2022 Highlights for Australia CIO & CISO Communities

Over the course of this year, CIOs and CISOs in Evanta’s communities in Australia came together to discuss mission critical priorities for IT and security leaders. For some, 2022 was the first time they could get together in person since 2019! 

At two Executive Summits, four Inner Circle Dinners, and seven virtual gatherings, CIOs and CISOs exchanged experiences and shared ideas on issues ranging from cybersecurity strategies to cost and resource optimisation. Here is sample of what they said about the community gatherings:

Great opportunity to connect with the CIO/CISO community, make new connections and share perspectives.”

– Angela Donohoe
CIO, BPAY

Awesome experience… friendly people, insightful speeches and presentations, and relevant topics covered during the sessions.”

– Jilbert Seng
Information Security and Compliance Manager, Hudson Australia

It was a great opportunity to get together with peers to discuss relevant topics. Good to hear how other industries are approaching topics and where they are on their journey.”

– Mike Wood
Chief Information Officer, Insurance Business, Suncorp Group

CIO & CISO Top Priorities

Results from our annual Leadership Perspective Survey helped to shape the agendas and topics throughout our gatherings in 2022. CIO and CISO community members' top priorities were:

• Cybersecurity Strategies
• Digital Business Priorities
• Data & Analytics
• Cost/Resource Optimization
• IT Strategy, Governance & Operating Models
   

Highly-Rated Presentations

Over the year, CIOs and CISOs from Evanta’s Australian communities saw great value in these popular sessions:

Keynote: Adopting a Growth Mindset and Boosting Resilience
In this session, Daniel Bull, a three-time world record-breaking adventurer, delivered a powerful keynote, sharing insights and lessons learnt from his expeditions – from Everest to Antarctica and beyond. Bull shared how anyone can defy limits, grasp opportunities, and conquer their own mountains – in work and in life.

Keynote: Why Many CIOs are Prioritising Security Management
In this session, Daniel Evans, Chief Information Officer at Rio Tinto Australia, discussed his incredible journey from a security leader to a CIO. Evans shared his insights on the changing role of the security leader from a gatekeeper to a strategic enabler, and how organisations can develop an effective governance structure by strengthening the CIO and CISO relationship.

Keynote: Securing Digital Business Transformation Starts With Zero
In this session, Heng Mok, CISO, APJ at Zscaler, shared strategies for accelerating transformation with innovative security services and communicating their value to the business. Mok discussed how organisations can scale and simplify security – minimising risk and gaining agility. Mok also shared how organisations can effectively protect today's cloud-first, hybrid workforce with a proactive, intelligent, and radically simple security architecture. 

Keynote: Cloud Strategy & Governance at Bendigo: How to Upskill Key IT Talent to Combat Talent Shortages
In this session, Andrew Cresp, CIO at Bendigo & Adelaide Bank, discussed how organisations can broaden their skill and opportunity lens to embrace diversity, focusing on reskilling and upskilling – beyond just the tech and engineering spheres. Cresp shared how Bendigo & Adelaide Bank effectively applied the democratisation of learning through the pandemic to fast-track learning around the cloud, DevOps, and APIs, as well as how they utilised their IBL program to widen talent pathways. 

Highly-Rated Town Hall Gatherings

Evanta also hosted virtual gatherings for the CIO and CISO communities. Here are some of the most popular sessions:

Melbourne CIO & CISO Virtual Town Hall: Leveraging the True Value of the Cloud to Drive Innovation
In this session, Sumner Lemon, Regional Director of Digital Transformation and Enterprise Sales APJ Territory at Intel, moderated a conversation with David English, CIO at Peninsula Health, Justin Davies, CIO at Ovato and Vijay Narayan, CISO of EPA Victoria. Lemon, English, Davies and Narayan discussed how the strategic choices made by IT leaders – regarding managing costs and advanced technologies, such as edge computing, AI, and big data – will be key enablers of competitive differentiation as the business innovation strategy evolves into the cloud. 

Melbourne CIO & CISO Virtual Town Hall: How to Evolve Your Identity Platform for the Workforce of the Future
In this session, Brett Winterford, Regional Chief Security Officer, APJ at Okta, moderated a conversation with Mary-Beth Hosking, Global CIO at Pointsbet, Jeremy Bree, CIO at Henley Properties, Mark Burns, CISO at Element Fleet Management Australia, and Gsen Chen, Information Security Officer at Village Roadshow. They discussed how organisations can evolve their IAM deployments to ensure protection against increasing threats, as well as how to integrate IAM initiatives with established business processes and policies that enable the business to be more agile, responsive, and customer-driven. 

Sydney CIO & CISO Virtual Town Hall: The Future of Email Security
In this session, Tim Bentley, Regional Director APAC at Abnormal Security, moderated a conversation with Scott Brown, Deputy CISO at Rio Tinto Australia, Abu Barkat ullah, Associate Professor in Cyber Security at University of Canberra, and Derek Chen, Head of IT Security & Governance at Toll Group. They discussed how organisations can leverage advanced behavioural science and automation for informed and near-instantaneous decision-making on what is good and what is bad email. This covered how organisations can protect their users from the full spectrum of targeted email attacks, as well as account takeover techniques and measures that can be taken to help protect against them. 
 

Most Popular Content

Here is a sample of what CIOs and CISOs in Australian communities were reading and listening to this year.

• What Does Community Mean to You? In this blog, we were reflecting on the concept of  community and creating a feeling of fellowship back when we couldn’t connect in person. We wrote about the need to “calibrate, adjust, and pivot” to deliver the power of community during uncertain times.
• Top 10 Trends for CIOs in Australia. In this blog post, we took a closer look at the business and investment priorities of our Australia CIO community members, including in Melbourne and Sydney.
• 2022 CIO Leadership Perspectives. This infographic highlighted what CIOs said were their most important priorities across their function and the business in 2022.
• 2022 CISO Leadership Perspectives. Similarly, this infographic focused on the top functional and business for CISOs in 2022.
• 3 Areas of Focus for C-Suite Leaders in 2022. This blog highlighted the top 3 business priorities across C-suite roles for 2022. 
• How Should C-level Executives Influence the Enterprise? In our 2022 podcast series, CHRO Janice Deskus of Staples discussed how to earn and keep a seat at the decision-making table. 

What’s in Store for 2023?

What’s next for executives in our Australian CIO and CISO communities? There are 5 upcoming gatherings to add to your calendar now: 

• Sydney CIO & CISO Inner Circle – 22 March 2023
• Melbourne CIO & CISO Inner Circle - 17 August 2023
• Sydney CIO & CISO Inner Circle – 6 September 2023
• Sydney CIO & CISO Executive Summit – 2 November 2023
• Melbourne CIO & CISO Executive Summit - 16 November 2023

Stay tuned for more information and the top 2023 priorities for CIOs and CISOs across Evanta communities.