​Google ANZ MD Maile Carnegie switches to ANZ Bank

ANZ Bank has announced Google ANZ managing director Maile Carnegie will join the company as group executive digital banking, and will commence her role in July.

Reporting to ANZ CEO Shayne Elliot, Carnegie will lead the development and delivery of the bank's digital experience including digital projects and relationships with the fintech sector. She will also have shared responsibility for the financial results of the bank's Australian and New Zealand divisions.

In taking up the position, the bank added Carnegie will be appointed as a member of the group executive committee and have group responsibility for marketing, including ANZ's brand, advertising, and sponsorship.

Carnegie revealed in an interview with ANZ BlueNotes that while she was not "actively looking to leave" Google, what helped her "seal the deal" was being able to "anchor" her career back in Australia.

"I've spent so much time working for multinationals and bumping around the world, and one of the things I'm really passionate about is working more broadly on what's going on in Australia, and the fact that I can stay in Australia ... was really attractive," she said.

Carnegie added she was also convinced by the direction the bank was taking. "You can really sense there is a lot of energy to move the bank forward."

Prior to joining Google in 2013, Carnegie was managing director for Procter & Gamble in Australia and New Zealand. She has also held other positions with Procter & Gamble, including general manager for Asia strategy, marketing and design based in Singapore, and in senior marketing and commercial roles in the United States.

Elliot said Carnegie's appointment marks the company's recognition that digital is central to driving revenue growth and making the company more competitive.

"Part of Maile's role will also be to shift our thinking and champion a Group-wide innovation culture at ANZ based on developing and attracting service-focused, technology-literate, innovative and experimental people and teams. This includes being the sponsor of a new Digital Business Transformation Leadership Program created jointly by ANZ and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology," he said.

"I am incredibly pleased to have Maile join us. Her experience at Google, her track record in building brands and business in Australia and in Asia, and her leadership skills make her uniquely qualified to lead ANZ's digital transformation."

ANZ revealed during its 2015 full year results that total technology expenses increased by AU$196 million from the AU$1.3 billion reported last year to AU$1.5 billion this year. ANZ attributed part of the increase to the increased depreciation and amortisation on key infrastructure projects, higher data storage, software licence costs, and increased use of outsourced and managed services.

The growing spend by the bank of technology forms part of the company's AU$1.5 billion five-year customer-facing Banking on Australia program, which was launched in October 2012 to transform the way the bank does business.

Since the end of last year, ANZ has been pushing to fast-track digital change when CEO Mike Smith outlined that it was a key objective for the group.

"At ANZ, I want us to fast track the change to a digital culture," he said. "We need to embrace the change in customer behaviour that technology brings, and to make sure we are offering the best possible digital services.

"We need to adapt to the widespread disruption of traditional business models, and make sure we are helping our clients thrive in these exciting but challenging times."

The company further signalled its commitment to the digital push when it recruited people from Twitter, Dimension Data, and former employees of PayPal and Procter & Gamble to establish a technology panel to help with the bank's digital transformation.

It also secured a five-year AU$450 million partnership with IBM to deploy the Big Blue's content management, data, analytics, and cloud software. ANZ said at the time it would support its ongoing core banking and infrastructure needs.

In November last year, ANZ launched a revamped version of its internet banking platform, designed to give customers a consistent user experience across desktop, tablet, and mobile.

The bank at the time boasted that as part of the upgrade, it introduced additional features including the ability for businesses to approve payments on-the-go using mobile internet banking; the ability for users to be able to choose either to view their accounts in a grid format or as a list; and a simplified navigation menu to help customers update contact details, pay a bill, or open a new account.

Last September, ANZ reported that transactions made through its goMoney app reached AU$100 billion, with the ecommerce technology being adopted by more than 1.4 million users since its launch in 2010. ANZ also said at the time that goMoney user logins accounted for 62 percent of the bank's total customer digital login tally.