Amit Thawani
Chief Information Officer for Insurance, Pensions and Investments at Lloyds Banking Group
With a rich history dating back to the founding of Taylors & Lloyds in 1765, Lloyds Banking Group has been at the forefront of enhancing customer experiences for well over two centuries.
The Group serves over 27 million customers across its various brands, including Lloyds Bank, Halifax, Bank of Scotland and Scottish Widows.
To meet the needs of its customers, Lloyds is undertaking what it describes as “the biggest technology transformation in the history of the UK,” encompassing not only technological upgrades but also a fundamental shift in the organisation’s culture.
Helping drive this transformation is Amit Thawani, Chief Information Officer for Insurance, Pensions and Investments at Lloyds Banking Group. With a career spanning continents and roles from software developer to enterprise architect and at companies such as Oracle, BNP Paribas, ING and Wells Fargo, Amit brings a unique perspective to the challenges and opportunities facing one of Britain’s oldest and most respected financial institutions.
Amit’s career began in software development, where he honed his skills as a Java programmer. He was encouraged to look beyond coding, considering aspects such as infrastructure, data centre operations, code release management, quality engineering and code optimisation. “I had great mentors and leaders who coached me to take a deep and broad view,” he explains.
As Amit’s career progressed, he transitioned from developer to architect roles and witnessed significant changes in the technology landscape. “The landscape changed a lot during those years, from 2000 when there were no mobile phones and the Internet was new, to 2007 when the iPhone launched and everything changed,” he notes.
Amit’s career took another turn when he expanded his skillset into the infrastructure space. “After doing architecture for several years, I realised it was time to learn new skills around building data centres," he explains. This move coincided with the rise of cloud computing, allowing Thawani to gain hands-on experience with emerging technologies like Amazon Web Services.
His time in Australia between 2015-2019 gave him the opportunity to be part of the public cloud transformation, combined with application transformation.
Throughout his career, Amit has embraced international opportunities, working in India, Japan, France, the Netherlands, Australia, Germany and the US. This global experience has given him a unique perspective on cultural diversity in the workplace. “I was lucky to see many cultural things in my journey. I worked with more than 100 nationalities, which provided an understanding that everybody is different yet brings a lot of value,” he says.
This diverse experience and global perspective eventually led him to a CIO role at Wells Fargo, overseeing consumer data and engagement platforms for 70 million customers which includes consumer marketing technologies and consumer data products..
The opportunity at Lloyds Banking Group came at a time when Amit wasn’t actively seeking a change. However, the scale of the transformation underway at Lloyds Banking Group caught his attention. “The Group was going through one of the biggest technology transformations in the history of UK banking,” he explains. “That was equally important for me as a technologist who likes transformation and change. Change is the only thing that keeps me going.”
In his current role at Lloyds, Amit is leveraging his diverse experience to drive the digital transformation in insurance, pensions and investments. As he puts it: “We can't rely on old ways of engaging. So we have to keep innovating and bringing customer centricity to our technology.”
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