battling the Contradictions of Executive IT Leadership by Martha Heller

With the help of a wide array of successful IT leaders, Martha Heller defines a set of contradictions that permeate the CIO role, and offers solid advice for breaking through them. Heller’s book helps CEOs, HR pros, board members, and IT vendors understand the modern Chief Information Officer.

The CIO Paradox by Martha Heller
 

About the Book

 
Martha Heller Discusses The CIO Paradox

Regardless of industry, most major companies are becoming technology partners. The successful management of information has become so critical to a company's goals, that in many ways, now is the age of the CIO. Yet IT executives are beseiged by a host of contradictions: bad technology can bring a company to its knees, but corporate boards rarely employ CIOs; CIOs must keep costs down at the very same time that they drive innovation. CIOs are focused on the future, while they are tethered by technology decisions made in the past.

These contradictions form what Martha Heller calls The CIO Paradox, a set of conflicting forces that are deeply embedded in governance, staffing, executive expectations, and even corporate culture. Heller, who spent more than 12 years working with the CIO community, offers guidance to CIOs on how to attack, reverse, or neutralize the paradoxical elements of the CIO role. Through interviews with a wide array of successful CIOs, The CIO Paradox helps readers level the playing field for IT success and get one step closer to bringing maximum value to their companies.

Praise for The CIO Paradox

In The CIO Paradox, Martha Heller has clearly articulated the many contradictions that permeate the CIO role. But more than that, she includes rich examples of how successful CIOs have managed to break through these contradictions. IT leadership is a balancing act, as Heller demonstrates in this entertaining and insightful book."

Carol Zierhoffer, VP & CIO, Bechtel Corporation

Martha Heller has unparalleled access to CIOs. She advises them, writes about them, and recruits them. With her terrific book, The CIO Paradox, she lets us in on all that she has learned and the advice she has given. The result is an invaluable resource. Martha demonstrates that for CIOs to be successful in this day and age, they must achieve balance in their skills, plans, and methods to eliminate blind spots and to achieve sustainable success for their departments and for their companies."

Peter High, Author of World Class IT: Why Businesses Succeed When IT Triumphs

Martha does a great job of capturing the paradox of not just the CIO role, but of Enterprise IT as a whole. In a world that greatly admires technology and over-rewards the start-up, how is the brand of the enterprise CIO and the technology teams that support our business so weak? As a CIO that has survived this paradox for more than a decade, I appreciate the insights of The CIO Paradox."

Robert B. Carter, EVP & CIO, FedEx Corporation
 
 

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