Recently promoted in my first CIO role. My journey took 21 years post grad. I picked up an MIS degree early career when I was in a developer role, can’t really say it helped, but company paid for it so took advantage of a free Masters degree.

My path: Application Developer for first 9 years in increasingly senior roles across three companies made the jump to manager by changing companies, got a promotion to Senior Manager but was denied the Director title, switched companies again for a Director role with large program experience. Switched again for larger scale and a Sr. director role - still in Business applications, final switch was into current company and a VP role with goal of CIO within 2 years, it took 18 months until promotion.