Gartner has urged chief information officers (CIOs) to engage more with their firm's customers to boost their profile within the organisation, after it was revealed that half of CIOs spend no time at all with external customers.

Research from the analyst firm presented at the Gartner Symposium/ITxpo 2008 in Cannes this week found that those CIOs who do spend time with their external customers, spend just five per cent of their total time interacting.

Gartner research vice president Tina Nunno said that these activities can help CIOs meet their number-one priority of enabling business growth.

"I would argue that the best people to talk to in order to ensure revenue growth-oriented IT projects are customers, but too often CIOs are focused on intermediaries," she said.

"Most CIOs are concerned that they are viewed as a back-office function, but the simplest way to avoid this is to get out of the back office, move into the front office and interact with the customer."

Nunno recommended CIOs prioritise their most profitable customers above all, and also seek out potential prospects, if they want to be viewed as business leaders.

"Often they believe that there is a risk they won't be welcomed doing this and, because not a lot of CIOs do it, it is a legitimate fear," said Nunno.

"But when we spoke to CIOs who did engage with external customers, they were enthusiastically received by the business."