India, July 9 -- Chief Data Officers are suddenly everywhere. While there were only about 100 of them 7 years ago, today they number at around 10,000, according to Gartner, which has been tracking these executives since 2012.

"It goes up every month. We feel like the role is well established," said Debra Logan, distinguished vice president at Gartner. She spoke with InformationWeek about Gartner's annual CDO survey results and her recommendations for how CDO's can deliver the most value to their organizations.

Not only are they everywhere, but CDOs also have quite a bit of influence in the organization. Gartner's survey of 257 data and analytics leaders showed that the highest percentage of them, 30%, report into the CEO. The second hig...