2017 State CIO Priorities Reflect Importance of Security and Strategic Enterprise Thinking

The National Association of State Chief Information Officers (NASCIO) today released its Top Ten state chief information officer (CIO) priorities for the coming year.  Not surprising, security, consolidation and cloud services continue to top the list as state technology leaders look toward 2017. 

This year, the State CIO Top Ten shows information technology (IT) security strategies and tools are at the top of the list across the states, with security topping the list of priority strategies for the third consecutive year. Cloud services and consolidation/optimization remain at the top as second and third rated priorities.

NASCIO President and Connecticut Chief Information Officer Mark Raymond stated, “The survey results show a strong alignment between strategic plans and technology investment. Data management, cloud solutions and certainly security are demanding our attention. Consolidation and sharing of services will drive needs to improve identity management, governance and optimization.  We will carefully examine these priorities as we develop our workplan for the 2017 program year.”

“No major surprises in the priorities for 2017. State CIOs continue to recognize the importance of IT Governance as they address enterprise security, cloud services and drive IT consolidation,” stated NASCIO Executive Director Doug Robinson. “Agile software delivery makes it in the top ten for the second time which reinforces the results from our recent national survey.” 

NASCIO utilizes the annual list of priorities to develop strategic areas of focus for the coming year, formulate new committees and working groups and plan NASCIO conference sessions and publications. 

The prioritized rankings of strategies and technologies reflect voting by state CIOs and are available for download at www.NASCIO.org/TopTen.