Computing launches the IT Leaders Campaign 2011

Computing is launching a new campaign to discuss the measures that private- and public-sector organisations need to pursue to deliver the IT leaders of the future.

Over the coming months on our new IT Leaders microsite, we will explore the most prevalent management issues and the impact they are having on senior professionals in the IT sector.

The debate will focus on the technical and managerial skills needed to become a CIO and the opportunities in the industry.

We hope to help IT leaders identify and develop the skills they need to further their own careers, and the ones they should be looking to nurture within the teams they manage.

The aim is to help those IT leaders become the backbone of the most successful organisations in the world, in the face of globalisation and a challenging economic climate.

The campaign launches with an exclusive interview with Clifford Burroughs, who is CIO at snacks company United Biscuits, home of household brands that include McVitie's, Hula Hoops and Penguin.

United Biscuits has been recruiting recently because Burroughs has identified a need for greater in-house cloud expertise.

Burroughs is interested in staff who understand the cloud environment and how to deploy software in a web environment, in particular a platform-as-a-service (PaaS) environment.

We also have a video interview with Mark Laws, head of application support at A&N Media, owner of the Daily Mail and Metro newspapers, in which Laws discusses the challenges of working with an outsourcing provider and the management skills needed to do this successfully.

Read also our exclusive interview with De Vere Group IT director Jo Stanford on moving business functions to the cloud, and discover why she describes the group's shift to the cloud as like "passing on a headache".

And we look into research that suggests that IT students  have a fairly low regard for technical IT skills, while 45 per cent of students believe that communication skills are by far the most valuable ones to have.

By the time our campaign finishes we hope that the crucial role IT professionals play in the success of the UK will be more widely recognised and appreciated, and that the industry is better able to develop the leaders of the future.

Click here to view the IT Leaders microsite.