'Human-Centered Velocity' Anchors CIO Strategy In Growth And Adoption

The modern CIO is accountable for the P&L conversation, not just the server room. Growth, margins, risk, resilience, workforce skills, and customer experience now sit alongside uptime and security as core accountabilities. The real measure of performance is how effectively technology converts strategy into results, at speed and with sustained adoption across the business.

At the center of the shift is Vishal Vallabha, Chief Digital & Technology Officer and PE Value Creation Leader. With a track record leading enterprise-scale AI and digital transformations at major corporations and working closely with PE firms, his perspective is grounded in first-hand experience. His programs have focused on measurable outcomes — service performance, cost-to-serve reduction, margin protection, and AI-enabled automation at scale. In Vishal's view, a CIO’s traditional responsibilities haven’t vanished. Instead, they have been layered with new strategic duties, stretching the role exponentially.

"The role has expanded. You still own uptime, cost, delivery, and security, but now you also own enterprise outcome growth, margins, risk, resilience, workforce skills, and customer experience enabled by tech," Vishal explained. Meeting this new mandate calls for a disciplined focus on what he called "human-centered velocity." This framework ties technology initiatives directly to financial outcomes and, most importantly, the quality of user adoption.

• Transformation vs. trying: Vishal outlined how this framework can serve as a clear litmus test to separate true transformation from isolated experimentation, a key distinction for leaders navigating the human part of the equation. "If it’s not improving revenue, margin, risk, or cycle time, it's a pilot, not transformation," he noted. "Human-centered velocity is about two things: speed of outcomes and adoption quality. It means designing a change so it's well understood, adopted, and sustained. Speed without adoption is just motion." In simpler terms, Human-centered velocity is the speed of outcomes multiplied by adoption quality.

• Empathy as efficiency: At the core of this human-centric approach is a surprising operational tool. Vishal offered a reframing of empathy, positioning it as a business accelerant. By building trust, leaders can improve communication quality, which in turn leads to tangible efficiencies. "The single most important aspect for an organization to be successful is trust, and the way you build trust is through empathy. Empathy for your teams and the company's mission directly reduces rework. Less rework, in turn, translates to fewer reversals and shadow IT workarounds."

Vishal's solution is a "two-speed governance" model to manage the inherent tension between innovation and stability. This structure provides a sanctioned "fast lane" for experimentation while protecting core systems with a "core lane." "On an innovation project, you should be measuring weekly deliverables," he advised. "This is different from the monthly or quarterly measurements you would use against the bigger milestones of core system projects." Fast lane uses guardrails (security patterns, architecture standards, data controls), while core language uses stage gates and change windows — both measured with KPIs.

• A call to change: The two-speed model is part of a larger identity shift, especially for established companies. According to Vishal, IT must shed its legacy as a reactive support function to fully become a proactive business driver. This often involves moving away from the old model of patchwork systems in favor of a modern architecture built on pillars like a product-centric operating model and platform thinking, positioning the CIO as a true change agent. "Gone are the days where IT can be looked at as a call center. Every single journey now is tech enablement. It's about business enabled by tech. Boards and PE sponsors increasingly expect CIOs to translate digital investment into EBITDA impact, risk posture improvements, and predictable execution."

• The talent pull: Adopting this new culture and operating model also helps build "talent magnetism," a strategic advantage in attracting and retaining the skills needed to execute this new vision. "This is also about attracting the right talent and building modern skills," said Vishal. "Talent magnetism comes from clarity: modern tooling, reusable platforms, empowered teams, and a culture where decision rights are explicit."

The new framework relies on a disciplined approach to prioritization built on true partnership. Vishal compared the ideal relationship to that of the finance department, where the business respects each function as the expert in its own domain. "The expectation has never been that the business has to be tech-savvy, just as the IT team was never expected to know every detail of financial accounting," he explained. "The goal is to identify the top 20% of projects that will deliver 80% of the value."

Looking ahead, Vishal offered his peers clear, distilled guidance and a three-step playbook: First, portfolio discipline. Fund fewer things, finish more, and measure value. Second, an operating model for speed, with clear decision rights plus reusable platforms. Finally, change architecture encompassing champions, enablement, and feedback loops tied to KPIs.