Defence Leaders: Senior Leaders
Dr Peter Lawrence
Chief Information Officer (CIO)
Dr Peter Lawrence was appointed to the role of Chief Information Officer in November 2012. Prior to joining the Australian Public Service he had a long career in the private sector working for Royal Dutch Shell, ANZ and Origin Energy.
Dr Lawrence graduated from the University of Bath with a PhD in Chemistry in 1989, prior to that he completed a BSc in Chemistry at the University of Nottingham from 1982-1985. Upon graduating with his PhD he joined Royal Dutch Shell in London and embarked on a career of 18 years with them. During this time he held a wide variety of roles of increasing seniority and global reach based in the UK, Australia and Japan. These included: Managing Director, Shell Services International Japan; Operations Manager IT Professional Services Asia Pacific Middle East, Shell IT International; and Country Manager IT, Shell Australia.
In 2007 he joined the ANZ Bank based in Melbourne as the Head of IT Infrastructure. After less than a year role in the role he moved to be the Chief Information Officer for ANZ New Zealand based in Wellington covering all of the business activities in New Zealand across the Retail, Agricultural, Commercial and Institutional banking business.
Upon returning from New Zealand in 2011 Dr Lawrence joined Origin Energy, based in Melbourne, as the Group Manager IT, supporting the Energy Markets business covering the Generation, Wholesale, Trading, LPG and Retail parts of the business.
He is married with two children, a son and a daughter. When time permits he enjoys watching most sport, keeping fit, and travelling.