Top 3 Priorities for CIOs in 2025

CIOs face a number of challenges and opportunities in the remainder of 2025. One major difficulty is the volatile and uncertain economic environment and the impacts it might have on IT leaders’ innovation and digital transformation strategies. They are facing pressure to demonstrate measurable value, maximize investments and optimize costs, while still driving key digital initiatives forward. 

To make these initiatives possible, CIOs are focusing on foundational areas, such as the architecture of their technology systems and the hindrance of legacy systems. According to the latest Gartner CIO Agenda, “In 2025, more than 80% of CIOs plan to make investments in foundational capabilities, including cybersecurity, GenAI, business intelligence and data analytics, and integration technologies like APIs.” 

At the same time, CIOs have a significant opportunity to harness value from the promise of AI, as they transition from test cases to meaningful improvements in productivity. AI was added as a response option to our annual Leadership Perspective Survey for the first time in 2024, and it quickly became one of the top five priorities for CIOs. 

Here, we take a closer look at CIOs’ current priorities for their function and across the enterprise, based on our proprietary survey of 2,200 IT executives across Gartner C-level Communities.
 

Top Functional Priorities for CIOs 

This year, CIOs selected Cybersecurity & Risk Management as their top priority for the fourth consecutive year. This perhaps speaks to the increasingly complex nature of the threat landscape, with more sophisticated threats employing AI, and the need to improve operational resilience, or the ability to recover quickly from an attack. The combination of these factors makes it imperative for IT leaders to spend time and resources on cybersecurity and risk management.

Delivering AI Value moved up to the second highest priority for CIOs this year. In many follow-up conversations to our Leadership Perspective Survey, executives indicated that they have moved from theoretical to tactical use cases and are focusing on providing measurable results from AI.

Security and AI are both closely related to Data & Analytics, CIOs’ third highest priority. IT leaders need to secure their organizations’ data, provide effective data governance, and have organized data structures in place to support AI initiatives. 

IT Strategy, Governance & Operating Models and Digital Business Priorities round out the top five priorities for CIOs, and both of these areas have been identified as top priorities for the past few years.

Next, we look more closely at each of the top three priorities for CIOs and explore what they have cited as the key opportunities and challenges in these areas. 
 

Strengthening Cybersecurity & Managing Risk

CIOs cite the “sheer pace of change” and “increasingly sophisticated attacks” as reasons for cybersecurity remaining their top priority year after year. Executives are trying to be proactive, detect threats early and take appropriate action. They report that they are relying on multiple vendors for protection, and because of that, they are managing third-party security in addition to their own. 

Threat actors are increasingly using AI, causing one CIO to share that they are “securing the organization around the threat of AI more than we are focusing on utilizing AI.” Several IT leaders mentioned raising cyber awareness about these new threats. One executive explained, “We can never be 100% protected, but we are trying to be as agile as possible in detection, protect people from being negligent, and put a lot of effort into being sensitive to the threats.”

CIOs reported some concerns about trying to control costs while investing in cybersecurity. One executive said, “What can reduce all of these cybersecurity platforms instead of continually adding more?”

Complying with regulations also emerged as a more important theme for CIOs this year. Organizations operating in multiple countries may have different levels of security depending on the location or even depending on the customer. As one executive noted, “Keeping up with compliance has been a lot. We are adding people and tools to keep up.”

For CIOs, their overarching goal is to mitigate risks, and their top challenge is the quickly changing threat landscape. Here are IT leaders’ other goals and challenges in the area of cybersecurity:

After the survey, we facilitate hundreds of follow-up conversations with CIOs to learn more about their priorities and challenges. Here is a sample of what they are saying about cybersecurity:

We almost have a security overload. Everyone has 20+ products to cover... We keep getting things to make you safer, but at some point, it's too much, and you can't move.

[Cybersecurity] is an ongoing battle forever. It's an arms race. We are always thinking, ‘What's coming next?

Uncertainty is going to be the certainty of the day. Geopolitical instability is driving increased focus on cybersecurity.

Demonstrating Value from AI

Now that they are nearly two years into piloting and experimenting with AI, CIOs want to deliver measurable value from AI investments. Many IT leaders are hoping to leverage AI to bolster their cybersecurity efforts, while others have the goal of finding improvements in productivity and creating efficiencies. As they attempt to scale their efforts, CIOs are also focusing on data quality and AI governance, with one noting, “It’s a major risk not having data processes to support AI practices.”

One challenge in achieving their objectives in this area is the ability to scale their AI pilot projects. As one CIO noted, “Use cases can be great in the pilot, but not good options to scale.”  Another executive shared that they also are trying to “move beyond a proof of concept, measure the value, and scale effectively.” 

Several CIOs said in follow-up conversations that change management is critical to AI adoption. They point out that there are generational differences in understanding AI in some cases, and in others, they need more AI talent. One CIO believes that “companies underestimate employees’ willingness to adopt new technologies and how long it takes for them to get there.”

