In this episode of Factory Fireside, Peter Inge, Co-founder & CEO of insightfactory.ai, sits down with Nicola Dorling, Group CIO at Downer Group and ranked #2 CIO in CIO Magazine 2024.

Together, they explore how enterprise technology leadership is being redefined in the era of Data & AI from scaling programs that actually deliver value, to killing Proof-of-Concepts early, to building teams and partnerships that execute relentlessly.

Nicola shares practical lessons on:

• Balancing value creation and risk in AI strategy
• Moving beyond endless POCs to production-ready outcomes
• Aligning AI initiatives to board-level financial metrics
• Building resilience and curiosity into technology teams
• What “the death of consulting” and “the future of the CIO” might really mean

It’s a conversation packed with candour, insight, and leadership perspective from someone who’s led digital transformation at the highest levels.

In this fireside, we explain how data and AI programs can work most effectively with enterprise architects in large organisations, cutting through the tension that often exists between the two. We highlight that while data and AI teams are driven by speed and experimentation, enterprise architects are too often perceived as rigid gatekeepers. Done poorly, EA slows everything down with excessive control, but done well it acts like town planning—using principles-based governance to set guardrails while enabling innovation at pace. We discuss how the true value of EA lies in aligning technology, business, and people design with strategy, equipping executives with better insight maps for data-driven decision-making, and establishing “freedom within boundaries” so AI teams can innovate safely. We also challenge the role of outdated architecture review boards, showing how embedding architects directly into agile delivery teams ensures principles are applied in real time. The core message is that effective EA doesn’t police data and AI—it empowers it, balancing safety with speed to drive transformation at scale