It’s not an ideal time for this dynamic to be surfacing, considering more business leaders are hoping to turn to data in order to navigate today’s uncertain economic times. More than three quarters of business leaders told Salesforce they feel increasingly pressured to back their arguments and claims with data, and that AI increases their need to be data driven. But fewer than half actually have confidence in their data—just 40% say it’s reliable, while 36% have faith in its accuracy and 34% believe it’s complete. These same executives were actually much more confident in their data two years ago. In a 2023 survey about data, 54% found it to be reliable, 49% said it was accurate, and 34% rated it complete.

The study pinpoints the issue as a problem of confidence. Out of all business leaders, 54% said they aren’t fully confident in their ability to find, analyze and interpret data. The study talked to tiers of business leadership from director level to C-suite, and confidence was much lower for directors than executives. Three out of five C-suite leaders were confident in their data skills, while just over a third of directors felt they could use data to generate and deliver timely insights.

This gap shows the importance of training for business leaders: Showing them where the data is, what is included, and how to find what’s relevant to their jobs. AI solutions aren’t useful when business leaders don’t have a basic knowledge and understanding of the data. Speaking about the study with Forbes senior contributor Joe McKendrick, Aspen Technology Senior Manager of Product Marketing Dwaine Plauche recommended CIOs look at enterprise data in a different way. “Rethink the data infrastructure as an internal customer service,” Plauche said. “The goal should be providing internal customers or projects with needed data—a service-oriented mindset that is aligned with the organization’s strategy."

In the last several years, no-code platforms have made programming accessible to everyone. I talked to Katherine Kostereva, founder and CEO of no-code platform Creatio, about how the platforms have evolved and where they fit in enterprise technology. An excerpt from our conversation is later in this newsletter.

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While these are the first fines issued under the DMA, the only unknown was the amount of each. The European Commission first announced the companies had violated the law last summer. And there are likely to be more findings on the way against U.S. Big Tech companies. The EC has been investigating Google parent Alphabet—preliminarily ruling last month that its search engine treats Alphabet-owned entities favorably—and taking a look at whether Apple is violating the law for interoperability challenges between iOS and non-Apple devices, Forbes senior contributor Emma Woollacott wrote.

Uppal’s departure comes as IT projects and leaders at the IRS are on the chopping block. According to FedScoop, about 50 IT executives at the agency were placed on administrative leave last month, and its Transformation and Strategy Office was shut down by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency. Access to the IRS’s tax return data has also been a political issue as of late, with the IRS entering an agreement to provide information about undocumented immigrants to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. This agreement led to the resignation of Melanie Krause from the IRS acting commissioner’s role.

Federal government CIO positions were previously non-political, and many CIOs continued in their roles regardless of which party was in the White House. The Trump Administration is working to change the CIO’s job designation to potentially become more political. A February Office of Personnel Management memo said AI and cybersecurity issues make the CIO’s job more policy-oriented. According to FedScoop, since Trump took office in late January, the Energy Department, Small Business Administration, Treasury Department and Social Security Administration are all on their second CIOs.

These types of issues have plagued Microsoft’s Recall AI, which is intended as a feature that constantly takes screenshots of a user’s computer so they can quickly pull up things they had been working on and closed. The feature was always controversial, with many concerned about how secure the data was and what it might be used for. And Microsoft has had issues with actually being able to deliver that security. Recall was supposed to be launched last summer with Microsoft’s Copilot+ PCs, but it’s been delayed several times, and is just this month seeing a limited release.

One often-overlooked area of business partnerships: How well does technology integrate? Here are some examples of partnerships where seamless use of technology is enhancing KPIs and transparency.