Is your technical hire set up to fail?
Borja Vara | Spain
Here’s a classic case of responsibility without power: 71% of CEOs don’t think their IT operating models are fit for the age of AI. But only 24% of CIOs believe their models effectively adapt to business needs.1
The disconnect between technical CXOs and their entourage signals the need for bigger bandwidth all round. Hiring organizations will increasingly need to seek CIOs (and equivalents) who combine technical expertise with business understanding and leadership skills. Boards and top management teams must better understand what success looks like.
A recent survey investigated the confidence of C-suite members in transformational efforts – including whether AI was delivering revenue and cost savings. Again, the misalignment was striking: whereas net confidence amongst CIO/CTOs was 61%, the C-suite average dropped to 46%. CEOs and Boards scored only 30%.2
But when it comes to appointing technical leaders, too many hiring teams start with the job title. They put the cart before the horse. Too few set out by asking: what is our business problem? What skillset could solve it?
Only once the answers are defined should the search begin.
Technology is not just a functional problem; it’s a leadership problem
Finding those answers is difficult. Not only do CIOs and their equivalents need a bigger bandwidth, so do top management teams and boards.
Even today, few would dispute the fact that technology can boost competitiveness. But they are unclear on exactly how. For some, the tech train is running too rapidly and unpredictably. Others have not yet boarded it. Whatever a company’s type or size, technical success depends on the willingness of the people who run it.
But for a board and C‑suite to be tech-supportive, they must be tech-aware. This raises another tough question: to what extent does your organizational environment allow technology to transform your processes, modus operandi, or entire business?
Under these conditions, it is difficult to secure a hiring brief, let alone a durable hire.
Technology cannot solely rest on technical shoulders
The fragmented thinking amongst top teams can be partially explained by the persistent bugbear of departmental disconnects.
It is the task of the CEO to ensure cross-functional collaboration. To set the strategic and operating guidelines for technical integration.
But no CEO can operate in a vacuum. Not only the board, but all C-suite functions, from CFO to CHRO, need to wire technology into their strategic decisions. They must understand how it can optimize investments, processes, productivity, and efficiency.
This is why building a technology environment must extend to all functional heads. I recommend that every CXO hiring brief embraces technological curiosity; flexibility and learning agility. Candidates must understand the opportunities and limitations, ask the right questions, and be able to take decisions in ambiguous and fast-moving conditions.
Hiring the technology leader – keys to sustainable success
A CIO, CTO, CAIO or CDO is a strategic appointment. For a solid starting point – putting the business before the job title - the CEO once again needs to lead, in consultation with a tech-literate C‑suite.
With the brief defined comes the next task: attracting candidates. The best want to solve complex problems and build new projects. Using technology to transform, and seeing the results of their work over time.
To appeal, hiring organizations need a growth mindset. Ambition without intimidation. A mission beyond money. Strong technical executives seek employers who can match their creative and innovative mindset. Boards and CEOs who give room to contribute ideas and execute on them. Responsibility with power.
They also need a fair level of failure tolerance, not a conservative machine that punishes (reasonable) experimentation. Given the cost of mistakes, pressure on quarterly results and share prices, this is admittedly difficult. Even if a CEO knows that an investment will pay off in the future, time is at a premium.
Top teams may agree with the theory, but acting on it takes vision, holistic thinking, and grit – the definitions of sustainable success.
When it comes to attraction arguments, your organization, whatever its profile, has strengths and pitfalls. Startups and scale-ups provide innovation, dynamism, and speed. But many lack resources.
Big legacy players have money, brand pull, and data. But their size can hinder an executive’s ability to make a visible impact.
Mid-cap and family-owned firms can offer the best of both worlds: faster decision-making, easier access to senior management, financial resources, and clear outcomes. Even then, top teams and owners may be cynical.
The hire is only the beginning
Once the candidate is on board, the company must honor its promises: giving the newcomer the confidence, time, resources, and support to fulfill the mandate.
It’s vital to monitor emerging gaps between intentions and reality. A few months in, quarterly results promote the urgent over the important. The CEO quits. The executive team evolves. The leadership culture shifts.
What can we conclude?
Technical literacy is a leadership competency, and leadership is a technical competency. A sustainable hire requires deep and honest pre-work from the top team, resisting the pressure for silo thinking and quick fixes.
Technology projects fail not because of technology, but because of organizational behavior - governance, culture, requirements discipline, and stakeholder alignment.
This is why bandwidth is so vital: alignment from the get-go, uniting technical excellence with the business case, conducting controlled experiments before scale-up.
All nourished by constant collaboration. Because without buy-in from the top, nothing moves.
1 Watt, S., (2026). ‘From IT Control to Technology Operating Model Orchestration.’ Gartner.
2 ‘How C‑suite alignment helps unlock operational value from technology modernization investments.’ Protiviti, 2026. (Based on its Global Executive Survey: The Alignment Advantage in Transformation, conducted with the University of Oxford)
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