Compass Group CIO Fiona Humphreys video interview – Understanding customer behaviour with data at FTSE 100 company

Compass Group CIO Fiona Humphreys says that technology provides a wealth of insight to her company, the most important of which is how data can inform understanding of customer behaviour.

The 2018 CIO 100 member was speaking to CIO UK contributor Scott Carey at the 2018 CIO 100 celebration reception, which took place in at the five-star Mondrian Hotel on the South Bank in London. CIO for the UK and Ireland region of the FTSE 100 foodservice company, Humphreys was recognised by the panel for proactively growing her IT department’s skills where they needed them most and expertly allocating resources accordingly, as well as overseeing a cloud-based transformation of IT at Compass Group.

Humphreys discussed the immense value that technology, and particularly data, is providing Compass Group.

“We are the biggest food service business in the world,” she said. “But from a market perspective, we’re noticing that our business is trending towards retail, so from a technology point of view, that brings in quite a lot of opportunities around EPOS, self-serve, digital payments, loyalty.

“But the real opportunity is the data we can extract from all of those solutions, and really trying to understand more about our consumer and how we can then drive sales.”

She also noted the immense value that can be gained from gathering with peers to share insight across different markets and industries.

“It’s really important, this evening has been very very interesting,” Humphreys said. “I’ve really enjoyed the topics that have been discussed.

“We’re just so busy, and to get just a few minutes to stop and think about what we do and why we do it and what’s really driving that, and really interesting to hear about the cultural side of things and diversity this evening.

“I think that they’re things you’re intrinsically aware of but to bring them up into your conscience is really useful because it means I’ll go back into the office and start to think about some of those things.”

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