Mark McDonald

Sydney is the final destination for the 2010 Gartner Symposium cycle enabling Gartner Analysts to share the latest insight gained from meeting with CIOs and IT executives in Europe and North America.   Australian companies are midway through their 2011 financial year and face the need to assess where they stand and the need to formulate new plans for the coming year.  This is an ideal time to step out of the office and into the Symposium to explore a world shaped by economic, technical and leadership requirements.

• We face a multi-speed economy – a term I first encountered here in Australia.  The term multi-speed reflects that economic recovery and growth in all countries will create new winners and the less fortunate.  You see this in Australia with resource-based companies generating healthy profits while other sectors continue to face challenging business conditions.

• Technologically we face an environment of change from heavy weight, owner operated technologies in favor of lighter weight Internet based services.  Australia’s development of the national broadband network will make these services increasingly viable.

• Leadership skills and management practices are changing within IT as the focus grows from providing quality services to creating new capabilities at speed.  Australian CIOs and IT leaders often describe themselves as conservative in nature will create challenges within the IT organization.

Australians recognize that they face a future that requires making tough decisions as illustrted by this year’s parlimentary election results and even the AFL grand final that ended in a tie and a rematch.

The CIO experience at Symposium recognizes these challenges in many different ways.  Gartner Analyst presentations concentrate on addressing challenges related to leading in an environment requiring innovation, leadership and transition to new technology models.

In this environment, CIOs are feeling the effectiveness of current practices slipping know that their current practices are losing their punch and they are looking for new practices to take on new challenges. The 2010 CIO experience concentrates on presentations, workshops and interactive sessions that concentrate on:

• Extending IT’s reach to the business edge
• Achieving leadership and solution imperatives
• Bringing integrity and transparency to measuring IT’s contribution
• Creating a lean and responsive IT organization
• What’s next on the horizon

The Executive Programs Lounge creates a unique meeting and networking place where you can be personally productive, even if that calls for taking a break or checking in with the office.  CIO workshops give you an opportunity to work with your peers and Gartner tools to explore and investigate your issues and alternatives. Taken together they offer an experience that respects your time and values your active participation.

So welcome to Sydney.

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Category: 2011 Strategy     Tags: 2011 Planning, Business Leadership, Economic conditions, Leadership, Strategy and Planning, symposium

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