A few years ago, there was a significant trend for CIOs to add new tasks to their job titles: in addition to information, it was usual to find tech chiefs taking on responsibility for technology, digital, and product. It was hard to speak with CIOs without hearing about the importance of customer experiences, whether for internal users or external clients, from the refining of home-working programs to the deployment of new e-commerce channels. They should now demonstrate how technical innovations ranging from artificial intelligence to virtual reality can help their company identify new markets and generate new revenue streams. Automation, on the other hand, should come with a warning: while these tools might help IT teams with their day-to-day tasks, someone must ensure that new applications fulfill high dependability and security criteria. Since increased automation will need IT professionals to spend more time engaging and overseeing, businesses should prioritize training and development to ensure that employees are prepared for a shift in responsibilities.

In recent years, the role of the modern CIO has been in flux. It's becoming more and more of a balancing act to manage traditional IT operations while also driving strategic objectives, with transformational change at the top of the priority list. As firms head into 2022, one thing is certain: This is a period of immense change for businesses as a whole. Much of it is driven by digital disruption and increasing customer expectations, and forward-thinking businesses are seizing the opportunity. Here are a few challenges that CIOs will face in 2022.

Robotic process automation (RPA) is the game-changer your organization doesn't know about. There are only a few leaders in your organization who fully appreciate the potential of RPA. The hype about RPA reminds me of the hype about the Internet in the mid-1990s. We know it's going to take off, but we don't know where or how this idea of knowledge-sharing will be adopted. RPA applies AI and machine-learning capabilities to perform a repeatable task that previously required humans to perform.