Finding Your Company's AI Middle Path

EP008 | Info-Tech LIVE Day 2: What a Fractional CIO Actually Does

Recorded live at Info-Tech LIVE 2026 in Las Vegas, Tad Doyle and Nabil Gharbieh pull back the curtain on the fractional CIO role — what it actually is, who needs it, and why so many mid-market organizations are running without IT strategy leadership they can't afford to be without. The conversation covers: * The difference between managing technology and owning IT strategy * Why a fractional or virtual CIO makes sense for SMBs and mid-market orgs that can't justify a full-time hire * How the vCIO role cuts across every department, from finance to marketing to operations * Concrete ways a vCIO saves money: vendor rationalization, software audits, shadow IT cleanup, and budget alignment * What involvement in the annual IT budget process actually looks like * The Covid case study: how IT strategy leadership moved companies remote in a week without buying a single new tool Nobody Told Me About IT is a weekly video podcast hosted by Tad Doyle and Nabil Gharbieh, two fractional CIOs and strategic IT advisors with 25+ years of combined experience. Each episode cuts through the hype and gets into the IT strategy conversations mid-market organizations need to be having. Find us on YouTube, LinkedIn, and everywhere you listen to podcasts. Contact: nobodytoldmeaboutit@gmail.com

Live from Info-Tech Live 2026 in Las Vegas 1 of 4

Live from InfoTech Live in Las Vegas, Tad Doyle and Nabil Gharbieh bring you a field episode straight from the conference floor. The CIO role is one of the most talked-about positions at this conference, and for good reason. The job has fundamentally changed. Two years ago, CIOs were managing infrastructure. Today, they are the only executives in the building having conversations with every department, every function, every stakeholder. That cross-functional visibility makes the CIO seat a natural launchpad into CEO and COO territory, and the best leaders here are starting to recognize that. But the opportunity comes with a prerequisite: data governance. Before any organization puts AI to work, they need to know what data they have, where it lives, who has access to it, and what shape it is in. Throwing AI on top of dirty data does not just produce bad outputs. It creates real security exposure. In this episode, Nabil and Tad break down why data governance, data loss prevention, and data optimization have to come first, every time. They also tackle one of the most common failure modes they see in client organizations: the binary CIO. The CIO who says no to everything blocks adoption and pushes employees toward shadow AI, which is worse. The CIO who says yes to everything creates a Wild West with no governance and real risk. The answer is a middle path, and they explain how to find it. Finally, they address the question every conference attendee is asking: is AI going to take my job? Info-Tech's position is clear. In the next two years, AI augments positions. It does not replace them. The organizations getting this right are not reducing headcount. They are repurposing people, freeing up capacity for higher-value work, and building institutional knowledge that AI cannot replicate. Episode recorded live at InfoTech Live, Las Vegas. Transcript available on YouTube. Nobody Told Me About IT is hosted by Tad Doyle and Nabil Gharbieh, two fractional CIOs and Strategic Advisors with 25-plus years of combined experience in IT strategy, infrastructure, and advisory services. New episodes every Monday.

Value-Based Billing

Value-Based Billing Why the hourly model is billing's version of micromanagement Episode EP006 Publish Date June 2, 2026 Host Nabil Gharbieh Runtime ~2 minutes Format Solo short Topic Value-based billing vs. hourly billing; measuring outcomes, not hours If a consultant solves your ransomware problem in two hours, you don't calculate the hourly rate. You calculate what a breach would have cost you. That's the core of value-based billing — and it applies the same way to AI in your organization. If AI saves your employees eight hours a week, you didn't lose time. You freed it up for strategy, growth, and the work that actually moves the business forward. In this short, Nabil Gharbieh breaks down why the hourly model is billing's version of micromanagement: it rewards delay, punishes efficiency, and misses the point entirely. The right question isn't 'how much per hour?' It's 'what did it prevent, enable, or save?' One important note: letting your team use AI responsibly means doing it with governance — policies, frameworks, and a plan. Not just downloading whatever app looks useful. Nobody Told Me About IT is a podcast for business leaders who make technology decisions without deep technical backgrounds. New episodes every Monday. Subscribe for weekly IT strategy conversations that skip the hype and get to what matters. TIMESTAMPS 0:07 The hourly model problem — why billing by time rewards the wrong behavior 0:40 The $10,000 project example — you're paying for expertise, not time on the clock 1:10 AI and the 8-hours-a-week argument — freed time is an asset, not a loss 1:35 The governance caveat — 2026 AI adoption requires policies, not just permission 1:50 About Nobody Told Me About IT — and a quick ask to share, like, and engage #NobodyToldMeAboutIT #ValueBasedBilling #ITStrategy #AI #ConsultingTips #BusinessLeadership #CIO #TechStrategy

