Academia is at the centre of developing trends. However, there is a gap between universities and industry that needs to be bridged by academics and IT professionals as individuals and as a community of practitioners. This requires a sustained programme of networking and developing specific areas of interest associated with this academic-industry channel. The industry is continually broadening and the knowledge domain increasingly complex so the focus must be more direct in terms of the target audience rather than trying to target a broad audience.

The format of the breakfast forum is a conversation modelled on the concept of Cafe Conversations - visit http://theworldcafe.com . The opening topic of the forum was "ICT Skills Development - the Role of Universities and Employers". In discussions with academics and CIOs it was evident that there was support for such an event and more importantly that on-going conversations between these important role players needed to take place.

The CIO Forum is an educational and interactive gathering of IT professionals and academics which evolved as an informal social network of academics and information systems (IS) professionals in the Western Cape province of South Africa.

The Chief Information Officer
The Chief Information Officer (CIO) in any corporate enterprise faces a daunting challenge. Dr Pete Janse van Vuuren of Gartner who addressed the forum in October 2008 provided some insights into the role of the CIO. Included in his presentation were 4 major issues facing CIOs, namely, Growth, Changing Role, Talent and Economic Uncertainty.

Enterprises are prioritizing growth and innovation. Leading CIOs are making a difference through focusing on distinctive IT that makes a difference for the end customer. CIOs see their role changing with over half of CIOs having non-IT responsibilities, top of which is business process improvement. The way CIOs use their time is making the difference in their success. CIOs are least confident about being able to evolve and retain the IT organization’s talent, especially with business and behavioral skills and capabilities. Economic uncertainty is impacting budgets, which still continue to grow slowly. Approaches to recession pressures will separate the winners and losers and CIOs must be ready.

Well known corporates in the Western Cape including Sanlam, Old Mutual, Shoprite, Foschini, MWEB and Deloittes have taken time to present and share information about their graduate programs, initiatives, architecture and complex technology environments in an effort to better understand the challenges facing the industry as a whole. Companies as employers have made a considerable contribution to important discussions such as skills development and have been able to work more closely with academics in internship and graduate programs and recruitment.

The forum has become an important initiative for closer collaboration between academics and chief information officers or employers and industry. It is also improving the relationship between the universities in the Western Cape. The participation of other industry organizations and government is also promising. Not only is the forum a channel for learning and communication but the involvement of important stakeholders at an individual level is also helping to turn conversation into action.

The Role of Industry Stakeholders
When the forum opened the discussions with the topic of skills development in the ICT sector and placed specific focus on internships and graduate programs, industry partners took note and contributed to a meaningful dialogue with academics and employers.

"As a vendor we want to see our customers really sweating the assets they have bought from us. We want to see them innovating on top of our platform, gaining competitive advantage and becoming global winners. Doing this takes great people ... We need our universities to produce these people and we need to support the forums such as the CIO / academic forum. The skills flight is a savage fact of life in the SA IT sector. SAP, Oracle, Microsoft and IBM experts can go anywhere in the world and are increasingly doing so. We have to fill the vacuum first and find ways to do this with our local tertiary institutions." - Simon Carpenter of SAP

The CIO Forum has had good support from companies in the industry. Firstly, from Simeka Business Solutions Group who sponsored our monthly breakfast event. Microsoft has provided a number of presentations around their education program, initiatives such as interoperability and working with the open source community. Oracle and SAP have been developing their university alliance programs and graduate training and certification to support the academic program of IT related degree qualifications.

The forum has been fortunate to have a high calibre of speakers and participants representing the industry and government such as the Cape IT Initiative (CITI), the State Information Technology Agency (SITA) and the e-Skills Academy of South Africa. Dan Ellappa presented on the topic of "Job Creation for Unemployed Graduates". Ramabele Emily Magoma-Nthite of SITA presented on "The Role of SITA in the Skills Development Agenda". We have also had presentations and speakers from IT companies such as Bytes Technology who have conducted successful programs.
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