Will Dalton
Vice President, Chief Information Officer
ATCO
Will Dalton is the Vice President and Chief Information Officer for ATCO. With approximately 7,100 employees and assets of $24 billion, ATCO is a diversified global corporation with investments in essential services that include Structures & Logistics, Utilities (electricity and natural gas transmission and distribution, and international electricity operations), Energy Infrastructure, Retail Energy, Transportation, and Commercial Real Estate.
In his role, Will leads the business relationship management, architecture, operations, long-range planning and strategy, PMO and organizational change management functions for the IT organization. Prior to this role, Will was the global CISO for HSBC Private Bank and CISO for Husky Energy, an integrated Canadian Oil and Gas company.
He is a member of the Conference Board of Canada Council of Chief Information Officer’s governing body, and an active participant with the Canadian CIO community. He also provides his strategic guidance to numerous steering committees and has served on boards and board subcommittees.
Learn more about the Calgary CIO community here.
Give us a brief overview of the path that led to your current role.
My father was in finance, and growing up I was always interested in the world of banking and curious about how Information Technology enabled it. I obtained a bachelor’s degree at the University of British Columbia and then enrolled in the British Columbia Institute of Technology.
After 19 years in banking, a new opportunity in a different industry presented itself which allowed me to apply my cyber experience in banking to the oil and gas industry. I joined Husky Energy as Chief Information Security Officer and Director of their CIO Office. After three years with Husky, I moved to my current CIO role with ATCO which has been both challenging and very rewarding.
What is one of your guiding leadership principles?
Integrity and agility are foundational and guide a strong work ethic and dedication. They are my personal compass points for the direction on how we accomplish our work, but also in how we treat each other. Inclusion and diversity are what make us powerful and successful in our pursuit of excellence.
With disruption being a key theme of the past few years, where do you see your role as a CIO going in the next 1-2 years?
Disruption requires us to be quick with our solutioning and decisive with our actions. Technology evolution now doesn’t offer the luxury of ‘wait-and-see'. The role of the CIO is becoming more complex as functionality becomes easier and as cybersecurity risk increases.
For me, the CIO role is more about people rather than the technology itself. Ensuring that our relationships with partners and vendors always result in a win-win, and placing a heightened awareness on our top talent has elevated our business and we see it in our results. Surrounding yourself with great people and creating a healthy corporate culture is where the true value lies.
What advice would you give to someone just starting out in the role as a CIO?
Take time to build relationships with your internal customers; senior executives, leaders, and teams across the organization. It is integral to understanding the company’s strategy and the positive impact technology can play to support it.
Tell us a fun fact about yourself.
I fancy myself to be an outdoors person. I have an older camper van that my family and I use to explore new places and spend time in nature. We spend a lot of time in Whistler, skiing in the winter and hiking in the summer, in addition to weekends in the Rocky Mountains.
What is the value of joining an Evanta community?
With the rate at which technology is changing, it is essential to have a strong network to share your operational experiences and learnings. Evanta offers a community to share and discover what others are experiencing in their environments and explore how their strategies are evolving. The CIO role is a busy one in this current landscape, so sharing advice and solutions provides more confidence as we predict the unknowns.
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