Rising to challenges by exploiting technological advance: Innovation 2026 Bitesize Insights
As we approach this year’s Innovation conference and exhibition, taking place on 24 and 25 March 2026 in London, we asked the event’s speakers to tell us what innovation-related topics they’re most looking forward to discussing – and the insights that will help drive their priorities forward in the months ahead.
Here, we pull together responses from chief information and digital officers from the governments of Canada, the UK and Ireland, focusing on harnessing the pace of technological change to tackle the world’s challenges.
Dominic Rochon, chief information officer of Canada, said he is looking forward to participating in the panel session ‘Scaling AI: From isolated examples to system-wide impact‘ at Innovation.
“This discussion goes well beyond technology, focusing on critical enablers such as data quality and governance, workforce readiness, and effective change management. I’m keen to learn from other governments on how they are moving from pilots to sustainable, enterprise-wide transformation,” he said.
He added that he is also looking forward to the conference discussions on defence, security, cyber, and resilience – a new stream for this year’s event – “and how these increasingly interconnected issues come together within a broader national and international digital ecosystem. Conferences like Innovation provide valuable spaces to explore how governments are responding in a coordinated and strategic way”.
He sets out that governments around the world are operating “in a challenging and rapidly evolving digital environment, shaped by complex ecosystems, overlapping mandates, and competing priorities” and that at the same time there is “growing pressure to deliver greater efficiency, productivity, and value for money while continuing to modernise services”.
As such, he said he keen to learn how colleagues and peers at Innovation are navigating these pressures. “As we continue to operate in this period of heightened complexity, these kind of practical insights into effective collaboration and prioritisation are invaluable.”
More about Innovation 2026
Innovation is a unique exhibition and conference that brings together government leaders from across the globe responsible for the transformation and acceleration of their public sector organisations and services.
Held on 24 and 25 March 2026 at Excel in London, the event is co-hosted by the UK Government, UK Civil Service and the Cabinet Office. It covers innovation across a range of topics, including data, digital transformation, workforce, culture, sustainability, and much more. This year for the first time, as well as the central government agenda, Innovation will include a dedicated programme for the defence, security, cyber and resilience industries, and the health sector.
Find out more about Innovation 2026 and register to attend here
Like Rochon, Charles Ewen, director of technology, chief information officer and senior information risk officer at the Met Office – the UK’s national weather and climate service – also alludes to the challenges facing governments and the accelerating pace of change.
“As a lifelong engineer, technologist and leader, I have never seen a time where the world is as radically changing. There are many challenges that we face in terms of geopolitics, climate change and socio-economics, however, technological advance is also accelerating faster than ever before,” he said. “I think it is imperative that we rise to the challenges ahead by developing and exploiting technological advance to the best possible extent.”
He added that “as any leader will know, change is complex and crosses the realms of people, process and technology”, and that, as such, he is particularly interested in having conversations with and gaining insights from peers on how to “go faster”.
“Of course, ‘going faster’ should be something that is enriching to people and society and not something that drives anxiety and concern,” he emphasised. “Anything that adds or informs that thinking will be fantastic!”
He said the Met Office has an “exciting and ambitious” new strategy that is about finding ways to accelerate the work of its people, from pioneering research to delivering tangible value for the UK.
“We are in the process of transformation having re-imagined the organisation to be more innovative, customer and value focussed and purposeful towards key UK risks and priorities,” he said. “In some sense, the tech is the easy bit and [at Innovation] I will be looking for other examples and ideas of where this has been done and learn from them.”
Read more: Innovation 2026 a ‘groundbreaking gathering’, says Cat Little in invite to civil servants
Shafiqa Dawood is chief digital and technology officer at the UK Department for Education. She said she is excited to explore practical ways to turn innovation into real world impact “not just the new shiny solution or tooling, but new ways of working, collaborating, and delivering outcomes that people feel in their everyday lives”.
Her priority this year is to continue getting digital foundations in place “which allow us to scale intelligently, integrate emerging AI capabilities, and deliver on both today’s customer needs, and the strategic opportunities we want to unlock in the years ahead”.
Her ethos, she added, “is to move away from single bespoke solutions to a culture of ‘build once’ and instead, reuse, repurpose and recycle, maximising value for the taxpayer”.
Barry Lowry, chief information officer of the Government of Ireland, says he is looking forward to learning from peers at the networking and discussion opportunities offered at Innovation.
He said he is currently working on completing the launch process for the Ireland Government Digital Wallet and further developing and exploiting its data assets.
Read the first article from this series – Aligning digital innovation with the needs of public administration: Innovation 2026 Bitesize Insights – and look out for our next batch of insights to be published soon.
The Innovation speakers quoted in this article will feature in the following sessions at the event:
Dominic Rochon, deputy minister and chief information officer of Canada and Shafiqa Dawood, chief digital and technology officer at the UK Department for Education, will be on the panel for ‘Scaling AI: From isolated examples to system-wide impact’.
Charles Ewen, director of technology, chief information officer and senior information risk officer at the Met Office, UK, will be on the panel for ‘Quantum leap: How governments are preparing now’.
Barry Lowry, chief information officer of the Government of Ireland, will give a keynote address on ‘Ireland’s journey to life events’, and will be on the panel for ‘Driving greater productivity across government’.
Find out more about the agenda and register for Innovation 2026 here
About Mia Hunt
Mia has been editor of globalgovernmentforum.com since 2019. She has 15 years’ experience as a journalist and editor and specialises in writing for civil and public servants worldwide, including covering sustainability policy and related issues. She has led the Global Government Women’s Network since it launched in 2023. Previously, she covered commercial property having been market reports and supplements editor at Property Week and deputy editor at Retail Destination. She graduated from Kingston University London with a first-class honours degree in journalism and was part of the team that produced The River newspaper, which won Publication of the Year at the Guardian Student Media Awards in 2010.
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