Project Description

Alex Soutter

Senior Program Director

Areas Of Expertise:

  • Digital Transformation
  • Portfolio Management
  • Program and Project Management
  • Stakeholder Management
  • Risk Management & Governance

Education:

  • Master of Management, Macquarie Graduate School of Management
  • Post Graduate Diploma (Technology Management), Macquarie Graduate School of Management
  • Certified Practicing Accountant, CPA Australia
  • Bachelor of Business (Accounting & Information Systems), University of Technology Sydney

About Alex

Alex brings over 25 years of experience in project and program management, with a diverse background across health, transport, financial services, FMCG and media industries in both public and private sectors. He has a strong track record of delivering digitally enabled programs throughout the entire life cycle, specialising in large, complex enterprise transformation initiatives (over $130 million). His expertise includes transformation, organisational restructuring, regulatory and compliance projects, application development, vendor package implementation, process re-engineering, and infrastructure deployment.   


What Alex brings

  • Accomplished in agile, traditional, and hybrid program and change management methodologies.
  • Strong focus on program risk management in the context of the operational environment.
  • Proven ability to navigate complex organisational landscapes
  • Fosters collaboration among teams and individuals and builds strong relationships with stakeholders.

Key Clients:

  • eHealth NSW
  • Foxtel
  • Lion
  • Sydney Trains
  • Westpac
  • Commonwealth Bank
  • Lloyds International
  • Smarts Group (NASDAC OMX)

Key Achievements:

As Director of the Clinical Portfolio at eHealth NSW, Alex was instrumental in overseeing comprehensive, digitally enabled statewide clinical transformation initiatives across more than 20 NSW Health organisations. He has provided strategic leadership for critical programs such as electronic Medical Records (eMR), Medical Imaging, Intensive Care, NSW Ambulance, Virtual Care, and Vaccination Management. Alex actively engaged with Chief Executives, C-Suite executives and Deputy Secretaries throughout NSW Health and other NSW Government agencies. 

Alex managed a portfolio valued at over $450 million and led a diverse team of over 200 colleagues. Alex redesigned the Clinical Portfolio Management Office to provide more contemporary and performance driven program management support, governance, reporting and insight. His leadership ensured the successful implementation of complex initiatives during the pandemic and natural disasters that improved patient safety, quality of clinical care, and equitable access to citizens of NSW, including overseeing Australia’s largest electronic Medical Record upgrade across more than 200 hospitals and integrating vaccination records into the Australian Immunisation Register, setting a national precedent for compliance with federal regulations. 


As Program Director (NSW Ambulance) at eHealth NSW, Alex established and formalised a program to manage multiple projects for NSW Ambulance, including developing the vision, objectives, strategy, governance and assurance. Alex secured funding exceeding $95 million and then mobilised a 70+ strong cross-organisational team and vendors to achieve agreed-upon outcomes. This included the successful remediation of a $25 million program to enhance NSW Ambulance’s mission-critical 000 response capabilities and the creation of a strategic roadmap for the Mobile Clinician stream. Additionally, Alex delivered next-generation integrated monitor/defibrillators and ECG transmission solution into 1,600 ambulance units and ~50 hospital facilities and spearheaded the upgrade of NSW Ambulance’s eMR solution and a proof-of-concept integration between the eMR and hospital emergency department systems. 


As Program Director (eRIC) at eHealth NSW, Alex led the remediation and stabilisation of a $120 million clinical transformation program to digitise adult, paediatric and neonatal ICUs across the NSW Health public system, guiding a 40+ person multidisciplinary team and international vendors to deliver over $250 million in benefits. He engaged senior executives and clinicians to build support for the revised strategy, resolving a $10 million vendor dispute and reorganising benefits management processes to improve measurement and reporting. Additionally, Alex delivered a proof of concept integrating eRIC with general ward electronic Medical Records, enhancing clinical safety and transfer times, and initiated the next program phase to implement eRIC in neonatal and paediatric ICUs across the state. 


