Excepts from the Survey

• Executive Summary
• Remuneration / Salaries

Executive Summary

A positive year for CIO evolution

Things are looking pretty good for CIOs this year, and most are in a confident mood. Salaries are increasing, packages are expanding and IT budgets, while not booming, are at least in line with inflation.

The CIO is continuing to evolve into a more in a strategic role, with heads of IT keen to gain more responsibility. Some 76% now believe their role has become more strategic, compared to 67% last year, and many are widening their remit away from just the IT department – 66% have already expanded their scope of responsibility, and the 34% who aren’t, would like to.

They are increasingly involved in strategic decision making that reflects the broader needs of the business, as well as taking specific responsibility for areas such as logistics, business continuity and corporate change management. Their growing confidence means that if CIOs are not getting what they need to feel fulfilled in their roles, they will look around to see what other employers can offer them. Some 60% say they are likely to move within the next two years, but only 16%of them are actively looking for a new job, indicating they are reasonably satisfied with their roles. On the whole CIOs seem happy and fulfilled with their current roles, but are keen to see them expand and evolve further.

Strategic challenges

The vast majority of CIOs say they are happy in their role, indicating high levels of job satisfaction. The primary drivers for CIOs seeking a new role are a greater involvement in business strategy (25%) and a new challenge (32%). The results all point to CIOs being more confident in their roles, and more determined to dictate their responsibilities.

Better packages

Salaries and packages are also an indication of the upbeat mood, and show that not only are CIOs being paid more, but they are also receiving better packages and benefits, compared with a year ago. The average respondent salary in 2006 was £104,000, compared to £84,800 last year, and while the 2006 benefits CIOs receive are similar to last year, bonus payments are higher.

Top priorities – integrating business and IT

CIOs believe that IT and business integration is moving in the right direction with 59% of respondents saying that they are well integrated, compared with 41% last year. However with a substantial percentage not properly integrated there is still much work to be done.

Meeting project deadlines has also become more important for CIOs, with 39% believing they are a high priority, compared to 28% last year. As the IT recruitment market becomes more buoyant, staffing issues have also become more of a concern- 17% of CIOs believe staffing is a high priority compared to 7% last year. The importance of controlling the quality and costs of outsourcing has also become more important this year with 17% of CIOs citing it as a high priority. This may be suggestive of an upward trend in outsourcing cost as competition for talent in countries such as India becomes more intense.

Mature outsourcing market

CIOs think that the outsourcing market has matured. Some 85% use it to run some of their operations, and 48% think spending on it will increase, however, only 14% think all of their original outsourcing objectives have been met. Ten percent more CIOs are looking for cost reductions from outsourcing this year, 33% compared to 22% last year.

Offshore meets business expectations

Of those who outsource, the majority use offshore services, and 41% of those expect the amount of work they send offshore to increase. On the whole offshore services are working well, some 66% of CIOs say that their business expectations of offshore services are being met, and 7% say they have been exceeded.

CIO benefits are similar to last year, although more CIOs are receiving bonus payments from their employers. Bonuses, contributory pensions and company cars/car allowance remain popular benefits.

Just over half of those who are eligible for share options, equity or LTIPs realised these benefits last year, and of those who did realise this benefit the average payment represented 8% of their salary.

There is also an upward trend in bonus payments in the last 12 months, with 87% of CIOs receiving a bonus and the size of these bonuses also increasing. The mean bonus for respondents is 20% of salary.

But in spite of the upward trend, a quarter of respondents are still not entirely happy with their packages. CIOs want better packages, and feel they deserve it. On a positive note the level of dissatisfaction is just 25%, compared to 30% last year, 64% are satisfied, compared to 62% last year, and 11% are extremely satisfied with their remuneration, compared with 8% in 2005.

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