Presenting the 2025 CIO 100 Agenda
Experience Innovation, leadership, and excellence at the 2025 CIO 100 Symposium & Awards! Produced by the award winning media brand, CIO.com, this conference is your gateway to three days of transformative insights, unparalleled networking, and recognition of groundbreaking achievements.
All times listed on the agenda are Mountain Time.
Monday, August 11
Join a discussion topic that best meets your needs. Facilitated by our partner subject matter experts, take a deep-dive into ideas, common questions, and proven solutions in an interactive, peer-sharing environment.
Driving better business outcomes with data-driven technology investment decisions, hosted by Apptio
The roundtable will consider the fast-moving AI landscape and how agentic AI has rapidly come on the scene. The focus will be on customer experience (CX) and whether to buy or agentic AI-enabled customer service systems. We’ll see how agentic AI agents use numerous tools that must access data from multiple systems – and depend upon real-time observability. The discussion will focus on three areas: 1) Defining agentic AI for CX project needs; 2) key factors to consider when deciding whether to build vs. buy; and 3) preparing for challenges along the path from pilot to production to scaling.
Hosted by Quiq
Pre-registration required
According to the latest PwC CIO/CTO Pulse Survey, 60 % of tech leaders plan to raise overall tech spend and 58 % will pour more into GenAI, yet 82 % say they’re still struggling to realize value—and only 48 % feel ready to back the new business models that AI promises. This discussion will surface actionable strategies for CIOs to reassert their influence: governing decentralized AI activity, bridging the gap between POC and production, and enabling enterprise-scale deployment without sacrificing agility. Attendees will also engage PwC experts on how to realign the CIO role around consultative leadership, infrastructure readiness, and long-term value creation in an increasingly AI-driven enterprise landscape. Walk away with a sharpened playbook for matching the business’s appetite for AI with IT’s mandate for value, risk control, and lasting impact.
Hosted by PwC
Pre-registration required
Organizations everywhere are optimizing how they use data and AI across their digital workplace. While high costs, technology and data silos, and complex issues create real challenges, AI-enhanced employee experiences and IT support solutions are changing how work gets done and how people feel about their jobs.
This interactive conversation explores how smart AI integration boosts productivity, streamlines operations, and creates employee workplace experiences that employees actually enjoy. We’ll share real-world examples from organizations getting this right, and you’ll see the tangible business benefits: improved efficiency, reduced costs, and higher employee retention rates. Come explore what’s possible when AI makes work better for everyone and drives measurable business benefits.
Hosted by Unisys
Pre-registration required
In today’s data-driven world, artificial intelligence is rapidly transporting – and transforming – organizations, but its potential can only be fully realized when built upon a foundation of clean, secure, and trustworthy information. CIO’s are faced with challenges to both provide an effective platform that solves a myriad of compliance and structural issues, while meeting the needs of business partners who want to extract value from data in different formats, locations, structured and unstructured. During this session we will discuss what it means to be AI-ready, who is responsible, and what needs to happen and when.
Hosted by Iron Mountain
Pre-registration required
Welcome to the CIO 100! Meet colleagues, old and new, and enjoy the flavors of the southwest with fun cocktails and small bites.
Tuesday, August 12
Join us for a networking breakfast at the CIO 100 Symposium. Connect with industry leaders, share insights, and fuel up for a day of innovation and success. Start your morning right with great food and even greater connections.
Championship teams win for a reason. They have a winning system that brings out a winning attitude and releases the Ultimate Winning Edge! Certain culture codes & systems must be in place to maintain this over the long term. As a 3rd generation professional athlete, David’s been surrounded by world championship teams and dynasties his entire life. In the NFL he was nicknamed “Superman” by his team two weeks into his pro career. While in Arizona, he helped turn around a losing culture to build a winning culture that took the Arizona Cardinals to Super Bowl XLIII. In this riveting presentation, David will take you inside this world and reveal how to create a culture that will win and grow in the face of massive challenge and change; how to build a culture that shares best practices – eliminating the silos; what a dynasty looks like, sounds like, feels like, and moves like. Following the presentation David will be available for questions, photos, and football signing.
Select which award-winning projects interest you and visit those digital posters to hear information about the project details. Attendees have an opportunity to ask questions of the award winners and will be able to easily network with small groups of peers who have common interests. This self-directed experience means you can focus your time on projects that are most relevant for you.
Following this inspirational presentation David will be available for questions, photos, and football signing.
Grab a coffee or iced beverage, enjoy the fresh air, and connect with award-winning CIOs and sponsoring partners.
In today’s digital economy, data is more than just information—it’s a critical business asset that can drive innovation, improve decision-making, and unlock new revenue streams. This session will highlight award-winning projects that have transformed raw data into actionable insights, implemented effective data governance frameworks, and aligned data strategies with organizational goals. Hear about best practices for maximizing the value of your data through advanced analytics, AI, and data-driven culture, while navigating challenges such as security, compliance, and scalability.
