How Lockheed Martin’s CIO Balances IT Stewardship With Transformation

As CIOs evolve into enterprise-wide leaders, they can’t forget their role as IT leaders.

While many are shepherding their organizations through a once-in-a-generation AI pivot, CIOs also have to make sure the core technology systems keeping the business afloat — spanning hardware, software, cybersecurity, and more — are not just delivering the necessary capabilities, but doing so in the most cost-effective way.

The modern CIO operates on “two sides of the same coin,” Maria Demaree, Lockheed Martin CIO and SVP of enterprise business and digital transformation, said on “Technovation with Peter High” podcast. Both “running the business, and also strategic vision of how we go forward to operate differently in the future.”

Maria is living this reality at Lockheed Martin, the defense and aerospace manufacturer valued at roughly $109 billion. As Maria’s team looks to help the company quickly embrace AI, they’re also hard at work streamlining the company’s legacy technology environment.

“While we are an over 100-year-old company, don't think of us as slow and sluggish. We are absolutely moving quickly and adopting new and existing technologies and capabilities," Maria said. And “when we bring AI on top of those, I’m already able to start to see the opportunities and possibilities that can be a part of that,” she added.