Meet Trailblazer Heather McDermott, IT Programs Manager
Tell us a bit about your role and responsibilities?
As the IT Programs Manager, I head up the IT Project Management office to govern the delivery of application development work at BINGO. This means that when the business wants/needs changes to existing systems, or wants to replace old systems or implement new applications, the business will work with me to ensure the IT team can deliver the necessary solution.
For the past three years, I’ve been leading the system transformation program to rollout Go-Collect, CRM, FSC and MyBINGO to all business units across BINGO. I’m very fortunate to work with wonderfully talented and dedicated people in IT as well as the many gifted and committed people in our business.
What made you join BINGO?
One of the great benefits of working in IT is the variety of engagements and industries where you can gain experience in, especially as an IT Project and Program Manager. I had previously heard somewhere that ‘If you want to make money, go into garbage’ indicating there’s huge potential for growth and expansion in the waste industry. It’s an industry currently transitioning to a circular economy and it’s great to see BINGO’s ambition and vision of a waste free Australia come to life.
What was your role when you first joined and any career progression since?
I started at BINGO in 2019 as the Project Manager for MyBINGO, a customer web portal and mobile app which provides customers with self-service capability and easy interaction with BINGO services and products. The following year, I was asked to take up the IT Programs Manager position and lead the Systems Transformations Program (STP) to replace our core operational systems – which were BinWatch, CommWatch, Drivers’ Apps, NAV and BINGO-Live.
What are some of the challenges and opportunities in your role?
I have had my fair share of challenges on the STP program. It’s a little over three years since we embarked on the journey and what a roller-coaster ride it’s been. The biggest challenge by far was realising two years into the program that outsourcing the development of a custom and very complex solution like GO-Collect to a vendor was not working. So we had to pivot and give our BINGO development team the control to design and build GO-Collect.
There are many opportunities that I have personally benefitted from like having access to meet and build relationships with all the operational and sales teams, to learn the processes that make up the BINGO business, and to be exposed to the amazing innovation and potential to leverage technology to reach our strategic objectives.
Tell us more about the team you lead, and some of the achievements.
We started in September 2020 with a much larger team, with four distinct project teams for Go-Collect, CRM, FSC and MyBINGO. Each project partnered with a technical vendor to develop and customise these new applications for the BINGO business:
- MyBINGO went live in Jan 2021
- FSC and CRM went live in May 2021
- GO-Collect, CRM (upgrade) and FSC (upgrade) went live in October 2023 for B&D Recycling and C&I
- We are working hard to build the B&D Skips functionality to ensure all operational teams move onto the new platforms of GO-Collect, Weigh2GO, GODriver, CRM, FSC and MyBINGO in 2024
- Our IT team including our many contract staff, led by Chief Information Officer Declan Hogan, is a truly resilient, courageous and talented group of individuals.
What are you most excited about at BINGO and our industry?
My most passionate goal for BINGO is to ensure we can decommission the legacy systems of BinWatch, CommWatch, Drivers’ Apps, NAV and BINGO-Live, by successfully rolling out STP across all states in 2024. I’m painfully aware of the operational issues of having to juggle multiple systems, so I’m excited to know we are very close to reaching this goal. As hard as it will be for the business to transition to new systems, I firmly believe that BINGO will be in a better position to support the growth and challenges ahead.
The waste industry is such an exciting arena to be part of with new insights and opportunities abound. I’m very grateful to BINGO for the personal growth and understanding that I’ve acquired of the business and the industry.
What kind of a leader are you?
I would like to be a leader that grows and enables other leaders, but I’m still learning to become a better leader. I’d like to think that I lead by example and communicate effectively with my team so they clearly understand their roles and objectives, and know that I’m always willing and ready to remove any obstacles that stand in the way of their productivity.
What is the most important attribute that you think people should bring to their job?
Enthusiasm.
What do you enjoy outside of work?
My four beautiful children are my pride and joy and I try to be fit and active to keep up with them. That means we go camping, ice skating, treetop zip-lining, indoor rock climbing and to the beach.
Do you have a personal mantra? If so, what is it?
Talent is God-given, be humble. Fame/recognition is Man-given, be thankful. Conceit is Self-given, be careful.
Any other career advice you’d like to share?
Change is the only constant in life, so always move forward by learning and embracing every opportunity and failure that comes your way. Your biggest growth opportunities come from failures. So don’t be afraid to unpack it and see what it is that you should learn from it and then move forward.
