IOPener UK—August 2008

Overview

Welcome to the first issue in 2008 of “IOPener”, a regular update from Russell Reynolds Associates’ Information Officers Practice (IOP) which highlights executive moves and other developments in the Chief Information Officer (CIO) and Chief Technology Officer (CTO) marketplace in the United Kingdom.

For the first half of 2008, the CIO/CTO market remains strong with a number of opportunities across a range of sectors. The turmoil in the financial markets seems to be creating a demand for highly experienced CIOs, and most good candidates have two to three roles under consideration. One theory is that in a period of prolonged downturn many organisations take a cost-control approach to IT and, therefore, bring in new technology leadership to drive that change. In terms of hiring themes, there is a shifting focus towards candidates with experience of tighter cost control management, strategic sourcing, and more efficient project and service delivery.

Good CIOs are fundamentally transformers. The prize for us all is to create an agile organisation.” –FTSE100 CIO

We hope you will enjoy this perspective on the Information Officer role and we welcome any feedback that you may have.

IOPening Moves (highlights Jan – July 2008)

Airbus

• Alain Carcasses has been promoted to EVP and CIO as well as executive committee member. He was previously the Group Technical Director for the A380 programme.

Alliance & Leicester

• Ian Buchanan has been promoted from Group IT Director to Group Manufacturing Director to be responsible for all back-office operations that support the retail and commercial bank.

Aviva

• Toby Redshaw becomes Group CIO for Aviva, having previously been Corporate VP, Innovation, Data, Enabling Platforms and Architecture Services at Motorola.

Diageo

• Brian Franz joins Diageo as Group CIO replacing Robin Dargue, who left to join Royal Mail. Brian was previously VP and CIO at PepsiCo, based in the United States.

Fortis Investments

• Sian Miller has recently been appointed Chief Operating Officer of IT, Strategy and Communications. She was previously Global head of IT for ABN AMRO Asset Management.

Inchcape

• Stephane Chatal becomes the Global CIO for Inchcape based in London. Stephane joined from Reckitt Benckiser where he was a divisional IT Director with responsibility for global programmes.

Mandmdirect.com

• Graham Benson joins as Group IT Director. He was previously CTO of Play.com

Merrill Lynch

• Tom Sanzone joins Merrill Lynch as their new Group CAO. He was previously the Group CIO of Credit Suisse.

National Health Service

• Christine Connelly joins the National Health Service as the first Information Officer for Health; she was previously the CIO at Cadbury Schweppes.
• Martin Bellamy joins the National Health Service as the Director of Delivery; he was previously the CIO of thePension Service.

RBS

• David Lister joins RBS as their new Chief Architect. Previously he was Group CIO for Reuters.
• Ron Teerlink becomes Chief Executive Officer for the Manufacturing Division of RBS which provides IT, Business Infrastructure and Support across the group. Ron was previously responsible for all Services and Market Infrastructure at ABN AMRO.

Rok Group

• Claire Hamon joins as CIO replacing Richard Gifford. Claire was previous CIO for the Crown Prosecution Service.

Telecom New Zealand

• Francis Mount joins TNZ as their new Group Chief Transformation Officer. Francis joins from Cable & Wireless, where he was Group CTO and Director of Operations.
• Stuart Sutton joins as the Group CIO; he was previously at THUS.

Vodafone

• Kevin Cunnington joins Vodafone to run their online technology division reporting to Global CIO Albert Hitchcock. Kevin was previously with T-Mobile.

Westpac

• Bob McKinnon joins Westpac as CIO to lead their newly restructured technology division. Bob was previously CIO of Commonwealth Bank.

Sector Focus: Retail

The high street is now starting to see the impact of the credit crunch and CIOs are having to respond to different market conditions and requirements. Several companies in the U.K. retail sector are focussing on either setting up or improving their shared service operations. There are also many examples of data centre rationalisation programmes happening at the moment with the result that several organisations are looking for Programme Directors. There is a wide discrepancy in the range of salaries offered for these roles (sub £100,000 – over £200,000) reflecting the broad range of programmes being undertaken in both size, scale and complexity. The scarcity of very good programme delivery skills also means that organisations are relying on third parties to deliver projects, e.g. ERP roll-out programmes. In addition, the operations supporting the Web/online aspects of the retail organisations are
actively recruiting.

IT is a transactional type function. It is there to help the business work better.” –Retail IT Director

IOPening Events

Russell Reynolds Associates and the CIO Executive Council co-hosted the inaugural Women in Technology Lunch in London on Wednesday 2 July with Heather Jackson, CIO of HBOS, as the guest speaker. A broad range of sectors was represented around the table. The main observations and themes that came out of the lunch were around the need to make the IT profession and technology leadership roles in general more attractive to younger women,
including more tolerance of flexible working arrangements and cross-company mentoring schemes for high potential younger women. A working party has been set up to put in place a pilot mentoring programme. If you would be interested in joining this pilot, please e-mail Tim Cook at tcook [at] russellreynolds [dot] com.

By 2010, women are likely to claim 45 per cent of the total workforce for the IT Industry in India. One of the reasons is the IT industry does not have an historic male orientated culture. More broadly, the risk is if we don’t re-address the balance–India/China will overtake as leaders in IT–we need to adapt or fall away.” –FTSE100 CIO