10 AI Trends Business Leaders Need to Know Right Now

Nobody Told Me About IT — EP005: Tad Doyle & Nabil Gharbieh 0:05 — THE HOOK Round-robin: ten trending AI topics, the honest read on each, what to do. No panic. No hype. 0:51 — TREND 1: THE EXPLORER TRAP 51% of small business owners are AI explorers. Only 8% have advanced adoption. Two years of exploration without commitment is diffusion. Pick one workflow, commit for a quarter, measure it. 1:37 — TREND 2: AGENTS ARE REAL, NOT MAGIC MIT Sloan: agentic AI hits Gartner's trough of disillusionment in 2026. Gartner: 40% of agent projects canceled by end of 2027. Agents hallucinate, need humans in the loop, and are hard to govern. Specific tasks, specific guardrails. Fully autonomous is a red flag. 2:35 — TREND 3: THE SKILLS GAP IS REAL 63% of employers cite skills as the primary AI barrier. 20% of small businesses feel confident adopting AI, vs. 82% of mid-sized firms. Only 12% of small businesses invest in training, despite 29% citing it as the biggest obstacle. Zero training budget means you have a software budget. 3:21 — TREND 4: THE WORKFORCE ISN'T ONE BLOCK 31% of employees push back on AI strategy. 45% worry too much AI will hurt the company's reputation. 30% of SMB workers use AI daily. Ask your team three things: what excites you, what worries you, what's missing. 4:05 — TREND 5: THE .COM ANALOGY IS INCOMPLETE MIT Sloan compares the AI moment to .com: sky-high valuations, growth over profits. Real businesses are also seeing real ROI. Both true. Some tools won't exist in three years. Don't bet on one vendor. Add a vendor audit annually. 4:46 — TREND 6: GOVERNANCE SEPARATES LEADERS FROM THE REST 68% of high-ROI AI organizations have mature governance. Among lower performers, 32%. 56% of CEOs are delaying major AI investments due to governance uncertainty. If you can't answer "Who owns AI here?" fix that first. Name the owner this week. 5:24 — TREND 7: TOP-DOWN PICKS OUTCOMES PwC: crowdsourcing AI from departments rarely produces meaningful outcomes. Senior leadership picks two or three strategic workflows and commits resources. Bottom-up gets adoption. Top-down gets outcomes. 6:01 — TREND 8: DATA IS THE REAL BOTTLENECK SAP and Snowflake advisors agree: data is the bottleneck to trusted AI. Healthcare charts average 46,000 words. Most business knowledge is scattered, duplicated, contradictory. Top adopters fix data first. Identify the one data set that, if cleaned, would unlock the most value. Beats three new tools. 6:45 — TREND 9: THE CATCH-UP IS REAL SBA: small businesses closing the AI gap with large enterprises faster than in previous cycles. Within SMB, the spread between adopters and non-adopters is widening. 96% plan to adopt, 8% have advanced adoption. Benchmark against your five closest competitors, not Microsoft. 7:30 — TREND 10: MARKET TIMING Microsoft Q1 2026: AI usage growing 1.5 points per quarter globally. US at 17.8%. UAE at 70.1%. Gartner: 40% of enterprises will use task-specific AI agents by end of 2026, up from under 5% in 2025. You're not late. You're not early. You're right on time. KEY TAKEAWAY "Every trend has an opportunity and a real friction. AI in 2026 isn't a crisis and isn't a paradise. It rewards leaders who hold both, the upside and the work." LINKS AND RESOURCES McKinsey — The State of AI: shadow AI and personal-account usage. https://www.mckinsey.com/capabilities/quantumblack/our-insights/the-state-of-ai Microsoft + LinkedIn — Work Trend Index: BYO-AI and talent migration. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/worklab/work-trend-index Gartner — AI governance and shadow AI risk. https://www.gartner.com/en/information-technology/insights/artificial-intelligence IBM IBV — CEO Decision-Making in the Age of AI: 56% delaying due to governance. https://www.ibm.com/thought-leadership/institute-business-value All episodes — https://nobodytoldmeaboutit.com

