Evan Schuman's StorefrontBacktalk

On the best-paid list of CIOs at publicly held companies, Best Buy’s Bob Willett ($4.7 million), Home Depot’s Bob DeRodes ($4.3 million) and Kohl’s Thomas Kingsbury ($2.5 million) stand at the top, doing the pocket-protector crowd proud, according to an analysis of SEC filings done by RISNews and CIO Magazine.

Like any list, it’s hard to be precise about what the content means. Are these truly the best paid CIOs in the country or just the best paid of those working at publicly held retailers? And even some publicly held chains aren’t required to report their CIO’s compensation, making the analysis even more inconclusive.

"It is likely that many large retailers, such as Wal-Mart and Target, for example, have highly paid CIOs, but since more than five executives at these companies are more highly paid, the CIO salaries do not appear in publicly available records," said the RISNews story. "Also, it is equally likely that several private companies, such as Meijer and HEB, for example, have highly paid CIOs, but since these companies do not file the same SEC reports, there is no public record to review."

Others on the top 10 list (in order) were: Amazon’s H. Brian Valentine, whose title is SVP, E-Commerce platforms ($2.1 million); Chico’s Gary King ($1.8 million); Big Lots’ Lisa Bachmann ($1.3 million); RadioShack’s Cara Kinzey, whose official title is SVP of IT ($776,000); Children’s Place’s Richard Flaks, who is SVP Planning, Allocation and IT ($735,000); Saks’ Michael Rodgers ($582,000); and Publix’s Laurie Douglas ($556,000).