There’s something fundamentally wrong about hospital CIOs reporting to CFOs and other money people, according to Mansur Hasib, a longtime CIO and now an author, speaker and educator on cybersecurity issues.
“The chief information officer’s job is to look toward the future,” Hasib said Monday at the World Health Care Congress in Washington. That makes CIOs innovators and strategy people.
When Investment Rhymes with Canada
Canada has a proud history of achievement in the areas of science and technology, and the field of biomanufacturing and life sciences is no exception.
“Many CFOs tend to look at people as expenses,” not assets, Hasib said. Hasib, who chairs the graduate cybersecurity technology program at the University of Maryland University College, said that layoffs kill innovation. They also affect loyalty of surviving employees.
When Hasib was researching his Ph.D. dissertation in 2013, he found that 50 percent of U.S. healthcare organizations had IT and cybersecurity operations reporting to the CFO or COO, rather than directly to the CEO. “That is deadly,” he said.
“In some organizations, the chief information officer is better equipped to be the chief executive officer,” Hasib said. “Everything today is about digital strategy,” the bailiwick of the CIO, he explained.
Off camera, he lamented that MBA programs usually don’t address cybersecurity or IT strategy. CFOs — and many CEOs — tend to have MBA backgrounds.
Health Benefit Consultants, Share Your Expert Insights in Our Survey
Share some of the trends you are seeing among your clients across healthcare, including chronic conditions, behavioral health, healthcare navigation, and more.
Here’s a short video of Hasib explaining his views.
Photo: YouTube screen capture
