Intelligent CIO Europe Issue 02 | Page 101

GET TO KNOW... On the lighter side of things, we ask the industry experts what makes them tick. . . . Avi Raichel, CIO of Zerto 1 What would you describe as your most memorable achievement? Throughout my career, I have been lucky to participate and lead a number of major IT projects. I really cannot select a specific one as being the most memorable. Each presented different challenges and I enjoyed working with so many people along the way. I have yet to reach the ‘looking back’ stage of my life, so I would like to think the biggest achievement is yet to come. However, being named Zerto’s CIO was a very exciting moment for me and I’m sure that working with the team to build a world of uninterrupted business will be an unforgettable journey. 2 What first made you think of a career in technology? At school, I liked coding a lot. I later became an accountant and, during these years, I gained valuable business experience, but I missed the feeling you get from creating something from scratch. So I made the career change and became a developer. It has been almost 20 years since then and I have never regretted that change for a second. www.intelligentcio.com 4 3 What style of management philosophy do you employ with your current position? I believe in shooting for the stars. I love crafting a vision for how IT will enable Zerto to grow and achieve our business goals and then building a strong team that can deliver on this vision. I enjoy coaching my team to look at everything we do from a business perspective; what difficulty are we solving? How are we saving money, increasing productivity and engagement, or delivering business outcomes? What do you think will emerge as the technology trend of 2018 and why? New technologies are redefining the playing field at a pace that we have never seen before. I think artificial intelligence, machine learning, blockchain and IoT have huge potential to disrupt and transform how we do things in many areas. It is not about how ‘cool’ the technology is, rather what type of impact it can have on the business side. “ I’M HAVING THE MOST FUN I’VE EVER HAD IN MY JOB AND I’M SURE THE BEST IS YET TO COME. INTELLIGENTCIO 101