DWP CDIO Mayank Prakash to leave for new role outside the civil service

DWP's Mayank Prakash leaving to return to the private sector

Mayank Prakash, the chief digital and information officer (CDIO) at the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), is to leave the organisation for a new role outside the Civil Service.

Former Sage and Avaya CIO Prakash has been at the DWP since September 2014, recruited to replace Andy Nelson, who only lasted one year in the demanding role. Prakash arrived at the DWP following three years as head of global wealth and investment management technology at US investment bank Morgan Stanley.

In a statement, Prakash said that he would "miss working with inspirational colleagues passionate about delivering services to 22m people", and added: "I am proud of the many achievements of colleagues and grateful to industry leaders for their partnership to transform the UK's largest IT estate beyond recognition.

"I look forward to tracking the future digitisation of DWP's services with keen interest and will follow with pride the great work of digital specialists at DWP."

It's not clear yet what Prakash's new role will be.

In an interview with Computing in 2017, Prakash explained that he had four items at the top of his agenda at the DWP.

"The first is raising our aspiration to be the best at what we do," he began. "Next is building capability so that we have the best talent. In my profession you're only as good as the talent in your teams. The third one is focusing on business outcomes rather than focusing purely on requirements or outputs. And the last one is delivering.

"We simply describe our strategy, as it is, to deliver things," Prakash told Computing.

Undoubtedly the biggest delivery challenge at DWP, of course, is the delivery of the IT systems behind Universal Credit, the government's ambitious plans to manage all non-pension benefits on one platform. While at the DWP, Prakash hired a new chief technology officer to help map out the way forward for this and other projects.

Prakash is currently number five in Computing's CIO 100 list of the top IT leaders in the UK.