MOST DISRUPTIVE TECH OR DIGITAL LEADER
The European Finals event takes place in just 9 days, and so the countdown is officially on! Today, we are going to be focusing on our second of five categories – ‘Most Disruptive Tech or Digital Leader’. Here we’ll take a sneak peek at each of the individuals that have been successfully shortlisted to attend the finals event taking place on Thursday 7th December at the Museum of London.
Next week on Thursday we will be welcoming three very different, yet innovative, game-changing leaders who have achieved amazing results through introducing disruptive and unique approaches to their firm’s tech and digital strategy. The following three finalists will be competing for the award, as well as the prize of a once in a lifetime, all expenses paid trip to Silicon Valley to tour some of the most influential tech companies in the world and meet Apple Co-founder, Steve Wozniak, for a private lunch.
So, let’s take a closer look at each of our finalists for the ‘Most Disruptive Tech or Digital Leader’ category…
- Richard Corbridge
Richard is a leader in the digital healthcare arena with 20 years’ experience. He has a passion for business change and benefits management and insists on a focus on engagement and highlighting benefits brought to every technology implementation he has responsibility for. In the last 3 years, he has been responsible for digital in health in Ireland, and before that was responsible for digital making a change to how clinical research is conducted in the UK.
When asked what made him come forward and apply to the awards, Richard said: “It felt like a way to put the talent that is in public sector and in particular healthcare, on the map. The public sector if often seen as less disruptive than commercial environments when it comes to the digital revolution but it’s time to shout from the roof tops that without digital, healthcare globally will not be able to deliver for mankind. Digital allows the health systems of the world to move from a ‘Fixing Service’ to a real healthcare service. Talent Unleashed is the opportunity to mark this and is an opportunity to learn from others and share with others what can be done.”
For Richard, winning the award would not only mean a lot to him, but to the healthcare sector as a whole: “To be described as the most disruptive digital leader will enable healthcare to be represented at the ‘table’ of digital disruption. I believe that the human part of digital disruption needs to be recognised and I want to be able to describe the role of the disruptive digital leader as one that puts the change to life first and the technology second. I want to be able to describe how digital leaders need to come together to share stories and experiences, to enable digital to be a catalyst for change for everyone and that it’s no longer a toy of the technological aware. Disruption is when we truly move from simple substitution through a new ability to augment and modify and actually get to the point of redefinition, and the award to me will recognise this talent and allow it to be unleashed through sharing stories with a wider audience.”
- Christopher Deery
Chris has been the Head of ICT at Solihull Community Housing since 2006. In 2008, he began exploring how IT could improve the life chances of tenants in social housing and received a national Award for digital inclusion in 2009. In 2015, he then won the “Social Impact of the Year” award from the Chartered Institute of Housing. As well as this, his team also won the Housing Heroes award for Central Services Team of the Year in 2016.
Commenting on the awards, Chris said: “I think sometimes people have a view that innovation always comes from the private sector and that the public sector and the 3rd sector are risk averse and slow to implement new ideas. I wanted to demonstrate that the public sector can be innovative and I also hoped that by generating some positive publicity around the rental exchange scheme, I could encourage private landlords to help tenants get a fairer treatment from credit checking agencies.
“Currently the rental exchange scheme that I championed has helped over 800,000 tenants in social housing save money and get fairer access to high street lenders. But there are over 4 million people in social housing in the UK so if this award can generate some positive publicity for this scheme, it may encourage other landlords to get involved and we may be able to help all tenants in social housing.”
- Fin Goulding
Fin is Aviva’s International CIO based in Ireland and is responsible for IT across several countries. He loves change, transformation and innovation in equal measures and is not frightened to experiment or challenge the status quo. Fin’s remit is to disrupt Aviva by modernising its Museum of Technology and introducing DevOps, continuous deployment & the next generation of Agile based on flow principles. Fin claims to be a failed punk guitarist that became a technician because he wasn’t a very good musician!
Talking about the awards last week, Fin said: “I was shocked and also really pleased to have been identified as a potential candidate for the Talent Unleashed Awards, as I had always assumed that Talent meant a much younger generation. And then I thought about it and realized that I’m still ambitious, constantly learning and love sharing my experience with others – so why not go forward. I see that I’ve been described as “seasoned pro”, which I think is a good thing.
“Winning any award is heartening and a vindication for all the work that one does in one’s career. However, as a disruptive tech/digital leader, you constantly take risks, push the boundaries of normality, embrace change and are always just one step from being fired. So being recognized as that type of person would be an excellent achievement.”
For more information about the awards and for a full list of the EMEA finalists, visit www.talentunleashedawards.co.uk