Leadership: CIOs' greatest attribute?

If IT organisations could magic up one thing ahead of anything else, what would it be? If the latest research is to be believed, the answer is simple: more leaders.

Leaders can provide value in many ways: by driving others to excel - at partner and supplier organisations as well as internally; by understanding a rapidly changing IT marketplace; and by focusing on a core set of values, likely to include trust and teamwork.

That's according to the CIO Desk Reference, a report from Meta Group, released in its third edition this week.

One of the biggest problems, the analyst house says, is that 70 per cent of IT organisations are still considered cost centres rather than partners in a business - and that won't change with poor leadership.

The report says the four objectives that make a chief information officer a good leader are:

- inculcating value management into IT culture;
- using IT portfolio management as a communications and investment vehicle;
- developing human capital management processes that increase IT employee productivity;
- ensuring core IT processes are singular, understood, consistent and scalable.

What do you think are the skills that you or your place of work lacks? We'd like to hear in silicon.com's sixth annual Skills Survey, here.