Below are CIOs’ specific goals and challenges in delivering value from AI initiatives. Most IT leaders have the goal of improving business outcomes, while their top challenge is a lack of skills in this area.

Here is a sample of what CIOs told us about their AI initiatives after the survey:

People are struggling to find value in AI because their data is not structured, cleansed and mastered in a way that can be useful with AI.

It’s important to develop an AI-driven architecture with efficient coordination among AI agents. We are currently testing AI agents in various areas, but the technology is still evolving.

We are focused on the impact that AI will have on people, and the speed at which AI will need talent to adapt.

Strengthening Data Quality & Governance

CIOs’ top three priorities are closely connected, and their third priority of data and analytics is tied to their cybersecurity strategies and ability to deliver value from AI. They are focused on data protection and effective data governance on the security front, as well as improving the quality of their data to ultimately enrich AI outcomes and data-driven decision making.

With most organizations having a large volume of data to manage, data quality and cleanliness are “a persistent challenge,” according to one CIO. Data governance frameworks need to be effective, but adaptable, and several IT executives noted that they require “cultural and mindset shifts.” CIOs are trying to strike a balance between unlocking the power of analytics for their stakeholders, while also ensuring they protect their organizations’ data. As one executive noted, “We want to make sure the right people have access to the right data – and we need data literacy and change management.” 

In addition, CIOs are fully aware that success with AI comes down to data, with many leaders sharing the sentiment that “AI is useless unless your data is of good quality.” Some CIOs may be prioritizing their data initiatives because of the push to deliver value from AI. As one explained, “It comes down to data quality, then comes data credibility, and then comes data downstream processes. It is all linked to the data you have.”

Many CIOs are still on a journey to improve their organization’s data-driven culture. Some expressed that they are interested in “seeing how AI can enhance data analysis.” Another IT leader asked, “How do we continue driving data analytics as a core competency that can scale and deliver true value?”

The primary goal for CIOs is to help their organization make data-driven decisions, and their biggest challenge is the quality and availability of their data.

CIOs shared more thoughts on their priority of improving data management, including the following:

Success with AI depends on the maturity of data management. AI cannot be effectively leveraged if foundational data issues are not addressed.

AI is making everything about to change. Companies are going to win or lose based on the data that they have.

If we don't get data management right in the beginning, customers won't trust us with it further down the line.

CIOs’ Priorities Across the Enterprise

In our survey, we ask executives across the C-suite about their enterprise priorities, in addition to their functional goals and objectives. This year, CIOs and all of their C-suite peers selected driving growth as their top priority for the enterprise. Last year, increasing operational efficiencies and productivity took the top spot for all C-level leaders, and it remains the second highest priority for most roles, including CIOs. 

Optimizing or reducing costs is the next highest enterprise priority for CIOs, which may be partially due to the volatile economic environment, in which uncertainty is creating some cautiousness around resources. In addition, many CIOs are expecting AI, automation and other technologies to help optimize their processes. Increasing revenue and improving customer experience round out the top five enterprise priorities for CIOs.

Here is a snapshot of the top enterprise initiatives for CIOs and their C-level peers.

The Outlook for CIOs

The CIO role continues to evolve, and CIOs are increasingly viewed as business leaders, not technology leaders. They seek to understand business challenges and see where technology can play a role in solving them. Many CIOs do not consider themselves the ‘owners’ of all technology platforms and products and want to implement technology thoughtfully and in partnership with stakeholders. As one CIO noted, “It’s important to partner with the right leaders across the C-suite.”

As CIOs work on foundational areas, like architecture, cybersecurity and data, they are increasingly called upon to demonstrate the value of tech investments and how they are contributing to business priorities. An IT executive shared that they can see this with AI initiatives, noting “the revolutionary impact of AI is challenging IT leaders to think about the value.”

CIOs also shared in follow-up conversations that change management is a major component of all of their priorities – cybersecurity, AI and data. They seek to raise awareness and influence behavior in all of these areas – perhaps none more than in AI. One CIO said, “There's often friction with AI. It's integrated into many apps, but when implemented into the organization, it can be a blunt change met with resistance.” 

At the same time, they are seeing progress in finding valuable use cases for AI and creating a more data-driven culture. One CIO said, “We have made huge progress and are seeing productivity and quality gains. Any value needs to harmonize data strategy and management.”

Stay up-to-date with your CIO peers on key topics and initiatives by joining the regional Gartner CIO community near you. If you are already a community member, explore opportunities to connect with other CIOs at an upcoming event.

This article is an update to a previous report, which you can find here: Top Priorities for CIOs in 2024.

Based on 2,240 CIOs’ responses to Gartner C-level Communities' 2025 Leadership Perspective Survey.

By CIOs, For CIOs®

Join the conversation with peers in your local CIO community.