CIO100: Russell Jones of ASB tops ‘power list’ of most innovative CIOs

Russell Jones of ASB is the top ranked ICT leader in the 2017 CIO100, the annual report on the most innovative CIOs, CTOs and CDOs in New Zealand.

Craig Bunyan of ANZ and Avi Golan of Air New Zealand took the second and third ranks respectively.

Who made it to the 2017 CIO100?

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Air New Zealand chief digital officer Avi Golan at the CIO100 forum in Auckland.

The CIO100 report was revealed at breakfast forums in Auckland and Wellington.

The forum also recognised the best ICT-enabled community programme, won this year by The Manukau Institute of Technology.

The award is for an organisation/ICT leader who has developed a technology-enabled initiative that helped address a community or social issue.

Edwina Mistry, industry and community engagement manager, faculty of business and information technology, received the award on behalf of MIT.

Edwina Mistry and Sam Sukumar from Manukau Institute of Technology receive the ICT-enabled community award at the CIO00 forum in Auckland.

Mistry nominated MIT’s two programmes: Shadow Tech, where school-age girls spend a day with ICT teams; and JHACK, which encourages young students to consider a career in ICT by introducing them to programming through an exciting format.

A panel of judges ranked the top 100 leaders and chose the finalists in the ICT-enabled community programme award.

Top three winners

Russell Jones says the key focus of his team is the ongoing transformation of technology as a business division which includes speeding up delivery, and future-proofing capabilities. These new capabilities have provided critical support for ASB’s digital journey as the high cadence delivery of unbeatable customer experiences is a base requirement for digital banking success, he says.

Jones is a member of the executive leadership team, reporting to the CEO. He contributes not only to technology related matters but also to strategy, governance and wider leadership discussions. A testament to his leadership capabilities is that the bank has handed him another challenge: he is now executive general manager – retail banking at ASB.

Craig Bunyan, general manager technology at ANZ says the ethos in his team is ‘learn fast and adapt’.

Over the past year, the technology team has worked hard to meet what business customers have asked for, which is to move ANZ “to a simpler, more agile bank”, he states. “In tandem, technology’s approach has improved products, processes and supporting systems across the board while managing risk and improving systems availability.”

“Transforming ANZ’s core systems has unlocked the ‘agility’ of the organisation,” says Bunyan.

Air New Zealand is one of the first companies in this country to recognise the importance of the Chief Digital Officer. It appointed Avi Golan to the the newly established executive position in early 2016. A year on in the role, he talks about how he and his team, working with business units and partners, are implementing the 2020 digital vision for Air New Zealand.

The success of the digital transformation has already resulted in improvements to business performance through our ability to respond and adapt to change, higher levels of experimentation and validation of ideas across the organisation and improved cross-functional collaboration, says Golan. “We are continually experimenting with disruptive technologies and looking to match these with needs in the market like using personalisation backed up with artificial intelligence.”

ICT in the community

Nurse Maude, nominated by Wayne Hutchinson, General Manager Information and Improvement, received the highly commended award for the ICT-enabled community programme.

Nurse Maude provides community based healthcare for the population of Canterbury and the West Coast. It has deployed the E-Medications Dispenser. This is a circular a circular device with 28 compartments for medications and one door that accesses one compartment at a time. The device is programmed to open at set times. At the correct time the internal cassette containing the medications rotates, an alarm sounds and the door opens allowing access to the medications in one compartment. The alarm does not stop until the device has been tipped up and the medications emptied from the cassette. The electronic medication management service has increased medication compliance, independence and dignity. It has reduced medication management service cost through reducing the number of physical visits by support workers but also contributing to the efficient utilisation of the health budget in Canterbury, says Hutchinson.

The other finalists for the award on best ICT-enabled community programme are:

• Airedale Property Trust
• Orion Health
• Stand for Children

The CIO100 was open to the most senior business technology executive in the organisation. These included CIOs, chief technology officers, chief digital officers and their equivalent roles, with responsibility for New Zealand companies and government agencies.

The nominees completed a questionnaire detailing how they are delivering change across the organisation, while focusing on three pillars: business transformation, innovation and leadership.

Avi Golan talks about Air New Zealand’s digital 20/20 vision at the CIO100 event in Auckland.