CEOs To CIOs: Get With The ProgramCEOs To CIOs: Get With The Program

Can't we all just get along?A thoughtful post from uber-blogger Jason McCabe Calacanis explores the ongoing tension between the CEO and chief technical/operations/engineering officers of Web startups. The lessons he imparts are just as applicable to the CEO-CIO relationship.

Calacanis makes the case that the CEO-CTO dynamic at Web startups can be the most critical one, especially when it comes to balancing the need for showing off features and services (the CEO imperative) vs. building an infrastructure that will scale to support them (the CTO imperative). "Of course, in a perfect world you would have 20 developers, tons of cash laying around, and no competitors chasing you down with features and showing them off to the press," he writes. "However, the reality is that you're going to cut corners at times for strategic reasons and that's OK." Calacanis goes on to discuss the factors Web startups must consider "when making a decision to build something to scale or to just 'get it out the door:'"

Just ask Yahoo -- no startup -- about the importance of technical scale. On Tuesday night, its Sports Fantasy Football site went down for 90 minutes as thousands of users tried to do their mock drafts in the run-up to tonight's NFL opening game. Yahoo, which blamed the outage on the catchall "server problems," said its fantasy football service has been restored and users have been notified. But the customer relations damage is longer lasting. Check out the Yahoo discussion board for a taste of the acrimony.

The same tension and potential pitfalls exist between the CEO and CIO of just about any company in any industry, especially as they now face customers on the Web. Whether a bank wants to promise seamless online transactions, a retailer wants to show off a nifty customer-service app, or a consumer goods company wants to stream video for its latest marketing campaign, it's left to CIO and crew to buck up on the critical question of not just scalability but also security, manageability, and regulatory compliance. Someone has to set the CEO straight.

It's beyond the scope of this blog to lay out every CEO-CIO scenario and propose best practices. But Job 1 for every business technology exec is to make the case for application rollouts, capital investment, hiring, and other IT initiatives in pure business terms. Even the CEO of a tech company doesn't care about technical merits unless those merits let the company cut costs, take on new customers, avoid quantifiable risks, generate revenue, or help the bottom line in other meaningful ways.

But you tell us what this dynamic is like: What's your relationship with your company's CEO or other top business execs? What reason are they willing to listen to and engage with you on, and what just produces blank stares or indignation? How are you building bridges? Some information swag is in the offing for the most thoughtful responses.