CIO – Enterprise Platforms — Enterprise-Operations Centre

The mandate

A Krakow enterprise-operations centre requires stronger architecture, integration and platform-operations leadership. Critical workflows depend on these platforms, release queues are lengthening, and an upcoming operating migration will add load to the same infrastructure. The executive committee created a broader CIO seat outside the annual plan to establish clearer ownership and deepen engineering capability ahead of that transition.

The CIO – Enterprise Platforms will lead a technology ecosystem supporting approximately 2,625 employees and material partners within a services perimeter near PLN 1.1 billion. Direct scope includes workflow, integration, operational data, low-code governance, platform reliability, architecture, technical vendors and engineering capability. Group IT owns core infrastructure and workplace; process executives own business controls. The CIO owns the shared platforms and the quality of technical decisions connecting them.

The immediate challenge is to restore informed client-side authority while respecting services that cannot be changed abruptly. Some vendor capacity must remain during recovery. The CIO should separate legitimate specialist support from outsourced product ownership, secure source and configuration knowledge and create a path to reduce dependency without destabilising production.

The migration cannot wait for a perfect target state. The leader must establish safe interim patterns, reserve engineering capacity for hidden dependencies and be prepared to defer specific process waves whose recovery, performance or data lineage cannot be demonstrated.

Low-code and citizen-developed solutions require a differentiated approach. Some are harmless personal aids; others now move regulated data or trigger operational decisions. The CIO will classify them by consequence, provide supported patterns for legitimate local innovation and bring critical components into professional ownership. Blanket prohibition would drive activity underground, while blanket acceptance would perpetuate the very dependencies the role was created to resolve.

Why this seat is open

This urgent, unplanned role has no predecessor. Technology responsibilities were divided among functional heads until capability loss revealed the need for one enterprise platform authority. Interim operational cover is in place, but it cannot make architecture, investment and senior hiring choices. The board seeks an appointment within eight weeks before the next migration wave.

What you will own

• Establish ownership, dependency, source, configuration, recovery and support records for every critical platform.
• Contain unsupported interfaces, credentials and low-code components according to business consequence.
• Rebuild architecture, platform product, reliability and engineering leadership in Krakow.
• Define the boundary between group infrastructure, enterprise platforms, process technology and vendor services.
• Negotiate vendor knowledge transfer, access, service evidence and exit obligations.
• Set release, observability, incident and technical-debt practices proportionate to platform criticality.
• Assess migration readiness and delay waves whose platform risk exceeds approved tolerance.
• Govern platform investment and unit economics with process and finance leaders.

The first 12 months

Within 45 days, the CIO will identify the 30 most consequential dependencies and assign interim owners. By day 90, severe support and access gaps will have containment, the permanent organisation will be agreed and the migration portfolio will carry platform-readiness decisions rather than assumed dates.

By month eight, priority platforms should operate common reliability and release practices, pivotal permanent leaders should be appointed and vendors should begin formal knowledge transfer. At least one unsupported interface family will be replaced or retired, including its access and contract obligations.

At year-end, all critical platforms should have tested recovery, severe change-related incidents should fall by 30% and vendor-held sole knowledge should be eliminated for priority services. Release lead time should improve by 25%, addressable external run cost by 12% and migration commitments should remain within tolerance after approved risk-based resequencing.

What the board will measure

• Restored client-side technology authority and visible reduction in key-person dependence.
• Platform resilience and safe migration decisions under operating pressure.
• Vendor knowledge, access and economics brought under accountable governance.
• Retirement of unsupported components rather than growth of an indefinite containment estate.
• Technical leadership, succession and pivotal-engineer retention.

The person

You are a CIO, enterprise-platform leader or senior technology-services executive who has recovered an estate after capability loss. You can work constructively with strategic vendors while reclaiming decisions that should never have left the enterprise. Experience in workflow-heavy global operations, integration platforms, regulated services or financial technology is relevant.

You bring 22–28 years of experience and have controlled at least PLN 630 million while leading technology supporting 1,850 employees or more. Evidence should include a migration you delayed for hidden dependency risk, a vendor knowledge transfer that survived staff change and a critical interface estate you simplified without service loss.

The position is onsite in Krakow because recovery requires direct work with engineers, vendors and operations.

Compensation and terms

Base compensation is PLN 1.4–1.9 million plus annual incentive and long-term incentives. Performance will combine recovery, reliability, migration judgement, external-cost release and successor depth. An unchanged migration date is not itself success. Final terms reflect scope and current mix and include standard vesting and risk protections.

Confidentiality

The platforms, vendors, migration and employer identity are confidential. Qualified candidates receive controlled technical details after mutual interest and an undertaking. The Krakow location and rounded support perimeter must not be treated as identifiers.