In today’s ever-changing technology landscape, it is important for IT leaders of all stripes to not only stay abreast of current events and trends affecting the industry, but also to know about the focus areas and challenges of their senior management colleagues, as the technology function increasingly viewed as a strategic business partner to the C-suite. One of the best ways for CIOs and IT leaders to absorb information is by tuning into technology and leadership podcasts. Here, 13 CIOs and CIOs across industries talk about the shows they’re listening to and why.
Risky business
Risky Business is a weekly cybersecurity news and current affairs podcast hosted by Patrick Gray and Adam Boileau. I listen to it because they do an excellent job of curating the most relevant cybersecurity news and events that happened in the previous week. Gray is a journalist with deep knowledge of cybersecurity and Boileau is an executive at a cybersecurity firm, so the presentation is professional and includes insights into the threat actors and motivations. Also, they have a sense of humor that makes the show fun. As a mid-market IT leader with no serious cybersecurity experience, this podcast has helped me better understand and stay on top of threats. – Kevin Hoople, CIO, Lawson Products
Intelligence matters
This podcast is hosted by former CIA Acting Director Michael Morrell, who paints a global picture of the threat landscape with an emphasis on incidents affecting privacy and data security. He speaks with senior U.S. intelligence officials who provide additional insight into their careers and the roles they played in shaping the national security policies that guide us today. – Kelvin Franklin, CTO at Illumio
CIO Mind
I find Gartner’s CIO Mind podcast particularly insightful and relevant to the work I do. It covers a wide range of topics that CIOs are grappling with, from the recession and cost-cutting to staffing specialized IT roles and employee retention. It keeps me tuned in to what interests others in the industry and what keeps them up at night, and makes me think about ways I can improve my own organization so we can better support our customers. The podcast also shares tips from Gartner analysts and other experts that I can apply to my own organization and use to prepare for what’s to come, such as generative AI, workforce trends, research investment trends, and developments etc. – Barry Shirkey, CIO at NTT DATA Services
T200Cast
I’m a big fan of the T200Cast, the dedicated podcast for T200: Elevating Women in Tech. This is a newer series spotlighting female tech leaders paving the way for the next generation. I always find the stories of their journeys – and the honest accounts of their successes and failures – inspiring. – Sandy Venugopal, CIO, SentinelOne (and former CIO of Uber)
CIO leadership live
There is some personal bias in choosing to have my own CIO.com podcast and one I’ve been a guest on. Each episode offers a CIO’s personal perspective on the issues, technologies and business challenges facing people in that role. I learn a lot from hearing from my colleagues how they have achieved success in their sectors. Host Maryfran Johnson excels at extracting these lessons from her guests. – Vishal Gupta, global CTO, CIO and senior vice president of connected technologies at Lexmark
Enterprise Ready
This podcast features in-depth interviews focused on building the next generation of enterprise software tools. His guests really hone in on the challenges of running a software-as-a-service company, which is quite a bit related to me and my colleagues. The guests on the show do a really good job of describing how their backgrounds led them to their current roles, how they went about building their teams, and how they’re building teams for the future. – Steve Watt, SVP, CIO at Hyland
The Lex Friedman Podcast
In this podcast, I get to hear from great tech thinkers discussing topics like ChatGPT (Stefan Wolfram) or Python (Guido Van Rossum), while learning about things like how an FBI agent took over Silk Road. It covers so many different industries, but each of the topics you hear guarantees a useful and interesting perspective on solving problems. – Siddharth Ram, CTO of Velocity Global
Leadership in Service Management
Listening to other experts in the IT space was very enlightening and even helped me grow in my own role. For example, a recent episode of the Service Management Leadership Podcast with Jeffrey Tefertiller featured unique insights directly from Gartner Executive Coaches and I learned about using psychometrics to improve the customer experience. This got me thinking about the importance of gaining a deeper understanding of clients’ challenges, needs and motivations. – Jeremy Rafuse, Vice President and Head of Digital Workplace at GoTo
Defense in depth
The Defense in Depth podcast provides CISO perspectives on cyber defense techniques—from proactive to structural—that work, and offers insights on how to implement them within the organization. They also discuss how defense tactics can be done differently, which provides great takeaways for leaders after a cyber incident. – Devin Hamilton, Principal Program Manager for Technology Alliances at Mimecast
How I built it
This is a fascinating podcast that delves into the stories and journeys of successful entrepreneurs and business leaders. Hosted by Joe Casabona, this podcast explores the strategies, challenges and key moments behind creating and growing remarkable businesses. Besides the joy of listening to the infinite capacity of human creativity, I learn a lot about how founders approach problems and turn them into opportunities. – Gil Dror, CTO of Digi’s SmartSense
20VC
Even though my day job involves leading the Americas region for a long-established, billion-dollar tech company, there are still applicable lessons I learn from this VC-focused podcast. The guests offer a thirstier, risk-taking perspective on new technologies and business practices that is very inspiring. I always find universal nuggets of wisdom in just 20 minutes that can inform all types of businesses, not just those starting out. – Scott Williams, President, Americas Head, Orange Business
The Privacy Advisor Podcast
It seems like a new data privacy regulation is materializing every day around the world. For security professionals trying to keep up and make sense of it all, The Privacy Advisor Podcast from the International Association of Privacy Professionals is a wealth of useful information. As a former Chief Privacy Officer, I still rely on this podcast to learn the latest on how privacy and data protection issues impact organizations. – Lucia Milică Stacy, Global Resident CISO for Proofpoint
The ERP Organizational Change Journal Podcast
In my role as global ERP leader for HB Fuller and co-senior IT leader, I often seek outside perspectives on how to educate an organization along the enterprise resource planning path. This podcast’s listen, learn and apply approach gives a leader like me practical examples and skills to tap into from thought leaders in the field. In addition, the principles discussed can be applied to ERP as well as any business software that will support the enterprise. The one major takeaway I get from this podcast on a recurring basis is that it constantly reframes my perspective to look at my results through the eyes of my stakeholders and what value they bring to the organization. – Nicholas Jackson, Global ERP Director at HB Fuller