IT Leader’s Fast-5: Ron Guerrier, Save the Children US

In this installment of the IT Leaders Fast-5 — InformationWeek’s column for IT professionals to gain peer insights — Ron Guerrier, CTO at Save the Children US, discusses why disciplined data governance is foundational in global organizations — especially when deploying AI platforms.

Guerrier has decades of experience leading technology at scale across the public and private sectors. Before joining Save the Children US, he was global CIO at HP, CIO at Toyota Financial Services International Corp., and CIO and secretary of innovation and technology for the State of Illinois.

At Save the Children — which operates in three-quarters of the world’s countries — he is modernizing core ERP and financial systems while navigating a patchwork of international data sovereignty rules. A speaker at the World Economic Forum in Davos last year and at London Climate Action Week, he has called for greater consistency in global data governance standards.

In this conversation, he reflects on those data and governance challenges. Guerrier discusses the importance of building AI capability from within, and how a book about expanding digital equity in the Global South reshaped his Ph.D. work — reinforcing his belief that widening AI access in historically lower-income and developing regions could help drive major breakthroughs.

This column has been edited for clarity and space.

The Decision That Mattered

What recent decision — technical or organizational — has made the biggest difference, and why?

Mandatory AI training. There was a reluctance [from employees], but it’s about building up your IQ when it comes to AI. I need everyone to be comfortable with what AI is, and more importantly, what it isn’t.

We rolled out AI training modules because telling people to get trained but not giving them the tools to do it isn’t helpful. Everyone is required to do the responsible AI module, that’s a no-brainer and a mandate. Then there’s different levels of training, including foundational training and training on data protection. There are also power users that get agentic AI training, like how to create an AI agent. Lastly, every one of our executives is going to get training. Our CEO went to an executive training where she was taught rudimentary Python and practiced creating a bot. As our CEO becomes comfortable with it, it shows other people that it’s OK for them to use AI.

The AI trainings launched today, but it took two and a half months of crossing the t’s, dotting the i’s and making sure legal is fine with it. It was a huge collaboration.

The Hard-Won Lesson

What didn’t go as planned recently — and what did it force you to rethink?

We’re working on a huge ERP [enterprise resource planning system] project and are going to upgrade our financial management system. We need to really home in on our data integration when it comes to the ERP, because that is the fuel behind financial management systems, our CRM and back office. That’s where we always struggle — making sure we get the data analytics right.

Now that we have AI in the forefront, there’s more awareness around how important data is. There were some hiccups, but now we’re having more global discussions on data analytics, and we’re looking at a master data management program. It was a wake-up call that we need to do data management right, or we’re putting a new platform on a really archaic data infrastructure.

The Talent Trade-Off

Where are you investing in talent right now — and what are you consciously not investing in?

AI dominates things right now, so we’re upskilling folks to be agentic AI administrators, or sys admins. These are people that we already have on staff that are already doing machine learning, or they’re already doing robotic process automation. AI is just kind of an upgrade of those basic systems that we’ve been doing for years.

The reason I want to upskill people within [the organization] is because they understand the data and the business the best. It’s a very hard skill set to fill — finding people who understand both the business and the technology. Agentic AI is clearly the next frontier we need to get right.

The External Signal

What recent external development is most likely to change how your organization operates, even indirectly?

I would say data governance — and it’s not only in the US. The differences, for example, between GDPR and Pan-African data sovereignty rules — all that comes into play. We work in three-quarters of all countries, we’re pretty much everywhere. As we start using more data, digital and AI tools, data sovereignty becomes more of an issue. Where is data at rest? Where can we transport it across lines? It’s a puzzle of rules right now.

One of the things I talked about when I spoke at Davos last year — and also at London Climate Action Week — is that we need some consistency when it comes to data, governance and the rules for how we operate across political lines. It’s still somewhat opaque. I live in Chicago, but 90 minutes north in Milwaukee — the state rules on data might differ between Wisconsin and Illinois. That further complicates the ability to create some standards.

The Perspective Shift
What have you read, watched or listened to recently that changed how you think about leadership or technology — even slightly?

I read this book called “From Pessimism to Promise” by Dr. Payal Arora, and it just really resonated with me. It changed the whole way I was going to do my dissertation — I’m working toward a doctorate from the University of South California’s Rossier School of Education. I got so enamored with the book that when I found out that the author’s book tour was coming to Chicago, I went. She signed my copy, and I said, “One day, when I’m doing my dissertation, I want you to be on my committee.” I went back to her about a year later, and now she’s one of my dissertation committee members.

The premise of the book is that if we could unlock AI and digital equity to the Global South — the Brazils, Indias and Africas of the world — they could unlock so much more. Her idea is that [these populations] tend to be more innovative because of scarcity.

That opened my mind completely and changed my approach to my dissertation. If we do this right and unlock AI for the Global South, we could give them an ability to help us make major breakthroughs.