Despite the cost-cutting forced on many organisations by the recession, pay packets for the IT management team have held up - and for some even grown.

According to the exclusive silicon.com 2009 Skills Survey a greater proportion of IT chiefs are now taking home bigger pay packets than in last year's survey.

A unified communications project is all too often a daunting prospect for a CIO.

UC is a broad topic - and a deployment can bring with it both unexpected benefits and unforeseen pitfalls.

It's not just the technology that's important - how you account for its cost can also have a huge impact on your organisation at large, says the Naked CIO.

I am very troubled by a new trend that is impacting IT departments across the country and around the world. It has nothing to do with critiquing the pros and cons of a particular technology but rather strangely enough with the financial accounting of how we pay for technology.

Michael Chui is a senior fellow of the McKinsey Global Institute, the economics research arm of analyst house McKinsey & Company.

In an exclusive interview, silicon.com reporter Tim Ferguson spoke to Chui about the report he co-authored on how CIOs can overcome the significant challenges posed by the business world emerging from the global recession into the 'new normal'.

In this age of mobile working, should businesses consider ditching their offices? Richard Leyland weighs up the pros and cons.

At the recent Workplace Trends conference, one speaker dared to ask: "Do we even need an office these days?"

As the hype around microblogging builds, should your business join the tweet-fest or keep schtum? silicon.com's Natasha Lomas deconstructs this Digital Dilemma.

So you've heard about Twitter. You might even know what the word 'tweet' means. Well done. Your finger is well and truly riding the social media pulse. But here's the rub: should your business join the tweet-fest and set up shop on Twitter? Is microblogging the new marketing?

IT leaders may not be fully responsible for workers' actions - but they could take more responsibility than they have been, says the Naked CIO.

We often talk about the power of technology to unite colleagues, boost collaboration and improve working processes to increase efficiency and allow companies to produce more with the same amount of staff - all of which I believe in as a technology prognosticator, if done properly.

While social networking sites can be fun for connecting with family and friends, they're no use when it comes to professional networking, says the Naked CIO.

It used to be that social networking websites were a perfect place to collaborate with colleagues, bring together like-minded people and make professional contacts who could enhance your career. But no more.

Despite tough economic conditions, CIOs have not turned to open source software as a way of making their IT budgets go further, according to silicon.com's latest exclusive CIO Jury.

Because it lacks the expensive licensing that is often the hallmark of proprietary software, open source is regularly touted as a way for IT departments to make their budget stretch a little bit further and it has already enjoyed considerable success in certain areas of the enterprise, such as web servers.

When you think of gambling, smoky casinos populated by tough guys chewing cigars and nursing their whiskey probably come to mind.

UK online gamblers might not quite fit this image but they can increasingly get into the spirit of their Vegas counterparts through technology that allows them a way to banter across the baize with their opponents.

In good times and bad, green IT deserves a spot on the CIO agenda. Stuart Roberts explains how to get it right.

Before the downturn, green IT - or environmentally sustainable computing - was one of the common threads on CIO agendas. It was popular for a variety of reasons: fluctuating energy costs, legislative mandate and social responsibility, to name a few.

Apple may be reinvigorated with CEO Steve Jobs back at the helm and a new OS just out of the gates, but it looks like the business world is still closed to the Mac maker.

According to silicon.com's CIO Jury, the release late last month of Apple's latest OS, Snow Leopard, won't signal the company's entry into the business market.

IT graduates are leaving UK universities without the business and technical competencies that employers need, according to silicon.com's CIO Jury.

The majority of the jury said they believe universities are not producing IT graduates with the right skills for their businesses - bad news for graduates competing for the diminishing number of IT jobs.

Do the pros of being an IT leader outweigh the cons? The Naked CIO says yes - see what you think.

I have wanted to do an article like this for a while - lighten things up because we should all hope our jobs are as much about passion and joy as they are rigorous and demanding. And in today's economy, doesn't everyone need a bit of cheering up?

Why is it so difficult to find a great CIO? Because the business will not support them, says the Naked CIO.

I read with interest a recent article by fellow silicon.com columnist Tim Cook about how hard it is to find good CIOs and how the job market is still quite active.

Do CIOs want or need another OS? And from Google? Naked CIO remains sceptical.

While I am no great fan of Microsoft or Apple - and have expressed rather opinionated views on the total cost of ownership of Linux environments - I have been recently perplexed by Google's decision to enter the operating system market.

Offshoring is a controversial topic at the best of times - and one that's becoming increasingly contentious as the recession continues to see thousands of jobs lost across the country.

It's also been accused of sapping UK IT skills by reducing the number of entry-level IT jobs available for UK graduates, giving fewer techies a chance to get a first foot on the ladder.

Board members should be held accountable for email and internet usage, just as other staff are, says the Naked CIO.

Last week I wrote about monitoring staff email and internet usage. The two reader comments to the article both questioned how to deal with board members who do not follow company policy with respect to appropriate computer use.

The hot weather the UK has been experiencing in the past week or so doesn't seem to have caused too many headaches in IT departments across the country.