Finding Your Company's AI Middle Path

Nobody Told Me About IT — EP004: Finding Your Middle Path in AI Hosts: Tad Doyle & Nabil Gharbieh  ·  Published: May 19, 2026  ·  Runtime: 8:02 0:05 — THE TWO EXTREMES Most AI conversations inside organizations are happening at one of two poles: total lockdown or no governance at all. Tad and Nabil open by naming the tension directly — and then spend the episode inhabiting each extreme as composite client characters, asking each other the questions advisors actually ask. “The fear is legitimate. You’ve got data leakage, you’ve got IP exposure, you’ve got compliance exposure. The response is an actual risk that can be a lot worse.” — Nabil Gharbieh 1:26 — THE LOCKDOWN CLIENT Tad plays a composite mid-market CEO who blocked ChatGPT, Copilot, and Claude at the firewall and told staff that AI use is grounds for termination. Nabil asks three questions: What happens when employees still need to get work done? What does this do to competitive position? And was the fear actually justified? The answers: shadow AI moves in immediately, competitors move faster, junior staff start leaving, and the lockdown just pushed the risk somewhere no one could see it. “You’re gonna get shadow AI. You’re gonna get people who use their personal cell phones, their personal accounts, their personal emails to forward to themselves — and now they’re going to work off their personal laptops. So you’ll have zero visibility, zero control.” — Nabil Gharbieh 3:00 — THE WILD WEST CLIENT Nabil plays a composite 75-person CEO who told staff to “just figure it out.” Everyone expenses their own tools with no contracts, no data protection agreements, no inventory. Tad asks three questions: Who owns the data those tools are seeing? What happens when a tool has a breach or shuts down? And what do you tell the board when they ask for the AI strategy? The answers: nobody knows, business continuity is a gap nobody has planned for, and “we’re embracing AI” is not a strategy. “There’s a lot of activity. There’s absolutely no strategy. There’s no value assessments. There’s no risk assessments. It’s just kind of ‘we’re embracing AI.’ There’s no strategy with this.” — Nabil Gharbieh 5:21 — THE MIDDLE PATH The hosts flip from adversarial to collaborative. Nabil’s two moves for the lockdown client: replace the ban with a one-page acceptable use policy and publish an approved tool list. Tad’s two moves for the all-in client: do a visibility inventory via Slack or email (no judgment), and define three data categories that can never go into an AI tool — customer PII, financial data, contracts. KEY TAKEAWAY “Neither extreme works. The conversation your organization needs to be having isn’t ‘Should we use AI?’ It’s ‘Where on the spectrum are we right now, and what’s our next move toward the middle?’”  — Tad Doyle LINKS AND RESOURCES Microsoft Copilot — https://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-365/copilot/microsoft-365-copilot [https://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-365/copilot/microsoft-365-copilot] ChatGPT Team — https://openai.com/chatgpt/team [https://openai.com/chatgpt/team] Claude for Work — https://www.anthropic.com/claude/work [https://www.anthropic.com/claude/work] All episodes — https://nobodytoldmeaboutit.com [https://nobodytoldmeaboutit.com]