We were recently engaged by our client, Sainsbury’s, to conduct an exclusive search for an IT Transformation Director to collaborate with the leadership team in delivering the company’s new IT strategy. Leveraging our expertise, we identified the ideal candidate to drive the transformation and support the company in achieving its growth objectives.
Discover the full case study below.
J Sainsbury plc, trading as Sainsbury’s, is a British supermarket and the second-largest chain of supermarkets in the United Kingdom.
The holding company, J Sainsbury plc, is split into three divisions: Sainsbury’s Supermarkets Ltd (including convenience shops), Sainsbury’s Bank, and Argos. As of 2021, the largest overall shareholder is the sovereign wealth fund of Qatar, the Qatar Investment Authority, which holds around 15% of the company. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index.
The business needed a high calibre IT Transformation Director to work with the leadership team and deliver the company’s new IT strategy as part of a £1.4bn transformation. The IT Transformation budget is £500m. NSCG were given an exclusive mandate to find a suitable person, but were given a time frame of just 3-4 weeks.
We ran a targeted search for candidates with relevant experience in owning large scale IT transformation in retail/B2C companies.
Sainsbury’s had explained that the right candidate had to fit culturally. They have a relaxed, friendly and professional senior leadership team and wanted someone who would complement that.
As the strategy had been largely defined by the board we concentrated on candidates with strong operational and delivery experience.
Finding someone who could start quickly was critical so we approached our immediate networks of interim as well as permanent candidates.
NSCG provided a high-quality, diverse shortlist of four candidates with strong retail experience.
All candidates had recently led successful major IT transformation programmes with similar large budgets.
The candidates were able to accommodate the fast start date.
The candidates were interviewed by the Sainsbury’s SLT and the successful candidate was chosen and started within a month of NSCG commencing the search.
- The appointment is helping Sainsbury’s achieve their cost saving plans by optimising technology and streamlining the IT department.
- We have helped Sainsbury’s with this by delivering a speedy, efficient process and finding a candidate within budget.
- The appointed candidate has fitted well with the SLT , delivering the transformation initiatives required as well as some of his own recommendations.
- He continues to work closely with the CTO and Head of Portfolio to help deliver the entire £1.4bn transformation.