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Belgium 27-8-26 AB Members Physical english

Summer Festival: Advisory Board

CIO agendas are crowded: cost pressure, cyber, regulation, talent, data, AI, vendor dependency, business expectations. Most organisations are trying to do too much at once, and the “must-do” work often blocks the strategic work. CIONET only creates value if its agenda matches what CIOs truly need, in the right format, at the right time. The challenge Pick the few priorities that matter most for 2027, then translate them into a clear CIONET agenda. Outcome we leave with A ranked CIO agenda for 2027, and a directly aligned CIONET programme outline (themes, formats, cadence), with a shortlist of speaker and case targets.

Belgium 27-8-26 Country Members Physical english

Summerfest: From Story to Habit

How to align people, shift routines, and prove value Technology transformations often fail not because the tools don’t work, but because people don’t change their work habits. Boards want proof of value, executives want business outcomes, IT wants clarity, and employees want ease. Between these expectations, the CIO’s role is no longer just to deliver platforms; it is to tell the story that motivates people and turn that story into daily habits. This session will explore: The narrative: how to craft a simple, repeatable story that explains the “why” behind change for every stakeholder. From story to routine: practical ways to embed new behaviours through manager rituals, team incentives, and visible leadership. Reskilling and new expectations: preparing teams for evolving roles, from cross-department collaboration to AI-enhanced workflows. Measuring what matters: showing progress in speed, quality, and resilience — not just in licences bought or trainings completed. The aim is to equip CIOs with a leadership toolkit: a story that unites, habits that endure, and proof that convinces even the toughest boardroom.

Belgium 8-9-26 Invitation Only Virtual english

What an AI Architect Actually Does in Practice; Skills, responsibilities, interfaces, and career moves behind one of the most misunderstood emerging roles.

The AI architect role is becoming more visible, and the scope varies across organisations. The challenge is defining what the role owns, where it sits, and how it works with existing architecture, data, security, risk, and business teams. Three pressure points need clarity. - Role definition matters because the position can span solution architecture, data architecture, governance, integration, security, vendor selection, and business process design. - Interfaces matter because the role must connect teams while respecting existing responsibilities. - Skills matter because technical depth needs to be combined with judgement around controls, delivery choices, and operational boundaries. The working question is simple: how do we define the AI architect role so it becomes useful, credible, and connected to delivery? If this role is emerging in your organisation, let’s compare how others are defining it and where they are placing it.

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Legal & General use AWS AI to transform Customer Experience, Speed, and Productivity

Using AWS, we now have a much more robust, elastic, and event driven architecture.” - Tariq Surty, IT Director, Retail Retirements Division, Legal & General

“Using AWS, we now have a much more robust, elastic, and event driven architecture.” - Tariq Surty, IT Director, Retail Retirements Division, Legal & General

Imagine you have over 5 million customers who send in paper forms amounting to 5,000 pieces daily. To best serve your customers—and to meet regulatory requirements—you need a way to process all these documents quickly and accurately. To meet this challenge, financial services firm Legal & General (L&G) modernized the daily ingestion of thousands of pension documents for its UK retail retirements division (RRD) using Amazon Web Services (AWS). L&G’s UK RRD migrated from its legacy scanning solution to AWS, using artificial intelligence (AI)–powered services. As a result, the division improved document processing speed, compliance with its regulatory service level agreements (SLAs), and staff productivity.

Modernizing Document Management Using AWS

L&G’s UK RRD has 5.2 million workplace pension members who send in more than 1 million paper documents per year, requesting, for example, a change of address or beneficiary. The division must process and respond to each one within a set period. It wanted to make the process more efficient, scalable, and cost-effective. “Using AWS, we now have a much more robust, elastic, and event-driven architecture,” says Tariq Surty, IT director for the RRD at L&G.

The UK RRD, alongside its local AWS team, created an internal proof of concept to ratify use of Amazon Textract, a machine learning (ML) service that automatically extracts text, handwriting, layout elements, and data from scanned documents. The division then engaged AWS Professional Services—a global team of experts that helps companies use AWS—to complete its project quickly and reliably, from designing the proof of concept to scaling into full production.

Improving Processing Speed and Staff Productivity with ML

L&G’s cloud-focused solution for document management is Docusort. It processes documents with ML using Amazon Textract and Amazon SageMaker, a fully managed service that brings together a broad set of tools for high-performance, low-cost ML. Docusort classifies documents, extracts the relevant datasets, and pushes that data to backend systems to update customer information.

Using AWS, L&G can now process 1,000 documents concurrently in 30 minutes, and with the serverless architecture, its solution can scale up and down to meet any workload. Before, processing was limited by the number of people handling the documents. With these time savings, the UK RRD meets SLA requirements more accurately and consistently. As a result, the division has been able to redeploy five employees, improving business productivity.

Moving Forward with Generative AI

L&G plans to use its Docusort solution as a template for other use cases where ML might be useful. In particular, the company is exploring how to apply generative AI to processes such as managing complaints, supporting the underwriting process, and analyzing customer feedback.

“We’ve learned how to manage, train, and maintain ML models, and we’re in a great place to use generative AI for new use cases now that we have a proven modular, elastic, and serverless architecture, which is really exciting,” says Surty.

Technologies

Amazon SageMaker Amazon Textract

Partners

CIONET Business Circles

Cyber Circle

CIONET’s Cyber Circle: a new three-event programme exclusively focusing on the most urgent, complex, and high-impact challenges in cybersecurity today. Launched in 2026, this initiative brings together CISOs, CIOs, and senior IT executives with a strong interest in cybersecurity for three curated gatherings each year. As part of CIONET’s trusted executive community, the Cyber Circle provides a confidential, peer-driven environment to exchange insights, share real-world experiences, and address evolving cyber threats. Each session is designed to foster strategic dialogue, strengthen resilience, and elevate cybersecurity as a core driver of business value.

Telenet Business Leadership Circle

The Telenet Business Leadership Circle powered by CIONET, offers a platform where IT executives and thought leaders can meet to inspire each other and share best practices. We want to be a facilitator who helps you optimise the performance of your IT function and your business by embracing the endless opportunities that digital change brings.

Les Rencontres

Découvrez la dynamique du leadership numérique aux Rencontres de CIONET, le programme francophone exclusif de CIONET pour les leaders numériques en Belgique, rendu possible grâce au soutien et à l'engagement de nos partenaires de programme : Deloitte, Denodo et Red Hat. Rejoignez trois événements inspirants par an à Liège, Namur et en Brabant Wallon, où des CIOs et des experts numériques francophones de premier plan partagent leurs perspectives et expériences sur des thèmes d'affaires et de IT actuels. Laissez-vous inspirer et apprenez des meilleurs du secteur lors de sessions captivantes conçues spécialement pour soutenir et enrichir votre rôle en tant que CIO pair. Ne manquez pas cette opportunité de faire partie d'un réseau exceptionnel d'innovateurs numériques !

Female Leadership Circle

CIONET is committed to highlighting and celebrating female role models in IT, Tech & Digital, creating a leadership programme that empowers and elevates women within the tech industry. This initiative is dedicated to showcasing the achievements and successes of leading women, fostering an environment where female role models are recognised, and their contributions can ignite progress and inspire the next generation of women in IT. Our mission is to shine the spotlight a little brighter on female role models in IT, Tech & Digital, and to empower each other through this inner network community.