As Program Manager at Foxtel, Alex spearheaded Foxtel’s $130 million program to transform the Foxtel Television Centre into a state-of-the-art facility and set of capabilities, delivering television to over 2.5 million customers. He assembled and motivated a dynamic team of 100+ members into 18 projects and 65 workstreams to leverage enhanced operating models and workflows, simplify operations and build an efficient cost base through a mix of capital equipment replacement and relocation, process redesign, outsourcing and development of new vendor relationships. Under his leadership, Foxtel achieved milestones including the establishment of two new data centres, the introduction of an IP broadcast playout platform (a first in Australia), and a dedicated data/video asset migration solution. 


As Program Delivery Leader at Lion, Alex led a cross-functional team of 120+ resources to deliver digitally enabled programs to the business. He set the organisational strategy for program management and managed the delivery portfolio prioritisation to balance risks and future benefits. He promoted the use of improved program management techniques, tripling the team’s delivery throughput whilst maintaining on-time, on-budget, and in-scope delivery. He developed and implemented new frameworks, processes, and templates for Agile project delivery, requirements management, quality assurance, test management and change management. Additionally, Alex led the implementation of a new enterprise project management tool and drove the remediation and discovery phase for a digital transformation program with an omnichannel digital commerce platform using SAP Hybris and Adobe Experience Manager. 


As Program Director at Sydney Trains, Alex orchestrated a $40 million, multi-phase program to deliver a fully automated time capture to pay solution across the 12,500 staff to drive more accurate and efficient business processes and outcomes and deliver benefits of over $145 million. Amid a challenging industrial relations environment, he successfully orchestrated a strategic realignment and comprehensive program replan, accelerating value-generating activities and increasing program benefits by $5 million via early savings and operational efficiencies. Additionally, Alex enhanced program team capabilities, recognised by directors as setting new standards within Sydney Trains for deliverable quality and governance processes. 


As Program Manager at Westpac, Alex developed the business case that secured $30 million in program funding to integrate customer and product data across multiple platforms (20+) to deliver an automated identification and reporting solution under the US Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act. He pioneered the adoption of new Business Architecture processes and tools to deliver a Business Operating Model and Solution Blueprint impacting 100,000+ customers and 30,000+ staff across front-line, call centre, third parties and back-office operations. Additionally, he identified and banked approximately $4.5 million in program savings and cost avoidance. 


As Senior Project Manager at Commonwealth Bank, Alex was responsible for the national implementation of the Mortgage Service Transformation Program. He led the national rollout of a mortgage services operating model, including outsourcing of key services to a specialist third party provider, and achieving a 10% workforce reduction. Alex also orchestrated the implementation of an enhanced contact centre model, achieving measurable improvements in average call wait time, hand time, grade of service and customer satisfaction. 


As Program Manager at Lloyds International and then at Commonwealth Bank, Alex was a instrumental leader in the delivery of the Personal Property Security Reform by the Australian Government. Working closely with the Attorney-General’s Department and Finance Industry partners, Alex led programs in both organisations to update policies and processes and deliver changes across 20+ applications. He oversaw the migration of over 1 million records to the new PPS Register and ensured over 5,000 staff across Retail, Commercial Lending, Asset Finance and Institutional Banking businesses were ready for the change. 


As Senior Project Manager at Lloyds International, Alex successfully delivered an automated liquidity reporting solution for the Treasury business, to meet stringent regulatory and prudential liquidity requirements. He also implemented the UK Government Asset Protection Scheme to reduce risk weighted assets and strengthen the Group; $25 billion capital position, including development of new credit policies and processes. 


As Program and Portfolio Manager for Smarts Group International (now part of NASDAC OMX), Alex managed the implementation of a real time visual market surveillance solution Tier 1 and 2 stock exchanges in the UK, Europe, Asia-Pacific and North America. He established and directed the PMO, developed a project based forward resource planning model and played an integral role in the bid management process to help shape offerings to clients. 


Other Team Members