Insight

South Africa’s ICT sector is increasingly prioritising soft skills over technical expertise, leading to skills gaps and greater reliance on outsourced services. To remain competitive and drive innovation, the industry must restore technical mastery as the foundation of education, hiring and leadership, writes Rennie Naidoo, IS professor and research director at the Wits School of Business Sciences.

CIOs managing large IT teams are at the forefront of the AI revolution, facing the dual challenge of integrating AI into their operations and ensuring their workforce has the necessary skills. This is particularly acute in South Africa, where the demand for AI expertise is exceptionally high, yet the supply remains critically low, writes Rowen Pillai, certified BI and data analytics expert.

Tsebo Solutions group IT manager Vinesh Gramny shares his journey into IT leadership and why he believes the future of IT belongs to the relentless.

MagicOrange’s Stephen Coull and Blake Davidson explore how CIOs can turn opaque IT budgets into strategic tools for business growth.

With phishing, smishing, and vishing attacks on the rise across South African enterprises, the proactive management of cybersecurity risks is no longer optional and is fast becoming an industry standard. Richard Cassidy, CISO for the EMEA region at Rubrik, offers his expert perspective on what CIOs need to prioritise to counter the growing threat of identity-based attacks. 

Yellow Card co-founder and CTO Justin Poiroux shares how the evolution of fraud detection, digital ecosystem requirements and emerging protocols are compelling organisations to build their own AI capabilities rather than rely on external providers.

An overseas trend of new laws governing AI could soon affect local companies and IT leaders. To gain a better understanding from an African context, CIO South Africa sought views from Africa Health Research Institute (AHRI) CIO Eugene Vanderlingen.

Quality data will always surpass aimless AI experiments, and data-driven AI tools with a strong business case can enhance decision-making, writes Luxaviation Group CITO Pieter Steyn.

The amendments to the EU AI Act have mandated organisations globally to educate their employees on AI literacy. Wits CISO Galeboe Mogotsi discusses how higher education institutions are equipping themselves to meet the demands of this new regulatory era.

CTO of Sage, Aaron Harris, explores the urgent need for coordinated ethical AI standards as 90 percent of SMBs prepare to adopt AI tools by 2030, and warns against a “Wild West” approach to implementation.

Changes to the EU AI Act are compelling organisations worldwide to train employees on AI literacy. glu Mutual CIO Sibusiso Mbingo unpacks what the law requires from a South African perspective and how to meet these obligations.

iOCO is using a balanced approach to lead businesses in local and international markets to leverage technology to differentiate their offerings to customers. This enables businesses to drive meaningful innovation and gain a competitive edge, writes Tessa Kruger.

Digital literacy needs to evolve to include neurochemical literacy, Rennie Naidoo, a research director and professor at Wits believes. He explains how social media can be manipulated to elicit specific engagement and warns that attention and mental clarity are IT leaders’ hottest commodity.

Direct Transact’s (DT) head of cybersecurity, Dirk Labuschagne, unpacks the vulnerabilities facing South Africa's financial sector and shares practical strategies for organisational resilience.

Nozipho Duma, AI programme business adoption and change management lead at FNB, shares insights on the bank's journey to equip its workforce with critical AI skills and create a culture of AI innovation.

Andrew Griffith, managing director at Information Genetics, shares insights on transforming data, driving AI readiness, and enabling sustainable success for CIOs.

The rise of big data has transformed decision-making across industries, offering unprecedented access to large-scale, quantifiable insights. Yet, as data volumes grow, a paradox is emerging: the more we quantify, the more we need qualitative insights to make sense of it all. This is where thick data – ethnographic, contextual, and human-centred information becomes indispensable, says Rennie Naidoo, professor in Information Systems (IS) and research director at the Wits School of Business Sciences.

In a globalised world, where economies are increasingly interconnected and technology is advancing at an unprecedented rate, cybercrime is big business. In recent years, the range and complexity of attacks have grown exponentially, as criminals exploit new methods of infiltration to gain access to confidential data and sensitive information, writes Ashley Singh, CIO at Sanlam Corporate.

Just as athletes rely on meticulously planned strategies to outmanoeuvre their opponents, IT professionals depend on a playbook to navigate the complexities of technology projects. CIO South Africa spoke with IT leaders Dolf Smook, Josh Souchon, José Soares, and Tshepo Motshegoa to uncover their strategies for taking IT projects across the finish line.

Nathan-Ross Adams, founder and managing director of ITLawCo, urges CIOs and compliance officers to ensure that AI is responsibly managed.