Achieving Operational Excellence

Karen is an experienced Technology Executive and Enterprise leader with extensive digital transformation skills and a proven track record of delivering innovative solutions that drive successful outcomes in complex environments.

As a passionate people leader, she is committed to building diverse teams and nurturing a collaborative and inclusive culture. She is an advocate of ‘digitising with diversity,’ opening up career opportunities for a broader range of people, particularly those who are neuro-diverse. This diversity significantly increases their ability to innovate, as well as their overall performance and engagement.

John Hunt was appointed Chief Information and Replenishment Officer on 1 September 2021. John initially joined Woolworths Group in 2017 as Chief Information Officer. John spent over 25 years at Woolworths Holdings, South Africa where he held a range of senior IT and core retail leadership roles, including CIO and Senior Executive for Food Planning and Value chain.

A graduate from the Cape Peninsula University of Technology in Cape Town, John is a retailer through and through and is passionate about how information technology and technology innovation is being optimally used in enabling the business to support both the front line team members as well as ensuring our customers have the best shopping experience.

A visionary and value-oriented Chief Information Officer with extensive global experience in planning, developing, and implementing cutting edge technology strategies that digitise, transform and enable business differentiation, optimisation and sustainable growth. As an executive leader collaborates with executive teams to align technology strategy with businesses and the wider corporate vision.

With a career spanning leading financial institutions globally, including Credit Suisse, CBA, Westpac, Macquarie, and NAB, has extensive experience in design and delivery of cost-effective technology solutions to address complex business problems, embed robust operational risk management, digitise and drive customer experience. This is combined with business intelligence, commercial acumen, and cyber security to enable market-attuned growth, future-proof businesses, and innovation with deep expertise in all aspects of project lifecycle, from feasibility analysis and conceptual design, through to implementation.

A track record of building and leading large teams high performance teams that are industry-leading, multidisciplinary, and geographical dispersed with deep skills across IT and businesses that are engaged and focused with vast experience in insourcing and outsourcing models. A strong advocate for and fosters inclusive, diverse and continuous learning cultures.

Peter Weill’s work centers on the role, value, and governance of digitization in enterprises. Weill joined the MIT Sloan faculty in 2000 to become director of MIT Sloan’s Center for Information Systems Research (CISR).

MIT CISR is funded by approximately 100 corporate sponsors and patrons, and undertakes practical research on how firms generate business value from Information Technology (IT). As chair, Weill focuses on globalizing the center’s research and delivery. In 2008, Ziff Davis recognized Weill as #24 of The Top 100 Most Influential People in IT, the highest-ranked academic. In Dec 2019, his 2015 MIT SMR article Thriving in an Increasingly Digital Era was recognized as one of The Best 10 SMR Articles in the 2010s.

Peter has worked on digitization issues with the Executive Committees and Boards of more than 40 companies globally. He conducts workshops for key conferences, including the CEO Summits for Microsoft, IBM, and SAP, and the International Monetary Conference.