BT appoints first Chief Information Officer for Scotland

Simon Haston joins from Aberdeen City Council as BT further strengthens its major corporate and public sector business

BT has appointed a Chief Information Officer for Scotland to work with its major corporate and public sector customers. Simon Haston joins BT from Aberdeen City Council, where he was head of IT and transformation.

He’ll liaise directly with the CIOs of BT’s customers, helping to create a long-term shared plan for how technology and innovation can enable their strategy and objectives and improve their operations.

Simon will be the ‘voice of the customer’ within BT, working with its business development, commercial and technology teams to make sure BT’s propositions and solutions meet customers’ current and future digital needs.

It follows the appointment last year of David Wallace as director of BT’s public service business in Scotland and a shift to a more devolved approach to the Scottish market that has also seen investment in seven new sales account managers in recent weeks.

Simon said: “This new role provides an opportunity to use BT’s immense capabilities, experience and skills to drive transformation throughout the Scottish public sector.

“To me it’s very much about getting a deep insight into what the Scottish public sector needs to meet its considerable challenges and then shaping how BT can help organisations on this exciting journey.”

David said: “Over the last 12 months we’ve been transforming our structure and building a new team with the expertise to meet the changing needs of our corporate and public sector customers in Scotland.

“Bringing an industry heavyweight like Simon into our business is a feather in our cap. He knows the market inside-out, and in particular the political, economic and technological challenges faced by our colleagues in the public sector.

“He brings an incisive, visionary and creative approach to how we can help the public sector deal with digital change and use technology most effectively.”

Simon will report to BT Business and Public Sector’s CIO for the UK and Ireland, Phil Brunkard, but will work closely with David and his expanded team to develop a shared technology vision in conjunction with customers.

Phil concluded: “We’re very pleased Simon is joining us to further strengthen our CIO level engagement with our customers. As CIOs we focus on mapping how technology and innovations can meet our customers’ requirements and transformational needs, to make sure BT develops the right solutions to achieve this.”

A graduate of the University of London, Simon has more than 15 years’ experience in change and transformation programmes, particularly in digital and IT solutions. Previous roles with Scotland Excel, The Improvement Service and the City of Edinburgh Council have seen him lead complex, multi-agency digital change programmes across the public sector.