“This digital vanguard distinguishes themselves from the rest of CIOs and CxOs because they co-own digital delivery,” said Raf Gelders, VP, Research at Gartner. “CIOs and CxOs are equally responsible, accountable and involved in delivering the digital solutions their enterprises need. This is a radical departure from the traditional paradigm of IT delivery and business ‘project sponsorship’ that predominates in most enterprises.”
Gartner analysts presented the survey findings during Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo, taking place here through Thursday. The 2025 Gartner CIO and Technology Executive Survey gathered data from 3,186 CIOs and technology executives (including 1,376 CIOs in EMEA) in 88 countries and all major industries. This survey was supplemented with insights from 1,126 executive leaders outside of IT.
“Behind every digital vanguard CxO, a digital vanguard CIO is guiding and enabling CxOs and their teams to co-lead and co-build digital delivery with IT,” said Daniel Sanchez-Reina, VP Analyst at Gartner. “Digital vanguard CIOs nurture their peers to become digital vanguard CxOs. Those CIOs make it easier for their CxOs to lead digital with them and for business area staff to build digital solutions together with IT.”
“CIOs' success now depends on their CxOs’ success. To succeed at the next phase of digital initiatives, CIOs need their CxOs to work together and co-lead with them. So their fortunes are intertwined: one cannot succeed without the other.”
CIOs Seek Compelling, Easy-to-Use Platforms for All Technologists
Over 80% of EMEA CIOs polled said they expect to increase their investments in cybersecurity, AI/GenAI, and business intelligence and data analytics in 2025.
“Digital vanguard CIOs do not invest in these technologies to be used by their IT staff only. They also make them easy to use for potential or actual technologists outside of IT,” said Gelders. “On average, there is 26% of business/corporate area staff outside of IT dedicated to building, implementing or managing technology. Many of these technologies naturally lend themselves to easing the burden of work enterprise-wide, accelerating time-to-market and time-to-value, and fostering the accountability of CxOs.”
At the other end of the spectrum, 43% of EMEA CIOs said they expect to decrease their investment in legacy infrastructure and data centre technologies. This is a trend that has become more common in recent years, mainly due to migrating to cloud-based solutions. That compares with 33% who said they expect to increase it, which can be attributed, in part, to those organisations that acquired on-premise infrastructure to experiment and produce GenAI solutions.
EMEA CIOs Are Not Prioritizing Tech and Digital Leadership Skills Development Across the Enterprise
Only 14% of EMEA CIOs surveyed prioritise building a technology workforce enterprise-wide (beyond their own IT departments) in 2025. That will limit the enterprise’s ability to get the most from their digital investments. It condemns them to perpetuate the low number (48%) of digital initiatives that meet or exceed their business outcome targets.
Furthermore, just 19% of EMEA CIOs said they will prioritise sharing technology leadership with other business areas, a paramount must-have to grow the digital vanguard.
“To become a digital vanguard, CIOs in EMEA need to prioritise four areas – making digital platforms easy for the workforce to build digital solutions; teaching them the interdependencies between technology and business; helping business leaders become innovation leaders at digital; and expanding digital skills beyond the IT department,” said Sanchez-Reina.
