Transforming Business: Big Data, Mobility, and Globalization

Prologue: The Crystal Ball

He who lives by the crystal ball soon learns to eat ground glass.

EDGAR R. FIEDLER, ECONOMIST

In 1980, at an otherwise ordinary industry conference, William Synott, then Senior Vice President of the First National Bank of Boston, approached the microphone and boldly asserted a prediction for the future of his profession. The event was the Information Management Exposition and Conference, and Synott would create a moniker, redefine the IT function, and invent a new career aspiration for the budding professionals in attendance. He stated:

The manager of information systems in the 1980s has to be Superman—retaining his technology cape, but doffing the technical suit for a business suit and becoming one of the chief executives of the firm. The job of the chief information officer (CIO)—equal in rank to chief executive and chief financial officers—does not exist today, but the CIO will identify, collect and manage information as a resource, set corporate information policy and affect all office and distributed systems.¹

With that, a new title and role for information managers was born. The goal of their craft was no longer merely to be a technical expert but to combine this know how with business proficiency to advance the goals of the enterprise.

That same ...