ACT digital chief departs for the UK

Canberra’s inaugural chief digital officer Jon Cumming has revealed he will leave the whole-of-government role after more than two years to move to the UK.

Cumming, who was the first government CDO appointed in Australia to be given cross-agency responsibility, will work his last day for the ACT government on Tuesday.

He posted on LinkedIn over the weekend that it was “time to self disrupt” and move to London.

"After two and a half years in the Australian Capital Territory we are leaving our Canberra life and moving to London. For the first time in seven years our whole family will be living in the same city,” he said.

He said he would initially take a sabbatical but was looking forward to expanding his UK network while he gets settled.

During his tenure Cumming delivered the ACT’s digital strategy, which is focused on shifting the territory government to the cloud and common platforms in order to help directorates quickly ramp services up and down.

He has also overseen the ongoing development of the government-wide digital services platform iConnect and a data lake pilot for securely sharing government data.

Prior to joining the ACT public service, Cumming spent almost seven years as the CIO of New Zealand’s Department of Corrections, where he pushed cloud computing and mobile-first programs.

The ACT is now looking for a new CDO to oversee its digital direction. There is no formal interim acting arranagement in place.