CIO-CEO Alignment Is Now the Biggest Variable in AI ROI
AI has widened the CIO mandate. Strategy, cost control, and workforce outcomes now sit alongside IT delivery. Yet many CIOs lack the air cover to move decisively.
New global research from Netskope shows a clear gap between ambition and alignment. The signal is simple: AI goals will stall without tighter CEO-CIO agreement on decisions, budgets, and measures of value.
Key findings executives should know
- 39% of CIOs say they're misaligned with their CEOs on decision-making; 31% aren't confident they know what the CEO expects.
- 34% don't feel empowered to make long-term IT strategy decisions.
- 41% say the business needs to increase investment in modern IT infrastructure; 26% struggle to get CEO buy-in on modernization and transformation.
- At least one in three CIOs are being asked to lead beyond IT, including human capital planning, digital innovation, and operational resilience.
- Governance responsibilities are growing: CIOs are expected to identify AI use cases, deliver savings, and build ethics and controls in from day one.
- 37% of CIOs say business strategy and stakeholder management now matter more than technical expertise for the role.
The takeaway: CEOs want AI outcomes without unchecked cost or risk. CIOs are ready to deliver, but need authority, budget clarity, and shared metrics to move fast.
Six conversations to schedule this quarter
- Cost: Set a 12-18 month AI portfolio budget with clear opex/capex guardrails, and a savings plan tied to automation and vendor consolidation.
- Risk: Agree on an AI risk posture, approval process for AI tools, and data boundaries. Establish a cross-functional AI review board.
- Innovation: Prioritize 3-5 use cases with measurable outcomes (revenue lift, cycle-time reduction, quality). Fund pilots with kill/scale rules.
- People: Define the model for AI agents and augmentation, role design, skills uplift, and change management. Align on productivity baselines.
- Measurement: Lock in KPIs and OKRs for value creation, risk incidents, adoption, and time-to-value. Review monthly; publish a scorecard.
- IT estate: Sequence modernization across data, identity, networking, and security to support AI at scale. Cut legacy that blocks progress.
What CEOs should ask their CIO
- Which top five decisions do you need from me this quarter to move faster?
- What's our AI value thesis, and how will we measure it by function?
- Where are our data, identity, or network gaps slowing down AI deployment?
- What risks worry you most, and what controls are we missing?
- What authority do you need to make long-term IT bets without delay?
What CIOs should bring to the table
- A 2-page AI strategy: portfolio of use cases, value targets, risks, and the modernization plan that supports them.
- A governance model: decision rights, tool approval process, model monitoring, and human-in-the-loop checkpoints.
- A workforce plan: roles to redesign, skills to develop, training paths, and expected productivity gains by team.
- A funding model: reallocate savings from consolidation and automation to priority AI bets; include stage gates.
- A metrics cadence: monthly value and risk scorecard with actions and owners.
Investment focus for 2026 planning
- Data foundation: Quality, lineage, access controls, and privacy for AI-ready data.
- Identity and Zero Trust: Fine-grained access, least privilege, and continuous verification across users, devices, and services.
- Network and edge: Low-latency access to cloud, SaaS, web, and private apps with consistent inspection.
- AI security and governance: Model and agent oversight, prompt/content controls, audit, and incident response.
- Platform consolidation: Reduce tool sprawl to cut cost and simplify operations.
- Skills and change: Executive education, manager playbooks, and practitioner training tied to role redesign.
Governance resources
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About the research
Crucial Conversations: How to Achieve CIO-CEO Alignment in the Era of AI draws on interviews with global CEOs, quantitative research with over 200 CIOs in the US and UK, and input from experienced operators across the C-suite. The report spotlights six discussion areas-cost, risk, innovation, people, measurement, and the IT estate-where aligned decisions accelerate outcomes.
Netskope, a leader in modern security and networking for the cloud and AI era, serves thousands of customers, including more than 30 of the Fortune 100, with real-time, context-based security and optimized access across cloud, AI, SaaS, web, and private applications.
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