S5 | Ep 18 | The Learnings of Being a CDO on the Board of a PLC with Rob Kent, Data & AI Leader at Greggs

In Episode 18, of Season 5 of Driven by Data: The Podcast, Kyle Winterbottom is joined by Rob Kent, Data & AI Leader at Greggs, where they discuss the learnings from reporting to a CEO and being on the board of a UK Plc, which includes;

• Starting a career in IT over 30 years ago.
• Building D&A functions from scratch on multiple occasions.
• How the common thread has been executive sponsorship at the highest level.
• Anchoring data strategies to business strategies.
• Being part of a small group of CDOs that have reported to a CEO.
• Sitting on the board of a UK PLC that publicly declared data as core to its strategy.
• The business drivers that allowed data to have a seat at a board table.
• The learnings and experience of reporting to a CEO.
• Growing an appreciation of competing with priorities of other functions.
• The importance of empathy when sitting on the board.
• Balancing wearing a corporate hat and a data hat.
• Still needing to justify the existence of the data analytics function.
• A simple three-tier model to calculate value-creation.
• Accepting that there is a cost of doing business.
• Delivering tangible benefit in a cost-effective way without a large budget.
• Whether reporting lines and titles actually matter.
• The things that the CEO will be thinking about and asking.
• The things that can influence the position of the data executive in an organisation.
• The two key questions to ask your CEO that dictate proximity to them.
• Why CDOs have the power to choose which organisation is right for them.
• Why the data industry should be pushing on open doors.
• Why there is often a gap in expectations.
• The contributing factors to being seen as a cost centre.
• Why attributing value is easier for B2C businesses than B2B businesses.
• Why you’re doing something wrong if you can’t attribute value to data initiatives.
• Why translation will take you further than most other things.
• Why business people don’t care about our data analytics world.
• The material differences between having a seat at the table versus being a layer removed.
• Why any decision is made based on facts, fear, or faith.
• Where the future of data analytics teams lies.
• Why we’re not being picked on and other functions have it worse than us.

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