Mike Schuman has moved on from his role as transformation business advisor at oil and gas giant, Woodside Energy.
Schuman joined the organisation from WA Police in May this year and told CIO Australia that his role was to spearhead change within a 12 month period.
His departure coincides with the removal in September of the chief information officer role at Woodside. This role was previously held by Sara Braund who is now VP of Woodside’s HQ Technology Project. Also in September, Woodside’s former VP Science, Tom Ridsdill-Smith was appointed as VP chief digital officer.
Schuman said he has completed the baseline cloud strategy, architecture and governance framework and ‘everything is production ready.’
“For me, it was a compartmentalised role. It was never going to be a landing point for me just to be doing cloud services,” he says. “It was interesting and I did learn some things but I am more of a holistic transformation person. Just doing technical transformation is only going to be interesting for a period of time.”
Schuman is now going out on his own as a freelance consultant focused on opportunities around large-scale transformation work around review, strategy development, and transformation program implementation.
He wants to work with organisations that are looking to change their organisational structure and operational model, cut their underlying costs and reinvest money into innovation.
He said that Woodside is headed in the right direction.
“The structures that they are talking about, roles that they are creating and how they are positioning it bode well for the future,” he said.
Schuman quit his role at WA Police in January after spending the past year delivering his transformation plan. He was initially appointed in July 2014 as a transformational director before becoming acting CIO in December that year and moving into the role permanently in April 2015.
CIO Australia has contacted Woodside for further comment.
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