Salmen is a member of the executive team, reporting directly to Bartlett. "We are delivering a tech product so having good strong representation at the executive level is pretty critical," he says. "I don't think Scott will ever want an executive team that will not include the CIO, CTO or whoever is the technology leader."

Bartlett says Salmen brings "a complete understanding of the business".

"A CEO has more comfort when the company's CIO is highly commercial, not just technical," says Bartlett. "This promotes trust and confidence and ultimately leads to tight strategic alignment on key issues."

For Bartlett, the key to a successful CEO and CIO working relationship is an organisational culture that "tolerates challenges".

"A CEO must ensure that staff have the tools and technology enablers to perform at the highest level -- and as such requires a CIO that understands this -- and actions it. It makes my job easier knowing I have a CIO who also believes in this philosophy and removes roadblocks to allow people to perform at their best.