In-Person

Vancouver, BC CISO Community

Executive Summit

October 29, 2026 | Vancouver Marriott Pinnacle Downtown

October 29, 2026
Vancouver Marriott Pinnacle Downtown

Join fellow CISOs for a day of peer connections, peer perspectives and Gartner insights

The Gartner Vancouver, BC CISO Community Executive Summit is the community’s signature event, bringing together CISOs for a full day of immersive, peer-driven discussions and curated networking. Connect with peers who share similar priorities, exchange real-world experiences and gain data-driven insights from Gartner analysts. Walk away with practical solutions, validated strategies and valuable connections, giving you greater confidence to lead through change.

Participate in discussions on the most critical issues impacting CISOs today:

Building an AI-Driven Enterprise Through Governance, Innovation and Responsible Adoption

Leveraging Data, Analytics and Cost Optimization to Accelerate Business Value

Elevating Cybersecurity and Risk Management as Drivers of Trust, Resilience and Growth

Vancouver, BC CISO Governing Body

The Governing Body Co-Chairs shape the summit agenda, ensuring that all content is driven By CISOs, For CISOs®.

Governing Body Co-Chairs

Rob Antonishen

BC Hydro
Director, Cyber Security & Compliance

Mark Basco

Adentra Group
Director, IT & Cybersecurity

Wyman Chin

Pacific Blue Cross
SVP & CIO

Rob Davidson

Pacific Blue Cross
CISO

Biying He

TransLink
Director, Cybersecurity, Resilience & Information Management

Leung Man

Insurance Corporation of British Columbia
Senior Manager, Information Risk Management

Greg Sieg

Ledcor
SVP & CIO

What to Expect at an Executive Summit

Gain New Perspectives from Peers

Hear from CISO practitioners and thought leaders on how they're solving critical challenges impacting your role in Keynote sessions, and participate in smaller, interactive discussions with your peers in Breakout and Boardroom sessions.

Strengthen Your Peer Network

Catch up with familiar faces and build new relationships in your Vancouver, BC CISO Community through dedicated networking time in an intimate environment and curated, one-on-one conversations with peers matched based on shared priorities and interests.

Leverage Gartner Insights

Gain data-driven insights and field-tested best practices from a Gartner analyst in the opening Keynote, setting the context for peer conversations throughout the day on the most critical topics affecting your role.

Agenda

October 29, 2026

8:00am - 8:30am  Registration & Breakfast

8:30am - 9:15am  Gartner Keynote

CEO Watch 2027 — The Year of Strategic Freedom

David Furlonger headshot

David Furlonger

Distinguished VP Analyst

Gartner

80% of CEOs say technology is not a function that supports strategy. It is the strategy. As leadership boundaries continue to blur, CIOs and CISOs face a potentially career defining moment - to grasp new leadership space to direct enterprise growth, or face role diminishment. The greater risk may not be disruption itself, but allowing others to define the enterprise agenda. The question is: who will lead that transformation if not you?  

Join this Keynote to learn more about: 

  • Reframing strategic freedom as a source of competitive advantage 
  • Leveraging AI and operating model change to accelerate business outcomes 
  • Expanding technology and security leadership into enterprise transformation

9:15am - 9:40am  Networking Break

9:40am - 10:25am  Breakout Session

From Tinkerers to Transformation — Scaling Agentic Development

Jordan Willms headshot

Jordan Willms

VP Technology

Finning

As organizations move beyond experimentation with agentic AI, many are facing a critical challenge: how to scale innovation while maintaining governance, security and architectural integrity. This session explores how enterprises can build a structured approach to agentic development that accelerates delivery, increases business agility and drives sustainable adoption across the organization.

Join this session to learn:

  • Establishing a governance-first framework for secure, scalable agentic AI development
  • Accelerating innovation and shortening delivery timelines while maintaining enterprise standards
  • Driving workforce transformation, leadership alignment and successful AI adoption at scale


9:40am - 10:25am  Executive Boardroom

Recovery as a Compensating Control — Defending the Undefendable

Mark Bentkower headshot

Mark Bentkower

Principal Technologist

Veeam

Trevor Verbeke headshot

Trevor Verbeke

Div Mgr Infrastructure & Cyber Security (CISO)

Metro Vancouver

Leung Man headshot

Leung Man

Senior Manager, Information Risk Management

Insurance Corporation of British Columbia

When legacy systems can’t be patched, recovery becomes a key compensating control. IT and security leaders rely on recovery documentation to support organizational resilience, risk management, and business continuity. This session covers how immutable backups and traceable recovery records withstand regulatory and legal scrutiny after incidents and how forensic and threat intelligence data can turn reactive recovery into a documented, risk-based decision.

Join this session to learn:

  • How recovery and immutable backups protect unpatched legacy systems
  • Building recovery records for regulatory and legal review
  • Using forensic and threat intelligence to justify response decisions


9:40am - 10:25am  Executive Boardroom

Unlocking Canada’s AI Advantage

Gráinne McElroy headshot

Gráinne McElroy

CIO, Faculty of Medicine

University of British Columbia

Hakan Kutluay headshot

Hakan Kutluay

Head of Global Technology

Centerra Gold

Canada has the research, talent and ambition but the real test is whether businesses can adopt AI confidently and turn AI strategy into real benefits for Canadians. With the right approach, organizations have a unique opportunity to turn AI leadership into business value through secure, connected and practical AI powered solutions, bringing greater control, trust and efficiency to where work gets done.

