CIO Executive Search
CIO Executive Search, Brisbane and South East Queensland
The CIO is the first technology appointment most founder-led and family owned businesses get wrong. Not because the candidates are weak. Because the business hires the pattern it read about in a magazine rather than the one sitting in front of it.
What a Chief Information Officer does in a mid-market business
A Chief Information Officer owns the technology a business runs on: systems, data, security, vendors and the internal teams that keep them working. In founder-led and private equity-backed businesses in Brisbane, the CIO is typically the first executive-level technology hire, appointed between 100 and 300 employees.
The trigger
When founders and boards hire a CIO
Systems are now a board conversation
When the ERP, the integrations or the reporting layer come up at every board meeting, the business has outgrown an IT manager reporting into finance.
A private equity investment has landed
New owners want a data spine, a security posture and a technology roadmap they can underwrite. That is a CIO search, not an infrastructure one.
Acquisitions are stacking up
Three businesses, three finance systems, three CRMs. Integration is the single most common reason a mid-market CIO gets hired in Queensland.
Cyber risk has become personal
Directors carry the exposure. A CIO who can hold a genuine risk conversation with a board is worth more than one who can hold an architecture conversation.
The assessment
What a strong CIO appointment looks like
- 01
Has run technology inside a business of comparable size, not just a division of a much larger one. Mid-market constraints are a skill.
- 02
Can talk margin, working capital and customer outcomes before they talk platforms.
- 03
Has replaced a core system at least once and can describe honestly what went wrong.
- 04
Builds a small, senior team rather than an empire. Headcount growth is the wrong success metric here.
- 05
Comfortable being the only technology voice in the room, and comfortable being challenged in it.
CIO compensation in South East Queensland
Total package ranges drawn from our own Queensland search data, reviewed quarterly. Equity, options and carried interest sit outside these figures unless noted.
Founder-led, 50 to 150 staff
Total package. Often a first-time CIO stepping up from a Head of IT or IT Director role.
$220,000 to $280,000
Family owned, 150 to 300 staff
Multi-site or multi-entity complexity. Frequently includes a discretionary bonus tied to a system programme.
$260,000 to $330,000
Private equity-backed
Base plus short-term incentive plus equity or options. Hold period expectations shape the structure.
$300,000 to $400,000+
Interim or fractional
Common bridge while a permanent search runs, or where the search is a single transformation.
$1,600 to $2,400 per day
Ranges come from our Queensland search data, reviewed quarterly. Total packages exclude equity, options and carried interest unless noted.
The Queensland market
What we see in the CIO market here
Brisbane has a genuine shortage of CIOs who have operated in the 100 to 300 employee range. The deep pool sits in enterprise and government, where the conditions are entirely different. Bigger budgets, longer timelines, and several layers of people between the leader and the actual work.
Moving an enterprise CIO into a founder-led business fails more often than it works, and it almost never fails on capability. It fails on pace. We screen hard for people who have already made that jump, or who have the temperament to survive it.
The other pool worth knowing about is the second-in-charge inside larger Queensland businesses who is ready for the top job and will not get it for another five years. A good number of our best CIO appointments have come from exactly there.
Questions we are asked
CIO hiring questions, answered
Most founder-led and family owned businesses reach the point between 100 and 300 employees, usually triggered by an ERP replacement, an acquisition that needs integrating, a cyber incident or a private equity investment. The clearest signal is when technology decisions start affecting margin and the board has no one in the room who can own them.
A CIO runs the technology the business uses. A CTO builds the technology the business sells. If your product is not software, you almost certainly need a CIO. If you have a product engineering team and a roadmap customers pay for, you need a CTO. Some businesses need both, and the order matters.
In our Queensland market data, CIO total packages run from around $220,000 in a founder-led business of 50 to 150 staff, to $300,000 to $400,000 and above in private equity-backed businesses where short-term incentives and equity form part of the structure. Interim CIOs typically engage at $1,600 to $2,400 per day.
First candidate profiles land within seven business days. A complete CIO search, from briefing to signed offer, typically runs six to nine weeks in Brisbane. Confidential searches where an incumbent is still in role usually add two weeks.
Yes. Confidential search is our default rather than an exception. We manage the market approach, the candidate narrative and the internal story so an incumbent stays protected until the business chooses to make the appointment public.
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