INDUSTRY
T H E M O N T H T H AT W A S
THE MONTH THAT WAS Exertis appoints IT director, service operations Exertis has appointed Cath O’Neill as
National ‘Keep It Local’ campaign reaches parliament
IT director, service operations. Cath will be responsible for the service desk, desktop services, infrastructure services and the implementation of ITIL standards across Exertis UK. She has more than 25 years’ experience of
The ‘Keep It Local’ campaign, launched by Nemo Office Club, is calling on
IT transformation and service delivery,
all SMEs to get behind the drive towards buying local following a series of
having restructured IT service teams
letters sent to PM Boris Johnson and then minister for the cabinet office, Michael Gove. The campaign has updated its www.keep-it-local.co.uk website to include
and embedded SLA management and ITIL processes.
a link to a template letter to send to MPs and, to make it easy to get involved,
Prior to joining Exertis, Cath worked
a link to help people find contact details for their local MPs. Since launching,
for the Odeon Cinema Group and
the letter has been downloaded more than 50 times, with site visitors also encouraged to share the message over social media. “It is important that we take the message to as wide an audience as
was responsible for all aspects of IT service delivery, keeping cinemas and
possible,” said MD Tim Beaumont. “I shared a letter we wrote to Boris
offices across the UK and Ireland fully
Johnson on LinkedIn and it very quickly received over 2,000 views. Not
operational and able to trade 24/7.
surprisingly we did not get a response from Boris Johnson - something to do
Cath will report to Liz Greenwood,
with Brexit, Afghanistan and the pandemic - but we are passionate about the
UK IT director, and will be based at
cause and so chose to follow-up with a second letter to Michael Gove.
Exertis’ National Distribution Centre
“At the time Mr Gove was minister for cabinet office, the position held by Matt Hancock when he declared government’s intention for £1 in every
in Burnley.
£3 of their procurement expenditure to be with SMEs by 2022; it seemed
“I am delighted to welcome Cath
appropriate that we enquired about an update on this and offered our help
to our UK IT team,” said Liz. “The
as a representative of over 300 SMEs within our group.”
business has experienced significant
Despite the lack of response from Johnson or Gove, the campaign has engaged with several MPs who have relayed the message that the campaign is being heard and the best thing to do is keep going and get more and
growth over the past couple of years and Cath will play a lead role
more businesses involved - hence the move to include all SMEs from across
in defining a number of upcoming
all industries.
IT projects.”
[06] NOVEMBER 2021
www.dealersupport.co.uk