In an era where technology is transforming the business landscape at an unprecedented pace, companies must fundamentally reinvent their business models to thrive. This session will explore how the current business and technology landscape (advancements in AI, cloud computing, availability of capital) are driving accelerated changes across industries, redefining competitive dynamics and creating new opportunities for revenue generation.
Join us for an engaging lunch where you can connect with newfound contacts! Take a seat and savor your meal while networking with peers. Don’t miss the opportunity to meet our sponsors and discover how their innovative solutions can benefit you.
Enterprises are increasingly adopting AI applications and utilizing various types of data (structured, unstructured, and semi-structured) to enhance their business processes across different industries. However, despite recognizing the significance and potential of AI, organizations often face challenges in formulating a strategy and implementing it effectively. To fully capitalize on the benefits of AI, Enterprises need to integrate AI at the data level, ensuring that it supports the entire data management lifecycle, from data ingestion to curation and discovery. This integration will enable the development of applications that are built on top of the data, maximizing the potential of AI. Learn how integrating AI with reliable data can enhance your decision-making, drive efficiency, and foster innovation within your enterprise management. Discover strategies to create adaptive systems that continuously optimize processes, ensuring your business achieves sustainable growth and resilience. Explore the latest tools and solutions designed to address industry challenges and lead your digital enterprise transformation journey.
Decades of digital transformation have made it difficult to fully realize the value of data. The sheer volume of it is becoming overwhelming.To give you some perspective, enterprises generate 1300 exabytes of dark data every day. And 90% of the world’s data was created in just the last two years.It’s a massive amount of value waiting to be unlocked to give you the competitive edge you need in a highly competitive environment. In this session learn how data is your advantage, but more remains dark, untapped, or unused and the importance of Discoverability and Connectivity in the AI Era. Let’s get started and unlock what’s possible for your organization.
Learn how emerging private cloud platforms provide enterprise-grade virtualization and a credible migration path. These solutions combine the benefits of a true private cloud experience with on-premises control, delivering critical virtualization capabilities, as well as Kubernetes, with existing hardware investments.
After more than two years of rapid experimentation, enterprises are now deploying AI at an accelerating pace. Join Meredith Whalen, IDC’s Chief Research and Data Officer, as she unveils key findings from IDC’s AI Maturity Model Benchmark study. In this session, you’ll gain a clear view of where your organization stands compared to industry peers, discover the priorities of AI-mature enterprises, and learn how to ready your technology stack for the rise of agentic workflows. Meredith will also share timely insights into how IT leaders are adjusting their spending strategies amid ongoing economic uncertainty.
The modern workday is full of disruptions, from IT issues to HR updates to policy changes. Affording exactly what employees need and provides the right solution in seconds, using conversational AI built for the enterprise. Learn how companies are revolutionizing to support their employees with an AI platform.
Grab a coffee or iced beverage, enjoy the fresh air, and connect with award-winning CIOs and sponsoring partners.
Select which award-winning projects interest you and visit those digital posters to hear information about the project details. Attendees have an opportunity to ask questions of the award winners and will be able to easily network with small groups of peers who have common interests. This self-directed experience means you can focus your time on projects that are most relevant for you.
Emerging technologies like artificial intelligence, quantum computing, blockchain, and advanced automation are reshaping the business landscape. The challenge lies in identifying the right technologies to invest in and ensuring those investments align with long-term organizational goals. This session will explore the evolving tech ecosystem, offering insights into assessing the maturity, business value, and risk of emerging innovations. Discover strategies for balancing AI advancements with other transformative technologies, fostering innovation, and future-proofing your organization in an era of rapid change.
Unwind with food and drink from local purveyors. Take part in the fun art of leather stamping with your own take home token.
Wednesday, August 13
Join us for a networking breakfast at the CIO 100 Symposium. Connect with industry leaders, share insights, and fuel up for a day of innovation and success. Start your morning right with great food and even greater connections.
The mysterious and dangerous world of jazz is a cauldron of spontaneous creativity. And in times of radical change and uncertainty, it serves as the perfect model for modern leadership. Professional jazz guitarist and prolific entrepreneur Josh Linkner connects the dots between jazz and business, helping to unlock the secrets of some of the world’s most creative geniuses. Using live jazz as a metaphor for collaborative innovation, this session is entertaining, inspiring, and directly applicable to the daily challenges we face in business. A fusion of live musical performance and keynote presentation, the session’s finale includes audience members “joining the band” to compose and perform a song in real-time to the delight of the audience. Cameras will flash as the entire group is dazzled by their colleagues’ improvisation and spontaneous invention.
