A: I strongly believe that uniform standards are less critical today than they were in the past, as interoperability is more important in today’s environment. There are good number of  systems deployed that have a common standard, but are deployed differently in each country and therefore operate as independent systems and environments.It is essential to have common standards around data and integration as opposed to technologies.

A: I believe technology mimics business and if  business operates as a cottage industry with local P&Ls and strategy, much of its IT infrastructure is likely to reflect this. I don’t believethat company culture dictates standards, as it is the inability of a company to establish a common business strategy for global and local growth. In such structures, local offices focus on developing systems that do not lend themselves to integration, and therefore do not add value to the organisation globally.

A: Again, I strongly feel that standards need to be around data,content and information and not so much around technologies. It will take some time for all markets to migrate off  legacy systems, but a middle-tier that integrates to these applications and can deliver reliable, accurate, and timely information for the organisation is essential. Global buying power is critical, but unfortunately many IT providers do not behave as a global company and do not offer deep discounts. Many, in fact, compete with each other in various markets, making it more difficult for CIOs to put together global deals. In addition, some of  the smaller markets generally end up paying more through a global deal compared to the larger markets.

A: Best practices  sometimes come  from the most unexpected places. I think looking at all innovations from small to mid size markets as well as new mergers and acquisitions can help a CIO find new and innovative ways that can be applied globally. Key to deploying anything globally requires building relationships and gaining consensus across markets.

A: Great CIOs have to be somewhere between Churchill, Mother Teresa and a kamikaze pilot. Managing cultures is one of the many issues they must tackle to be able to deliver transformation through the deployment of  technology. I think the basic premise is to be open to ideas, embrace differences and be adaptable. Getting buy-in and support around big ideas requires a good deal of  dialogue, debate and buy-in when working globally.

I believe the toughest challenge far and away is change management during application deployment. This trumps all other challenges.

A: We are seeing a great deal of datacentre consolidation across all markets. Most markets with to inexpensive bandwidth or shutting down data centres, moving their applications to virtual centres and the cloud. This will help to ensure security, reliability and standardisation while reducing the organisation’s carbon footprint and computing costs. Consistent standards around information security are of course critical and essential. And getting buy-in around this issue is certainly easier than around other issues.