Turnover of chief information officers is on the rise, as an increasing number of firms are downgrading IT from a strategic function to everyday business. That is the outcome of a survey of over 650 CIOs by a UK recruiting firm.

The trend seems to validate Nick Carr's 2003 assertion that "IT doesn't matter".

Servers and storage are commodities. The only notable difference between Intel and AMD processors lies in the number of floating point calculations that they can perform, a metric that no real person really cares about. The Intel Inside logo on a computer these days is as useful as knowing that your car comes with an engine.

03 Oct 2007

In that reality, the average firm doesn't need a CIO – or at least doesn't need one as part of the management team. Such a role warrants an IT organization that is constantly raising the bar on its vendors and software. Companies like Google, Merrill Lynch or Wal Mart need a CIO.

But for the majority of the economy, a CIO demonstrates a desperate attempt to appear innovative.