Alistair Vickers named CIO of the year 2022

Tū Ora Compass Health is delighted to announce that Alistair Vickers has been named CIO (Chief Information Officer) of the year at the IDC conference and summit held in Christchurch this week.

“We are so proud of Alistair’s achievement and leadership,” says Justine Thorpe CEO.

“This recognition places our orgnaisation alongside some of the largest and most agile in the country. This reflects not only the extraordinary efforts our organisation has made to keep our community safe during the pandemic but also acknowledges our whole of system business transformation journey over the past three years,” she says.

Alistair Vickers has been CIO of Tū Ora Compass Health since December 2017. Tū Ora Compass Health is a primary health organisation (PHO). As an essential part of the regional health system, Tū Ora works alongside 57 General Practices, allied health, community-based providers, and Iwi to deliver quality and equitable health and wellbeing services to a population of around 334,000 people across the Wellington, Porirua, Wairarapa and Kāpiti areas.

“Alistair is an authentic leader who leads by example to set the standards of work he expects, not only from his team but also vendors. This leadership style also has positive impacts across the organisation in his role on the Executive Leadership Team,” says Debbie Chin Board Chair.

“He is a whole of system thinker, who can not only can think through an end-to-end ICT system, but also the impact it has on the wider business and ultimately, the communities that we serve. It is this attribute that has been critical to the digital transformation that has placed our organisation ahead of most in the health sector when it comes to cyber-security, agility, our ability to respond to the increasing demands of the health sector and the credibility gained through the transformation.”

“I am humbled and honoured to be named a finalist in this award category, and I’d like to acknowledge my Executive leadership team, CEO and Board for their support. Also to fellow nominees and their leadership contribution to respective organisations,” says Vickers.

The CIO of the year award was presented at the IDC conference and summit in Christchurch this week and we congratulate all finalists in the CIO of the year nomination group.

Award winners

Leadership in Business transformation:

In 2018, Tū Ora's systems comprised more than one hundred legacy applications, over 160 databases and almost eighty virtual and physical servers. Under AV leadership and with full support from the Board, CEO and leadership team, the organisation embarked on a comprehensive digital transformation journey to replace these systems with a single unified platform, but this process was not without its challenges.

In August 2019, Tū Ora suffered a major cyber incident where up to one million people’s health records were potentially exfiltrated.

Despite it being an exceedingly challenging time, the organisation pressed forward with the Digital Transformation, determined to build a system that would not compromise patients or their care in the future.

By the time the COVID-19 pandemic hit, the entire organisation was able to move to a virtual paradigm at very short notice. This was due to the groundwork of user training and deployment of modern technologies in the months prior to the first nationwide lockdown.

Tū Ora is now 100% Azure Public Cloud-hosted, with all services delivered through a Software as a Service (SaaS) model. Its core SaaS platform is from Aceso Health, and the same applies to all its security services from Medical IT Advisors (MITA). The organisation leverages Microsoft’s M365 tools, tracking and managing all devices through Endpoint Manager. This approach has seen Tū Ora
regularly attain a Microsoft Secure Score of over 99% - it is worth noting that the average in the APAC region for organisations with under one thousand employees and using E5 licenses is less than 50%.

The PHO has reduced its server environment from eighty to four virtual machines and re-platformed 160 databases onto a data warehouse with thirty core databases, presenting these through Microsoft’s PowerBI to its stakeholders.

Tū Ora is now offering its internal capabilities to the Very Low-Cost Access (VLCA) General Practices in its network. These are not for profit organisations working with many of the most at-risk members of their communities, for whom IT is not a key focus or deliverable. For the VLCAs, Tū Ora IT is providing its full-service catalogue at no cost, so long as they upgrade to a standard offering of licenses and hardware. For the first VLCA practice to adopt this new service model, they are realising significant savings on IT expenditure which they can reinvest into improve healthcare outcomes for their patients.