The ITAM Review has announced the winners of its 2021 ITAM Review Excellence Awards at a hybrid virtual/face-to-face ceremony at the Kia Oval Cricket Ground. For the first time, members of the ITAM Forum, the non-profit professional body for the advancement of the IT Asset Management industry, formed the Awards’ judging panel.
Danske Bank won the prestigious ‘ITAM Project of the Year’ for elevating and broadening the role of ITAM within the organisation and placing ITAM into a key role in the bank’s transformation agenda.
Rachel Ryan, First Vice President – Global Head of IT Asset Management at Danske Bank, accepted the award on behalf of her team on the evening of 28 September 2021 at the ITAM Review Wisdom EMEA 2021 conference. In her award submission, Rachel stated, “Danske Bank’s ITAM function has transformed in two years from reactive to a dynamic, strategic and forward-thinking organization playing a key role in the bank’s transformation agenda. This has been achieved by addressing People, Process and Technology aspects and the function has moved up the bank’s hierarchy to reflect its achievements and importance. The team has grown from 7 to 19 ITAM managers, adopted 100+ best practices and established strong governance throughout.”
In addition to spearheading the growth and reach of the ITAM function within Danske Bank, the judges recognized a number of standout achievements:
- Rachel’s team achieved a Best-in-Class score during a SAM Maturity Assessment conducted by Softline - the highest score ever achieved.
- ITAM team delivered $multi-million cost savings and cost avoidance
- The team’s remit has extended from purely Software Asset Management (SAM) to also incorporate Hardware Asset Management (HAM), Lifecycle management, Shadow IT and from managing just 10 vendors to more than 350+.
- ITAM is now viewed as a trusted partner across the bank and now works in collaboration with Risk Management, Security, Vulnerability management and Procurement to reduce IT Security risk and proactively optimize the IT estate.
- ITAM has moved up within the organizational hierarchy, culminating in Rachel Ryan’s promotion to First VP and providing more opportunity to present to the COO and CTO, receiving excellent feedback.
In awarding Danske Bank, one judge commented: “Danske have really impressed me; not only has it scored the highest in a ITAM maturity assessment, but it continues to evolve and improve as time goes on… Rachel has continually been supported by her business to grow and mature the ITAM Team so more and more value is delivered back. They are a credit to the ITAM industry to show when investment is made, real ITAM value can be delivered, which is recognized by senior management.”
Other awards handed out on the night were:
- Rising Star: Gemma Binnie, Abrdn (formerly Aberdeen Asset Management)
- Specialist or Consultant of the year 2021: Alex Golev, SAMexpert
- ITAM Partner of the year: The Mastermind Group
- Technology or Service Innovation of the year: ServiceNow Machine Learning Normalization
- Professional of the year: Ben Strictland, Ray Allen Inc.
- Lifetime achievement award: Sherry Irwin, Technology Asset Management Inc.
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