Chief Information Digital Officer

ETI Professional Search; Atlanta (GA); On-site; USD 300,000 - 450,000; Full time

Job summary

ETI Professional Search is helping a PE-backed company locate a Chief Information & Digital Officer in Atlanta, GA. This role will be the first technology executive, reporting to the CEO and joining the executive team.

You will own enterprise technology strategy, ERP modernization, data, cybersecurity, and external partnerships to drive real business results. You will lead a high-impact modernization effort, manage a small internal team with a large vendor bench, and be accountable for project

Qualifications

• Led a full ERP replacement or major modernization from requirements through data conversion, testing, cutover and adoption.
• Experience in private equity-backed, acquisitive environments with board reporting and Day 1 planning.
• Managed small internal teams with large vendor benches including offshore support and MSPs.
• Improved IT efficiency by accountability, measurement and removing redundancy, not by headcount cuts.

Responsibilities

• Owns enterprise technology strategy, applications, infrastructure, data, cybersecurity, and technology risk.
• Leads the ERP modernization program from vision to execution, including platform selection, sequencing, cost and risk.
• Sits on the executive leadership team and reports to the CEO; overseeing delivery and results across IT.
• Manages vendor relationships, offshore partners, and MSPs to maximize performance and value.

Skills

ERP modernization

Executive leadership

Vendor management

Board reporting

Education

Bachelor's degree

Job description

CHIEF INFORMATION & DIGITAL OFFICER

Private Equity-Backed

Reports to: Chief Executive Officer

Location: Atlanta, GA

About the Role:

The company has never had a technology executive. IT has reported into Finance, delivery is largely outsourced, and the core ERP is over twenty years old and heavily customized. The business has grown anyway, and it is profitable and acquisitive. But the systems underneath it has not kept pace, and the CEO and board now want someone at the table who can fix that.

This is the first Chief Information & Digital Officer in the company's history. You will report to the CEO and sit on the executive leadership team. IT moves under you when you arrive. You will be responsible for enterprise technology strategy, applications, infrastructure, data, cybersecurity, service delivery, vendor sourcing, and technology risk. You will also be responsible for the results, not only for delivering projects on schedule. The central program is ERP modernization. A roadmap developed before the company's sale identified a target platform. You are free to validate that recommendation, revise it, or start over. You will take your recommendation to the CEO and the board with the platform, approach, sequencing, cost, and risk laid out, and then you will run the program from beginning to end.

About the Business:

This matters as much as the technical background, and we are being deliberate about it. The work is field-based and asset-intensive. Crews and technical specialists do safety- and compliance-sensitive work on customer infrastructure, dispatched from service centers across the country. Sales cycles are long, relationship-driven, and heavy on bids and RFPs. Deals take quarters and sometimes years to close. Revenue comes in as projects, recurring service programs, and time-and-materials work, which means job costing, work in process, change orders, and milestone billing are constant realities.

You should already know how this works. Work order to invoice. Crew scheduling and utilization. Field data capture that has to function where connectivity is poor. Project margin you can see while the job is still running rather than ninety days after it closes. We are looking at candidates from industrial and infrastructure services, specialty contracting, engineering and construction, power and energy services, environmental and waste services, testing and inspection, facilities and asset management, equipment rental and dealer services, mining and resource services, and similar businesses where the work happens in the field. We are not the right fit for someone coming out of product manufacturing, software, financial services, insurance, healthcare, or retail. The operating model is different enough that the first year would go to learning it, and this role does not have a year to spare.

Current Environment:

• A system of records more than two decades old, hosted by a third party, customized to the point that the customizations themselves generate much of the service desk volume.
• Twenty-plus other business applications alongside a Microsoft 365 estate.
• Integration handled mostly through scheduled jobs, file transfers, and legacy scripting rather than managed APIs.
• Reporting spread across a legacy reporting tool, a spreadsheet-based financial product, and a modern BI platform used inconsistently.
• A small internal team: an ERP manager, an application support manager, a technical and help desk lead, and an open business relationship and project management position to fill.
• Application support provided by offshore analysts and a development partner; infrastructure and end-user support provided by an MSP.
• Several acquired brands still operating semi-independently under their own general managers.

None of this is broken. It is more complicated than it needs to be, lightly governed, and expensive for what it returns.

Comparable Technology Environments:

We look at scope and complexity rather than specific brands.

• Core ERP: Oracle E-Business Suite, Oracle Fusion Cloud, NetSuite, Microsoft Dynamics 365, Infor, Epicor, Sage Intacct.
• CRM, quoting and pricing: Salesforce, Dynamics 365 CRM, Oracle CX, HubSpot, or a CRM integrated to an ERP.
• Field service and work order management: ServiceMax, ServiceTitan, IFS, IBM Maximo, Salesforce Field Service, Oracle Field Service, KloudGin.
• Reporting and analytics: Power BI, Tableau, Qlik, Looker, Domo, Oracle Analytics.

What we are looking for:

• You have led a full ERP replacement or major modernization yourself, from requirements through data conversion, testing, cutover, and user adoption. Sponsoring a program someone else ran is not the same thing.
• You have run technology in a private equity-backed, acquisitive company and are comfortable with hold periods, board reporting, EBITDA math, diligence, and Day 1 planning.
• You have done that work with a small internal team and a large vendor bench, including offshore support partners and managed service providers, and you know how to get real performance out of that arrangement.
• You have reduced IT operating expenses by building accountability and measurement and taking redundancy out, rather than by cutting headcount or buying another tool.
• You have cybersecurity at the executive level, including strategy, identity and access, third-party risk, incident readiness, and reporting to senior leadership or a board.
• Fifteen or more years of progressive technology experience, several of them leading an enterprise IT function with full accountability for staff, budget, vendors, and business results.
• Bachelor's degree or equivalent experience.