CIONET International, in partnership with INSEAD, the leading international business school, today announced the winners of the 2013 European Chief Information Officer (CIO) of the Year Award.

Presented by EU Commission Vice-President Neelie Kroes, the awards recognise the success of CIOs who have increased their organisation’s competitiveness by using information and communication technologies (ICT) to create significant business value. The winners did so in many ways, including by operating their enterprises more efficiently and economically; by, collaborating more effectively; by enhancing the customer experience; and by increasing the success of mergers and acquisitions.

For the third time, CIONET, the largest community of European IT professionals, partnered with INSEAD eLab, the school’s Centre of Excellence for research and insights into the impacts of digitisation on leadership, organisations and countries, to present the awards. A committee of experts, including past winners, selected three winners from a field of 18 prominent finalists, identified by the country offices of the CIONET network. Judges selected the top three in the following categories, each representing an important type of business value that CIOs help organisation achieve: Technology-Driven CIO, Business Process-Driven CIO, and Client-Driven CIO.

The following CIOs earned this year’s award:

• Technology-Driven CIO: Luc Verbist, Chief Information Officer of De Persgroep
• Business Process-Driven CIO: Bassim Haj, Chief Information Officer of Yara International
• Client-Driven CIO: Gerry PENNELL, CIO of the London Organising Committee for the Olympic and Paralympic Games

“Look inside most successful organizations today—no matter what sector—and, increasingly, you will find the critical success factor is how well they manage and use information and communications technologies,” said Theos Evgeniou, Academic Director of INSEAD eLab. “Today’s CIOs face unprecedented challenges and opportunities of massive trends such as broadband, social media, cloud computing and ‘big data’. We are pleased to join CIONET in recognising this year’s CIO leaders.We are proud of contributing to show how, in such a complex and rapidly moving environment, CIOs adapt, lead and create significant business value.”

Selection criteria included examining how well CIOs adjusted their IT strategy to meet business needs; how successful they were in deploying ICT and related teams to meet business requirements and to effectively manage business priorities. The final three winners were selected on the basis of their own and their team’s accomplishments.

“To be innovative and competitive in today’s global digital economy, organisations have little choice but to invest in information and communication technologies,” noted Nils Olaya Fonstad, Associate Director of INSEAD eLab, “However, without the proper skills and leadership to put these technologies to effective use, firms are at significant risk of wasting their investments and missing key opportunities for growth and competitiveness.”

Concurrent to the CIO of the Year awards, INSEAD and CIONET released the results of an in-depth European business survey: 2013 IT-Enabled Leadership Report.

[button color=”orange” link=”http://blog.cionet.com/2013/06/03/2013-it-enabled-leadership-report/”] 2013 IT Enabled Leadership Report[/button]

IT-Enabled Leadership Report compiled from a survey of CIOs in 10 European countries – identifies the roles of CIOs in strengthening and enabling organisational growth in today’s challenging economic climate.  The survey looked at their strategic priorities in their roles leading IT within organisations and the amount of time CIOs spent the year before on managing IT services; working with non-IT colleagues; managing enterprise-wide business processes; and working with external customers and partners. The report—available at www.ciocity.com— provides summaries on each of the 18 finalists of the 2013 European CIO of the Year Awards.

“Highlighting effective uses of ICT and building future IT-enabled leaders is the shared responsibility of multiple stakeholder groups,” noted Hendrik Deckers, Managing Director of CIONET International. “These reports are the most recent results of fruitful collaborations between INSEAD eLab, CIONET and the European Commission. We look forward to many more.”

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