The latest silicon.com CIO Jury poll asked tech chiefs whether they'd taken any extra steps to protect their technology infrastructure during this week's heat wave, with nine of the 12 revealing they haven't.

TalkTalk has hired a CIO for the first time.

The company announced today that it has appointed David Cooper to the newly created post in April, after previously splitting responsibility for IT across a number of individuals within the company.

Let silicon.com keep you up to date with all the latest CIO job moves and changes with our regular CIO Job Report.

CIO moves

Do you want to help shape the future of silicon.com? Want to help make the UK's best business and technology publication even better?

silicon.com is currently setting up an exclusive Advisory Panel which will help guide how we develop the publication further. We want to understand more about the silicon.com audience in order to make sure we are delivering exactly what you want.

Keeping watch over employees' online activities can be a slippery slope, says Naked CIO. Here's the right way to do it.

I often get asked whether or not it is best to implement a strict, penal environment in the office for email and internet monitoring.

City University London is setting up a centre dedicated to training the next generation of CIOs.

The centre will provide short courses and ultimately a Masters-level qualification for mid-career IT professionals looking to develop themselves and acquire the skills to move up the IT ladder.

The launch of silicon.com CIO50 2009 - the list of the UK's 50 most influential CIOs - took place last week at the Paramount, in London's West End.

Photo credit: Chris Beaumont/CBS Interactive

CIOs spend countless hours listening to suppliers pitch their technology, so silicon.com decided to make the process a lot more entertaining by putting the vendors on the spot. Welcome to the 60-Second Pitch.

Suppliers have just one minute to pitch their product or service to a panel of current and former heads of IT, who then have the opportunity to quiz the vendor before giving the technology a green or red light - just for fun, of course.

Learning to work with colleagues you don't like is good for you and your company, says the Naked CIO.

Ever think about those tense relationships at work? Or those personalities you just can't seem to get on with?

Newspapers need to find innovative ways to embrace web 2.0 - or accept certain doom, says CIO Ian Cohen.

Newspapers are facing the most fundamental period of change in their history. In many ways, until recently nothing much had changed in news delivery since the town crier wandered into the market square, rang his bell and shouted, 'Hear ye! Hear ye! - plague, death, taxation, fat-cat bankers and the worst recession in living memoryÂ… local vicar involved.'

Social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter pose a host of difficulties for businesses and business people, says the Naked CIO.

Personally I think the emergence of Facebook, Twitter and other forms of spontaneous social conversation within the connected world is good. However, as these technologies transcend and even infiltrate businesses, I have some real concerns about their impact on business and working environments.

Changing the sector you work in can be a great way to survive a recession. IT director Mike Roberts explains how it's possible - even a good idea.

I started my career in IT back in 1979 when the world of technology was very different to how it is today. Since then I have worked in almost every business sector and learnt that experience in one sector is no barrier to working in another.

The Naked CIO asks: could the banks' hard times lead to better times for smaller businesses?

I know it is unkind to hit someone when they are down, however in this case I believe it is warranted.

Integrating IT can make or break a merger or acquisition, says the Naked CIO. Here's how to get it right.

Inspired by Oracle's recent bid to purchase Sun and mumblings about the difficulty to integrate their product sets, I recalled the challenges IT had in several companies I worked for when trying to integrate systems as a result of mergers and acquisitions.

When hiring, remember to focus on finding the necessary skills - no more, no less - to fit the job, says the Naked CIO.

For a while now I have been looking for a job. This means I've been doing lots of networking as well as applying for jobs, and discussing job opportunities with many people.

For a company to get ahead, it's got to innovate. IT director Peter Birley offers some ways to encourage fresh thinking in your business.

One of the biggest challenges for IT leaders today is how to differentiate our organisations from the competition.

The recession has led many IT leaders to search for ways to save money. But open source isn't one of them, says the Naked CIO.

It still surprises me that open source supporters, activists and vendors make the argument that model is cheaper than other software in business environments. This is a myth.

The Telegraph Media Group is embracing cloud computing in a big way.

Speaking at Salesforce.com's Cloudforce event in London this week, CIO of the Telegraph Media Group (TMG), Paul Cheesbrough, said the company is looking to move as much of its back office IT into the cloud as possible.

While the recent Conficker worm may have turned out to be a damp squib, enterprises are still very much on their guard against malware.

Asked whether viruses are still a genuine threat to corporate IT security, 11 out of the 12 members of silicon.com's CIO Jury said they are.

Let silicon.com keep you up to date with all the latest CIO job moves and changes with our regular CIO Job Report.

CIO moves

Cloud computing has been given a definite thumbs down by silicon.com's CIO Jury.

Following exclusive silicon.com research that found IT leaders voting cloud computing the most over-hyped technology of the year, the CIO Jury was asked whether cloud computing is part of their IT strategy to cut costs.

Consolidating IT infrastructure and trimming the financial fat are among the key objectives for CIOs this year.

When asked what their top business or strategic issue is this year, cost cutting was the subject mentioned most often by IT chiefs who responded to silicon.com's fifth annual exclusive CIO Agenda 2009 survey.