David Lister CIO50 2009

David Lister joined the National Grid in March 2009 and is responsible for the vast IT infrastructure that underpins the giant utility company.

Lister told silicon.com: "It's a great time to be joining National Grid, there are dramatic changes in the industry from the increasing renewables and nuclear agenda, to smart grids and smart metering."

Before joining National Grid Lister was chief architect for Royal Bank of Scotland, where he was responsible for the delivery of centralised back office services, including IT for the banking group's many brands such as Churchill, Direct Line and NatWest.

Lister also spent almost four years at Reuters where he put in place a global tech platform and cut IT costs.

Prior to that, Lister was at Boots, where he overhauled the health and beauty retailer's IT strategy with a £300m modernisation programme and major outsourcing deal with IBM.

"Many people have looked at my career and thought David is about cost cutting but I would argue it is about delivering fantastic enabling capability, that enables business growth and delivers productivity benefits, " he said.

Lister trained as an architect before moving into IT in local government and then the chemicals industry. A spell in management consultancy at Coopers & Lybrand followed, before joining Guinness where he spent 10 years in senior IT roles, including two-and-a-half years in Seville where he had to learn Spanish.

He then joined Glaxo Wellcome just before the pharmaceutical giant's merger with SmithKline Beecham.