UK & Ireland CIO Executive Summit

As CIOs, providing strong, inclusive leadership means giving people on your team the safety and space they need to thrive. Vulnerable leadership can contribute to delivering the psychological safety required for high performing teams but can be difficult to put into practice. Join Daniele Fiandaca, Inclusion & Diversity Specialist at Token Man Consulting as he challenges our myths around vulnerability and explores what could be different if we (our culture, our workplaces and ourselves) saw vulnerability as courage rather than weakness. Specifically, Daniele will discuss:

• Why vulnerability sits at the heart of inclusive leadership
• How vulnerability can contribute to delivering the psychological safety required for high performing teams
• Practical ways to show vulnerability in the workplace and help provide the space needed to deliver an inclusive and diverse workplace

Today’s CIOs face lofty expectations and a changing set of skills necessary to be successful. They are expected to build healthy team cultures remotely, understand the nuances of inclusive leadership, manage high levels of ambiguity, and the list goes on. To meet this moment, how can technology leaders support their business and their people by developing successful teams at all levels? Join Ashling Cunningham, CIO at Irish Life as she shares her story, and recommendations, about how technology leaders can successfully lead teams through inclusivity and communication. Specifically, Ashling will share:

1. How fostering an inclusive mindset at Irish Life has contributed to successful transformation
2. How to gain key advantages with a one-team mindset when equipping employees for what comes next
3. Demonstrating the impact of your programs — on individuals, teams, and the organisation

For CIOs, current external forces are making it tough to prepare for success. This, coupled with a fast-moving technology landscape means that the CIO must wear more hats than ever before. What are best practices to navigate the complexities of an evolving tech landscape in times of ongoing uncertainty? This session empowers CIOs by exploring strategies to build resilience, enable digital business outcomes and power the workforce to boost productivity.

Join this session and conversation with your peers to discuss:

· Practical solutions for enhancing productivity

· How to adopt fast moving emerging technology for a competitive edge

· Secure strategies to drive resilience through IT

CIOs are defining and executing on IT strategies in an era of abundant data, innovative technologies, and an increasing need to deliver on ever complex business goals. As such, it’s never been more important to simplify the processes of delivering data to business users, ensuring greater productivity. What are the best techniques CIOs can use to drive efficiencies, remove data silos and drive more value to the business through data?

• Gaining buy-in from internal stakeholders on your data strategy
• Bringing enterprise data sources together into an easily managed data fabric to drive efficiencies
• Reducing complexities in an age of fast evolving technologies, driving a culture of data-informed decision making

It takes more than excellent ideas to secure funding for an IT automation project. To justify starting or expanding a project in today’s economy, you must demonstrate both current and future value, and how the project will support key business initiatives in service of your company’s goals. But with so many business priorities and objectives, how should CIOs decide which areas to automate for maximum business value? How can they better demonstrate that automation can yield significant impact and ROI, from both cost savings and revenue generation?

Join this boardroom to discuss:

• How to grow revenue by increasing your innovation velocity
• How to reduce costs to achieve operational efficiency at scale
• Using automation and AI to mitigate the risk of operational failure and poor customer experience

In 2024, the success of the modern enterprise increasingly hinges upon all things digital. This heralds the continued evolution of the CIO role, whose scope has needed to develop to be a representative that can successfully spearhead the digital enterprise. As such, the skills and traits of the prospective CIO have also shifted dramatically – and continue to do so.

The question for any aspiring CIO, then, should be which attributes are currently sought after? – and who better to ask than a CIO themself.

Join this session to gain insight on:

• Which qualities are currently in demand from organisations recruiting CIOs?
• What are the key traits organisations look out for while assessing candidates?
• How should you adapt your approach to meet the ever-shifting requirements of a CIOs?

Connect with like-minded peers in a one-on-one setting through Evanta’s Peer-to-Peer Meetings. You will be matched with peers in your community based on your shared interests and priorities.

Driving tech-enabled and insight-driven business outcomes varies drastically among organisations and it can be difficult for CIOs to know whether they are focusing on the right aspects of their strategy to accelerate digital business. The challenges faced span across multiple different areas — from providing data-driven insights and capabilities to demonstrating the impact digital strategy has on business outcomes. So how can IT Leaders get past the complexities of these challenges and utilise them to drive forward digital business initiatives? Join Craig Donald, CIO, The FA at as he shares his insights into how The FA are digitising participation in football across England, and radically transforming professional sport through their technology and data strategy. Specifically, Craig will share:

• How the FA are embracing the ever-changing digital landscape to enable the smooth running of football across England
• Communicating confidence to the business that digital strategy is aligned with wider organisational goals
• The learnings and recommendations for CIOs looking to make the most out of their technology and drive business collaboration and value

CIOs are currently managing expectations of business stakeholders who are excited – but also bewildered - at the promise of disruptive technologies like AI. From bringing artificial general intelligence closer, to a reality of delivering monumental change for humanity, was does AI mean for your business today? How are you communicating the opportunities and concerns across the enterprise when new techniques hit the headlines? What are the use cases to deploy in your organisation for maximum impact?

Join this session to discuss:

• The concerns and opportunities technologies like Generative AI hold for the organisation
• Adoption versus mitigation to key stakeholders
• The use cases that will ultimately drive value and ROI and value for the business

Digital business transformation combined with the increasing threat of cyberattacks creates unprecedented security risks. CIOs must balance cybersecurity with the need to run the business, but what are the best ways to enable risk-based decisions across the organisation whilst protecting against security threats and other cybersecurity events? Join this boardroom to discuss:

• Implementing a robust and defensible cybersecurity program that enhances overall business value
• Ensuring your cybersecurity strategy supports business resilience and growth while reducing risk
• Effective partnership across the business to drive cyber awareness

Connecting with your purpose, articulating your goals and creating your path forward as a leader can be hard. Future IT leaders must ensure they are acting as true business enablers, driving change across their teams and organisations. But how  can leaders drive this change in an effective and authentic way? What are the leadership attributes and team capabilities that are most critical to success? Join Judith van de Pas, Founder at Bloom Coaching & Consulting (and ex-CIO Community member), as she facilitates a space for you to reflect on how this relates to you in your development as adaptable change leaders and shares her insights research into:

• What the future IT Leader, and team, should look like
• How IT Leaders can drive effective culture change
• The leadership qualities and capabilities critical to success