Blog.

An open letter to CDO Hub members 

Those who have been in the CDO Hub community for a while will know that each year before heading off for the holidays, I like to round off with a letter to you. It’s my way of saying thank you for being part of the community over this last year, actively contributing and enabling this to be an open and valuable space for all our members. It’s also an opportunity to reflect on the year, the progress made, and challenges faced by the data leadership community.  

Looking back on 2023 in the years to come, we’ll see this as a pivotal moment. Not to overstate the influence and impact that Generative AI has made, but for business leaders across organisations, the explosion of this technology has made a topic that was once reserved for those who actively sought to understand it, into a solution that has landed at the fingertips of many. And it’s more than hype. 

As data leaders, this is your window to solidify the value of data on the C-suite agenda. We all know that Artificial Intelligence or Generative AI may be the right answer in some instances, but not all. Either way, the need for a strong strategy for data across the business has never been bigger and it’s fantastic to see this community already using the excitement around this emerging technology to educate and secure funding to help solve data and business challenges. A positive evolution this year. 

Despite, all this it’s been a challenging year for data leadership. Many organisations have shaken up their organisational design, chopped up the data leader role and folded data teams into other departments. We’ve seen changes in role definitions, redundancies and a tepid job market for senior data leaders.  

What I know is that by continuing to raise the understanding at the executive-level about the importance of data and what it takes to be successful, more & more businesses will give data leadership the backing and mandate that it requires.  

To support this, through 2024, we will be expanding our conversations with a broader business leadership audience, lifting the lid on the data leadership role and, ultimately, enabling better collaboration across business functions.  

The data leadership community is stronger than ever. We’re inspired every day to work together to set the standard of what world class data leadership looks like. Your openness and willingness to support each other, leave egos at the door and creatively find ways to put data on the agenda is what makes the CDO Hub such a great place. 

So, thank you. Thank you, for choosing to contribute your time and effort to the CDO Hub. We work hard to make sure this continues to be a valuable space for you all and I, along with the whole Cynozure crew, look forward to continuing the debate and discussions in 2024 and beyond. 

For now, I wish you all a restful holiday and I look forward to catching up with you soon. 

Thanks, 

Jason