Information technology management in higher education: an evidence-based approach to improving chief information officer performance

It is critical to higher education institutions that chief information officers (CIOs) succeed since they control information and technology assets, oversee tremendous resources, and facilitate the accomplishments of institutions and their members. The CIO holds a complex and demanding position. Currently there is little quantitative research on how to succeed as a CIO. Available literature about the CIO position is almost entirely based on expert opinion or the experiences of past CIOs and although these insights and experiences are extremely valuable, quantitative research studies are needed to validate, expand, and revise current success recommendations. Available chief information officer studies focus heavily on clarifying the roles in which a CIO must excel as well as the skills, abilities, attributes, and knowledge a CIO must possess in order to succeed. According to evidence-based management literature, although leadership matters, a leader's actions rarely explain more than 10 percent of the differences in performance between the best and the worst organizations and teams and leaders may have the most positive impact by improving organizational and group performance, valuing employees, and developing systems that enable others to succeed. Therefore, rather than focusing on the specific CIO roles, skills, abilities, attributes, and knowledge requirements, this study examines the environment the CIO creates among his/her staff and how it impacts CIO and information technology (IT) organization performance. The results of this study are consistent with the hypothesis that CIOs whose centralized IT organizations perform well in organizational quality areas and who create high-performance IT cultures are perceived as having more successful IT organizations and as being more successful CIOs. Further, this study identifies the factors that are most associated with satisfaction with the centralized IT organization and the CIO, organizational quality and high-performance areas of opportunity for improvement, factors CIOs believe are most important for the success of the IT organization, areas to include in CIO performance reviews, criteria to assist with CIO hiring, and factors to include in employee job descriptions and incentives. Finally, it begins the development of a much needed framework for CIO success