Join this session to discuss:

  • Bringing AI closer to where business happens with edge solutions
  • Overcoming cloud cost and complexity with distributed AI strategies
  • Democratizing AI to empower businesses of every size and sector

10:25am - 11:10am  Networking Break

10:35am - 11:00am  Peer-to-Peer Meetings

Peer-to-Peer Meetings

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

11:10am - 11:55am  Breakout Session

From Noise to Proof — Reinventing Vulnerability Management

Ellen Sundra headshot

Ellen Sundra

VP, Customers

Horizon3.ai

Most security programs measure effort — not outcomes. CISOs patch thousands of vulnerabilities and deploy countless tools, yet real resilience depends on proving defenses actually work. Organizations are shifting from assumptions to evidence using autonomous pentesting to view environments through an attacker’s lens.

Join this session to come away with insights on:

  • Prioritizing real attack paths and exploitable vulnerabilities
  • Closing the find, fix, verify loop with measurable improvement
  • Reducing attacker dwell time with offense informed detection

11:10am - 11:55am  Executive Boardroom

Enabling an AI-Fluent Workforce

Brian Stewart headshot

Brian Stewart

CIO

Simon Fraser University

Hardeep Mehrotara headshot

Hardeep Mehrotara

VP, Cyber Security

QuadReal Property Group

As AI transforms the enterprise, success depends on an AI-fluent workforce so they can thrive alongside AI. CIOs must foster a culture of hands-on upskilling, psychological safety, and open communication.

Join this boardroom to discuss:

  • Build scalable AI upskilling and experiential learning
  • Encourage psychological safety and knowledge sharing
  • Redesign roles for human-AI collaboration

11:10am - 11:55am  Executive Boardroom

Data Sovereignty — Achieving Compliance without Complexity

Steve Goldsmith headshot

Steve Goldsmith

Vice President of Product Management, Application Performance

Cloudflare

Larry Carson headshot

Larry Carson

CISO

University of British Columbia

Lia Sana headshot

Lia Sana

Director- Information Security and Data Stewardship

Fraser Health Authority

Data sovereignty presents serious challenges for any company that wants to do business globally. The good news is that adhering to data sovereignty and data localization requirements does not require massive investment or curtailed expansion. With the right strategy, CIOs and CISOs can securely store and process data in each of the countries where they are doing business without adding excessive costs or complexity.

Join this session to discuss:

  • Developing governance frameworks for cross-border data management
  • Leveraging cloud and technology partners to control costs
  • Anticipating future regulatory shifts and preparing adaptive strategies

11:55am - 12:30pm  Lunch Service

12:30pm - 1:05pm  Keynote

Building an AI-Driven Enterprise Through Governance

Lavina Pinto headshot

Lavina Pinto

SVP, IT, Business Apps

Palo Alto Networks, Inc.

This session explores how to build an AI-driven enterprise through continuous innovation and responsible adoption. Attendees will discover actionable strategies to navigate AI non-determinism, reshape team topologies, and effectively operationalize AI-native engineering organizations at scale to thrive amid technological disruption.

Join this session to learn more about:

  • Redesigning operating models to support AI-enabled execution and decision governance
  • Implementing robust enterprise architecture for responsible AI scaling
  • Operationalizing AI-native engineering teams to drive cross-functional alignment

1:05pm - 1:30pm  Break

1:30pm - 2:15pm  Breakout Session

Staying Ahead of AI Data Risks

Karthik Krishnan headshot

Karthik Krishnan

CEO

Concentric AI

AI is quickly becoming one of the biggest drivers of enterprise productivity—and one of the fastest-growing sources of data security risk. As copilots, assistants, and public AI tools become embedded in daily workflows, sensitive data flows into systems that most security teams can't fully see, understand, or control. To stay ahead, organizations must rethink their security strategies and harness AI’s potential to protect what matters most. 

Join this session to discover: 

  • Why AI is a rapidly growing, unseen enterprise risk  
  • Where legacy data security falls short with AI  
  • How to enable AI innovation without added data exposure 

1:30pm - 2:15pm  Executive Boardroom

Restoring Transparency and Trust in AI‑Driven Systems

Michael Taylor headshot

Michael Taylor

RVP Solutions Engineering

Dynatrace

Sid Arya headshot

Sid Arya

Director, Enterprise Analytics & AI

West Fraser

Swapna Tembhekar headshot

Swapna Tembhekar

Director, IT Planning and Governance

City of Burnaby

As enterprises shift from human‑driven to human‑supervised operations, AI has introduced new forms of complexity that traditional monitoring can’t explain. The challenge is no longer whether systems are up, but whether leaders can clearly understand how decisions are made, where risk accumulates and why performance or cost changes in unexpected ways.

