ANZ CIO out with appointment of new tech chief

ANZ has appointed Gerard Florian as group executive technology as part of its technology and operations management shake-up.

The appointment means current CIO, Scott Collary will leave the bank later this month.

Florian joins from Dimension Data where he was chief strategy officer for the global Cloud Business Unit. Previously he was CTO and chief marketing officer for Dimension Data’s Australian division.

In the newly created role Florian will be a member of the Group Executive Committee and report directly to CEO Shayne Elliott. He will be responsible for defining ANZ’s technology strategy and building and managing the group’s technology infrastructure, the company said.

His remit will include the development of new technologies to support improved customer outcomes and business revenues, implementing existing technologies to further strategic goals, and the creation of systems and processes to make optimum use of current technology resources, ANZ said in an announcement this morning.

Move fast, safely

Florian said the technology challenges facing banks were similar to the ones facing many other companies.

“I think in simple terms it’s ‘how do we move fast, safely?’”, he said. “Particularly in the financial services space that safely piece is important. Compliance, regulation, customer trust is pretty fundamental.

“Our competitors in financial services are all moving quite quickly and we need to move faster than them if we are going to win.”

Florian, who starts at the end of January next year and will be based in Sydney, added that cloud will play an increasingly large role in the way the bank operates.

“I think it’s very important to keep a clear understanding of what our customers need and then look at the technology, look at the expectations of the regulators, while combining all of those pieces and continuously looking for ways in which we can provide innovative services to our customers.”

ANZ Chief Executive Officer Shayne Elliott said: “Gerard’s appointment together with the appointment of Maile Carnegie as Group Executive Digital Banking earlier this year, highlights the critical importance of technology to transforming ANZ to compete effectively in the digital age.

“Increasingly technology is redefining our business and our relationship with customers. Gerard’s leadership skills and his background in technology including cloud computing make him ideally suited to oversee the strategic shift that we need to make.”

Collary to depart

Having previously reported to chief operating officer Alistair Currie, Collary had been reporting directly to Elliott following the announcement of Currie’s departure in September.

Collary joined the bankas CIO in 2014, seven months after the departure of Anne Weatherston.

In that time, Collary has collaborated closely with executives to simplify frameworks, methods and governance to deliver smaller projects more frequently and increase the number of projects delivered using Agile methodologies.

ANZ’s Banker Desktop, an integrated platform that is used to facilitate and capture a ‘needs-based conversation’ about a customer’s financial situation, was built using an Agile methodology. That approach was also applied to the bank’s adoption of Apply Pay, which was launched earlier this year.

Collary has also overseen a company-wide Windows 10 deployment and established an ‘internal app store’ for employees. He also facilitated the bank’s open approach to its technology, developing tooling and techniques to make it easier to connect to its legacy systems, and building APIs on the assumption they may be released externally.

CEO Elliott paid tribute to the American, saying: “Scott has made a very strong contribution since he joined us in 2014. He has established great working relationships between technology and our businesses, continued to strengthen reliability and efficiency of ANZ’s systems, and built a cohesive team and culture within technology.”