Where Should the CIO Report? Leadership Insights for University IT Success
Exploring how CIO reporting lines impact campus IT leadership, trust, and effectiveness beyond the org chart. Insights for aligning urgency and vision in higher ed IT.
This show was created with Jellypod, the AI Podcast Studio. Create your own podcast with Jellypod today.
Get StartedIs this your podcast and want to remove this banner? Click here.
Chapter 1
Imported Transcript
Timothy Chester
A few months ago, a longtime friend, now a university president, called for advice. He’d inherited a campus IT organization that was capable but cautious. The systems were fine, the people competent, but the energy wasn’t there. He wanted more urgency and more alignment. His question was simple: Where should the CIO report: to him, the provost, or the CFO?
Timothy Chester
The CIO profession has debated this question endlessly. Too many CIOs still insist they’ll only consider roles that report to the president: a trap, in my view, because authority alone rarely builds the trust real leadership requires. I’ve reported to both a provost and a COO, and the work feels dramatically different in each context. But understanding those differences has made me far more effective in both roles.
Timothy Chester
In today’s Dispatch, we explore why that question matters more than most leaders realize, and how the CIO’s effectiveness depends less on the organization chart itself and more on mastering that structure through trust, respect, and adaptability.