Forrester Research suggests companies start taking the idea of having a chief mobility officer (CMO) more seriously-- a CMO might be key to successful mobile strategy.
"To remain vital in this business technology reformation, CIOs must step up and work with other executives to establish an "office of the chief mobility officer" to implement an enterprisewide mobile strategy," the analyst says.
The concept of a CMO is not exactly new-- but with mobile enterprise growing rapidly in importance, companies risk being left behind. Forrester predicts mobile project spending will grow by 100% by 2015, while spending on mobile apps should hit $55 billion by 2016. The analyst says mobile app development is an investment, and as such development spending estimates should be set higher.
"If an app is highly used and rated, then it's valuable... if it's unused and dissed, then it's not," Forrester says.
The chief task for a CMO and their team (Forrester suggests 10-30 person task forces) is to improve mobile initiative coordination, acting as a bridge between CFO and CTO. The CMO team should also incubate mobile ideas, while identifying mobile projects currently in place and their means of funding.