For the past decade, IT-trade magazines have preached to the rest of the C-suite about the importance of giving CIOs “a seat at the decision-making table.”

Fair enough (even if this argument has been made a bit too anxiously for a bit too long: Step up and take your own seat at the table, CIO).

However, as incidences of information security lapses increase, the absence of CIOs from strategic risk-management discussions becomes, well, a risk.

This is particularly the case right now: As companies morph (through mergers, divestitures, layoffs, etc.) more frequently and more radically in response to new economic conditions, the challenge of managing access to corporate data grows increasingly difficult.

It may help to understand how this risk area looks from the CIO’s perspective.

Yes, this slide show — “Managing Identity Risk During Mergers or Downsizing” — encourages IT leaders to take the proverbial seat at the table, but it also provides a high-level view of what needs to be done to protect corporate data during periods of dramatic change. ###