The title of chief technology officer has had a place in the C-suite for nearly four decades. But that individual’s role has evolved significantly over that time, as businesses have come to rely more heavily on technological innovation for their very survival.

CTOs were brought on to take a high-level view of their companies’ technology infrastructure, while also being tasked with the selection of tools that could drive short-term gains. More recently, they’ve been asked to make bigger bets on capital expenditures for cutting-edge hardware and software, says Ahmad Baitalmal, co-founder and CTO with Mytra, a specialist in warehouse automation.

The CTO’s role in the organization today “is to find those strategic positioning maneuvers that put you in position to create the most value for shareholders,” Baitalmal says. That means much more than selecting the best robot for a distribution center, or deciding between applications that are hosted on-premises or in the cloud.

CTOs are becoming an even more vital part of executive teams as American manufacturers take steps to relocate production from Asia back to the western hemisphere. In the case of factories being built or expanded in the U.S., that means adopting technology that can offset the higher cost of domestic labor, as well as chronic shortages of skilled human workers.

Baitalmal says CTOs can be a “guiding light” that illuminates the advantages of investing in new technology, the initial cost of which might seem off-putting to corporate finance types. The CTO’s role, he says, “becomes extremely critical. You need to convince everybody else that it’s worth their time, and what it means if we’re successful.”

Indeed, the role of technology cheerleader can easily clash with others in the C-suite, such as chief financial, operating and even executive officers, the last of whom are responsible to their boards and investors for producing bottom-line profits on a quarter-by-quarter basis. But Baitalmal says the resulting dynamic is less one of endless battles for influence and “more of a group discussion. The important thing is that everybody at the table is aware of what the goal is, and that there’s alignment.”

For that matter, the CTO isn’t always going to be pushing the latest technological advancement. “Being just a purely technical advocate doesn’t go far enough,” Baitalmal says. All member of the C-suite, the CTO included, are viewing key decisions from a shared business-strategy perspective.

“It’s also your job as a CTO to say no to things that are wonderful technologies, but make no sense for you,” he says.” For even the most bullish advocate of new tech, the question around investing in a particular application becomes: “Am I really advancing the company’s goals? Many times, you say no.”

To be sure, there are plenty of “shiny things” available from modern-day purveyors of automation. It’s hard to resist, for example, the lure of artificial intelligence and machine learning, at a time when those technologies promise to transform every aspect of the business. And when it comes to innovations for the warehouse, the notion of a “lights-out” operation, in which no humans are present, might seem irresistible. But it's only applicable to a limited number of products and economic calculations, at least for the foreseeable future.

Also weighing heavily on the CTO’s shoulders today is the need for an ever-faster return on investment from whatever systems the company acquires. Baitalmal says many businesses are being pushed by Amazon.com’s ability to deliver orders within a day or less, raising consumer expectations across the board for rapid fulfillment. Investors are becoming similarly impatient for quick results.

In some cases, the technology itself can enable that level of rapid payback. 3D printing, for one, allows manufacturers to quickly prototype new products, cutting short what used to take months to execute. In the process, everything becomes cheaper, satisfying the executive protectors of the bottom line. “You’re being asked to create improved performance at the same time the technology is enabling you to do that,” Baitalmal says.

He believes the CTO’s role will become even more vital in the coming years, as the unstoppable march of technology expands to cover more aspects of business operations.

“It doesn’t have any limits to areas it can improve,” Baitalmal says. “The problem is, it’s still unknown how effective it’s going to be. So CTOs have to keep a watchful eye on what’s happening.”

With the rise of edge computing, he says, it could be a matter for many companies of acquiring smaller, cheaper technology, without the need for massive data centers in the cloud, or extensive IT infrastructure.

The actual role of the CTO, today and in the future, is that of both technology cheerleader and guardian at the gate. “In the next five years,” Baitalmal says, “CTO’s have to really understand what this enables for their business.”