"The chief analytics organization must rise. We think this is necessary to handle where analytics is heading."

So says Will Hakes, co-founder of Link Analytics, an Atlanta-based consulting firm.

Call me a contrarian, but I couldn't disagree more.

If you listen to some people today, organizations now need each of the four following chief executives:

• CTO: Chief Technology Officer
• CIO: Chief Information Officer
• CAO: Chief Analytics Officer
• CDO: Chief Data Officer

(And that doesn't include the COO, CFO, CEO, and other CXOs.)

More Questions than Answers

I've never heard a compelling explanation on why an organization needs either a CDO nor a CAO. (See The CDO Is no Elixir.) Where does the responsibilities of one end and the other being? How do you ensure that there isn't a great deal of overlap?

I'm serious. I'm all ears.

The mere thought of a CAO raises a number of questions:

• Doesn't the presence of a CAO in all likelihood confuse employees and dilute responsibilities?
• Are finance, HR, and sales folks no longer responsible for their own analytics?
• Does the "Analytics Department" now handle all that?
• Aren't we living in an age of employee self-service with attendant tools? Doesn't a CAO contradict that notion?
• Or is the CAO merely the titular head of some type of center for excellence?

Finally, I can't help but think that an organization justifiably confused by big data might view the CAO or CDO saviors or necessary hires? How else are they supposed to make sense out of petabytes of unstructured data The success of Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, and Netflix all indicate otherwise. Each is doing quite well with nary a CAO nor CDO among them.

Simon Says

Hire anyone you like. Just don't be surprised when that expensive new chief executive doesn't have the expected impact. A newfangled CXO is neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for success today. In fact, a new position may well cause more harm than good.

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