Join this session to discuss:

  • Where visibility breaks down in AI‑driven, hybrid and multi‑cloud environments
  • Why “nothing is down” no longer means systems are operating as intended
  • How CIOs re-establish transparency and trust as autonomous actions scale

1:30pm - 2:15pm  Executive Boardroom

Beyond Protection — The ROI of Converged Physical and Cybersecurity

Jon Farkas headshot

Jon Farkas

Field Chief Technology Officer

Verkada

Rob Antonishen headshot

Rob Antonishen

Director, Cyber Security & Compliance

BC Hydro

Duane Benetar headshot

Duane Benetar

Director, Cyber Security Operations

FortisBC

As physical and cyber threats increasingly converge, organizations must adopt a modern approach to enterprise risk. Historically, cybersecurity and physical security operated in silos, even though physical security incidents can directly lead to cyber events. Leaders can align security functions, support compliance requirements, and articulate clear ROI to executive leadership.

Join this session to explore:

  • Evolving security strategies to remove barriers between physical and digital worlds
  • How integrated controls support compliance readiness and strengthen risk management
  • Ways to transform security investments into measurable business value and ROI


2:15pm - 3:00pm  Networking Break

2:25pm - 2:50pm  Peer-to-Peer Meetings

Peer-to-Peer Meetings

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

3:00pm - 3:45pm  Breakout Session

Mind the Gaps — Accelerating Growth with Cyber Transformation

Sam Shaabani headshot

Sam Shaabani

Senior Manager, Cyber Security & Architecture

Seaspan Corp

Garret Wong headshot

Garret Wong

VP, IT

Seaspan Corp

As organizations expand, cyber risk becomes increasingly interconnected across business functions, operations, vendors, and technology. At Seaspan, security and technology leaders elevated cybersecurity to a strategic business partner. That enabled teams to align priorities, build resilience, and address the crucial question: What are we missing? 

Join this breakout session to learn more about:

  • Applying a digital risk management lens to growth
  • Building influence through effective communication and accountability
  • Establishing governance frameworks that uncover gaps and strengthen organizational resilience

3:00pm - 3:45pm  Gartner Boardroom

IT's 2030 Identity Crisis

Brian Baker headshot

Brian Baker

Executive Partner

Gartner

Kurt Pregler headshot

Kurt Pregler

CIO

TransLink

Matthew Grunert headshot

Matthew Grunert

Chief Technology Officer

AutoCanada

As leaders rethink how technology organizations create value, the operating models that worked in the past are becoming less effective. CIOs and CISOs face critical decisions about how IT and security should evolve to meet the demands of 2030. As new archetypes emerge and strategic planning priorities take shape, many are asking a vital question — Who will we be in 2030?

Join this session to discuss:

  • Reimagining operating model archetypes for 2030
  • Aligning strategy investments and organizational design
  • Positioning IT and security for future business impact 

3:00pm - 3:45pm  Executive Boardroom

Rolling Past Pilot Purgatory

Wyman Chin headshot

Wyman Chin

SVP & CIO

Pacific Blue Cross

James Tan headshot

James Tan

VP & CIO

BC Ferries

AI is no longer a side quest, yet many organizations remain trapped in AI pilot purgatory. As CIOs and CISOs navigate governance, security and business growth, IT must serve as the proving ground for the use cases, guardrails and operating models needed to scale AI. Change management is the critical roll between experimentation and enterprise value.

Join this adventure to gain XP in:

  • Designing guardrails that enable innovation
  • Defining operating models for AI adoption
  • Applying lessons that move pilots to scale

3:45pm - 4:00pm  Networking Break

4:00pm - 4:35pm  Keynote

The Power Pair — How CEOs and CIOs Drive Transformation Together

Patrick Davis headshot

Patrick Davis

CEO

BCLC

Mark Goldberg headshot

Mark Goldberg

CIO

BCLC

Dharmesh Gandhi headshot

Dharmesh Gandhi

CIO

BC Hydro

The strongest transformations begin with aligned leadership. At BCLC, CEO Pat Davis and CIO Mark Goldberg have a partnership that has improved prioritization, strengthened board communication, and enabled successful enterprise-wide transformations across cybersecurity, data, AI and customer experience.

Join this fireside chat to learn more about:

  • Aligning technology strategy with business priorities and outcomes
  • Driving faster decisions through clear executive ownership and focus
  • Building the change management capabilities needed for lasting transformation

4:35pm - 4:45pm  Closing Comments and Prize Drawing

October 29, 2026

We look forward to seeing you at an upcoming in-person gathering

Gartner cares about the health and safety of our community. If you are feeling unwell, please refrain from attending the conference. At this time, Gartner does not have any health-related requirements in place for attendance. Should this change, we will follow up with updated guidance.

Location

A block of rooms has been reserved at the Vancouver Marriott Pinnacle Downtown at a reduced conference rate. Reservations should be made online or by calling 604-684-1128. Please mention Vancouver Executive Summit to ensure the appropriate room rate.

Deadline to book using the discounted room rate of $409 CAD (plus tax) is September 29, 2026.

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Community Program Manager

For inquiries related to this community, please reach out to your dedicated contact.

Heather Bosillo

Community Program Manager

heather.bosillo@gartner.com