In a time of relentless change and digital disruption, modernization and AI adoption are no longer just a strategic advantage but a business imperative. In this session, Phil Buckellew, President, Infrastructure Modernization Business Unit at Rocket Software, will discuss how enterprises are modernizing core systems, embracing hybrid cloud architectures, and strengthening security to drive transformation without compromising business outcomes. He’ll also share findings from recent studies which highlight that IT decision makers see modernization as essential not only for ensuring reliability and resiliency, but also for enhancing stakeholder experiences and unlocking deeper insights from enterprise data. Learn how organizations can modernize their technology stack without disrupting business operations, unlock new growth, and future-proof their business.
Grab a coffee or iced beverage, enjoy the fresh air, and connect with award-winning CIOs and sponsoring partners.
How organizations execute around AI will depend on their end game. Are you looking to become an AI-first company transforming your business models, products and services via new AI-enabled offerings, or simply leverage AI to improve existing business models, products and services? Will AI become a core competency and differentiator for the organization requiring you to build internal teams of specialists, or something you develop by working with partners? Join us to learn how successful CIOs approach the integration of AI into their tech stacks for maximum business value.
This session will explore practical strategies for balancing innovation with operational efficiency, managing change fatigue, and building resilient frameworks that support growth and agility.
Session details to follow.
Join us for an engaging lunch where you can connect with newfound contacts! Take a seat and savor your meal while networking with peers. Don’t miss the opportunity to meet our sponsors and discover how their innovative solutions can benefit you.
1:30 – 2:45pm
Integrating Human and AI Teams to Optimize Customer and Employee Experience
This session explores strategies for integrating AI tools with human expertise to create personalized, efficient, and impactful customer interactions. Learn best practices for aligning technology with organizational goals, addressing workforce concerns, and maintaining a balance between automation and human empathy. Gain actionable insights to drive innovation, improve operational efficiency, and deliver exceptional customer experiences.
Sponsored by Freshworks
3:15 – 4:30pm
Where Automation Meets Robotics: Shaping the Future of Intelligent Enterprises
Automation and robotics are converging at an unprecedented pace, powered by advancements in AI, machine learning, and intelligent automation. This session will delve into the transformative impact of this intersection, highlighting how robotics is evolving from task-specific tools to intelligent, adaptive systems capable of decision-making and collaboration. Gain insights into the role of intelligent automation in orchestrating workflows that combine robotic and human efforts, driving efficiency, scalability, and innovation. Sponsored by SoundHound
1:30 – 1:40pm
Welcome and Opening Remarks
1:40 – 2:20pm
Two Journeys to Leadership Excellence
Join us for an inspiring session where we explore two unique pathways that have led visionary CIOs into the prestigious CIO Hall of Fame. Hear firsthand accounts from industry leaders who have navigated different career trajectories—whether through groundbreaking innovation, transformative digital leadership, or strategic business alignment. Learn how each journey shaped their approach to technology, leadership, and organizational impact, and gain insights on how you can chart your own course to influence the future of IT and business. This session offers valuable lessons and practical takeaways for aspiring and current CIOs looking to leave a lasting legacy.
2:20 – 2:50pm
Skepticism, Fear, and Backlash: Overcoming Resistance in the Age of AI
The single greatest challenge CIOs face in AI adoption is not the technology itself, but the people and cultural dynamics around it. Because many organizations rushed in, eager to claim early wins and bragging rights, there are bound to be failures. To navigate through this shifting landscape, CIOs must not just be technology leaders, but expert change managers. This session will focus on the three key pillars CIOs need to be equipped with to meet this challenge: awareness, a structured change management framework, and a toolkit focused on trust building.
3:10 – 3:45pm
Leading the C-Suite into Digital Fluency
The CIO is the C-suite’s digital Sherpa, responsible for elevating digital fluency across executive leadership and ensuring that AI, automation, and data-driven decision-making are embedded into the fabric of business strategy. In this session, award-winning CIOs will discuss key responsibilities and opportunities for new C-level collaborations. These include partnering with the CFO to develop AI-driven financial models, collaborating with CHROs to reskill the workforce, and guiding CMOs and CDOs on how AI is reshaping customer engagement.
3:45 – 4:25pm
Driving Simultaneous Modernization and Innovation
CIOs must balance the urgent need for modernization with the pursuit of innovation. This session will explore practical strategies for ensuring both initiatives happen simultaneously, including aligning legacy systems with emerging technologies, fostering a culture of innovation, and optimizing resources. Attendees will learn how to create a forward-thinking IT ecosystem that supports agility, scalability, and continuous improvement without sacrificing stability or security.
4:25 – 4:30pm
Closing Remarks
Sponsored by EXL
Raise a glass to toast the 2025 honorees.
Come celebrate IT excellence at this elegant dinner and awards ceremony. The 2025 CIO 100 Awards presentation will honor the winning organizations for their use of innovative IT to deliver business value, followed by the induction of our newest members into the CIO Hall of Fame.
Sponsored by KPMG
Cake, champagne and plenty of photo ops is the sweetest way to celebrate the finale of the CIO 100.
Sponsored by Rocket Software
