IT Professional of the Year

Chris Berry, Royal Bank of Scotland

Compliance is a huge issue for the financial sector, and the Basel 2 Accord, recently incorporated into EU law, fundamentally changed the way Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) had to calculate and report capital.

This required major transformation of the company’s core transaction and financial systems, as well as to risk management, rating and modelling systems.

Berry led RBS’s programme to establish a core systems infrastructure for Basel 2, successfully delivering an end-to-end architecture across the bank while meeting complex regulatory requirements within a set timescale. Berry led from the front, acting as a passionate advocate for the programme, communicating effectively at all levels to remove obstacles, resolve issues and build a strong team.

Paul Briddock RBT (Connect)

RBT (Connect) is a partnership between Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council and BT, launched in 2003 to help transform the council into a modern, customer-focused organisation. Key to this was making the best use of cutting-edge IT.

Briddock was appointed head of information systems 18 months ago, and has brought the necessary blend of technical know-how and a strong customer-service ethos.

He has played a major role in convincing council staff of the benefits of new technology to themselves and the citizens of Rotherham, as well as implementing many cutting-edge projects. These include Rotherham Connect, a one-stop contact centre dealing with calls from the public 12 hours a day, five days a week.

Tom Cadman, Crimson Systems

Cadman, of IT services company Crimson Systems, managed a successful project with insurance services provider Charles Taylor Consulting (CTC) to replace CTC’s protection and indemnity mutual insurance system with a web-based .Net application deployed to offices on three continents and integrated with core systems.

The bulk of the work was offshored to Mastek in India, which required hands-on specialist management. Gary Willis, IT director at CTC, says Cadman was the perfect project manager, fitting into the team from day one and quickly forging positive relationships with individuals and teams at all levels.

‘He is able to make a contribution in all areas, driving out solutions to business and technical problems that others have been unable to achieve,’ says Willis.

Tim Needham, West Midlands Fire Service

Needham, senior systems developer of the West Midlands Fire Service, delivered his groundbreaking vision for an Integrated Risk Management Information System (Irmis) in May 2005. In its first year the system captured the details of more than 60,000 varied activities from 1,500 employees in richer detail than ever before, enabling the brigade to work more productively.

Needham has also consistently demonstrated an ability to use his technical talent to meet business objectives – the quality of the user interface he developed for Irmis dramatically reduced the need for user training.

Needham is also singled out for softer skills, including the ability to convey his ideas in a way that captures the imagination and inspires the organisation.

Jay Saw, T-Mobile

Saw is T-Mobile’s WiFi hotspot manager and has been responsible for rolling out T-Mobile hotspots to more than 1,000 locations.

He was also behind the launch of the first genuine broadband WiFi service on a passenger train, Southern Rail’s London-to-Brighton service. Saw was the driving force behind the project, co-ordinating staff from T-Mobile, Southern Trains and technology supplier Nomad and adopting a very hands-on approach.

He placed emphasis on an open communication process, crucial to understanding day-to-day issues affecting the project, and nipping any problems in the bud.

Without Saw’s vision and determination, it is unlikely that such a complex project would have got off the ground, let alone been such a success.

Andrew Sergeant, Portsmouth Hospitals NHS Trust

Andrew Sergeant, ICT development manager at Portsmouth Hospitals NHS Trust, has built what he believes is one of the best teams in the NHS, striving to use technology in innovative ways to tackle the complex and diverse needs of the healthcare community.

One project to use data mining to analyse clinical datasets has been shortlisted in the Innovative Project of the Year category. Another used XML to develop an application to build electronic forms and deploy them to any device. He has also driven his team’s commitment to quality and excellence through adherence to recognised design methodologies and quality assurance principles.

‘I hope to show that IT excellence within the NHS is achievable, sustainable and above all represents true value for money and improved patient care,’ he says.

For more information , see www.computing.co.uk/awards