Banta Earns CIO of the Year Award

Oliver Banta, vice president and chief information officer (CIO) for East Alabama Health, was recognized by AlabamaCIO in Birmingham earlier this month as a 2022 CIO of the Year ORBIE Award winner. Banta, who joined East Alabama Health in March 2019, was nominated by Jeff Buda, the CIO at Atrium Health Floyd in Rome, Georgia. Buda is a previous finalist with Georgia’s CIO awards and Banta served with him on the Georgia HIMSS Board a few years back.

“Winning the award is a testament to the great work EAH did over the past year during the pandemic,” stated Banta, who was joined at the awards ceremony by Molly Proffitt and Jon Jager, both directors in Banta’s division at EAH. “I was privileged to share our story about working with, and for, the communities we serve. The IT team’s dedication to the organization’s mission was demonstrated throughout the pandemic and I couldn’t be more proud to work with them.”

Sarah Nunnelly, an executive vice president and the chief operating officer (COO) for East Alabama Health, expressed her appreciation for Banta following the award ceremony. “Our EAH leadership is extremely proud of Oliver’s accomplishment. The Alabama CIO Leadership Association recognized what we already knew—Oliver is a leader in the rapidly evolving and increasingly complex field of healthcare informatics. In his tenure here so far, Oliver has helped EAH be proactive in how we use technology to enhance our mission, while also remaining vigilant in our IT controls and security mitigation.”

AlabamaCIO recognized chief information officers in five key categories – Leadership, Large Enterprise, Enterprise, Large Corporate and Corporate. Banta received the Enterprise ORBIE for organizations over $600 million annual revenue. “Every organization is technology-dependent, but strong leadership is the X-factor that drives innovation, motivates teams and is the strategic differentiator for success,” said Chris Morrow, AlabamaCIO Chair. “The ORBIE Awards are meaningful because they are judged by peers – CIOs who understand the challenges of technology leadership.”

The CIO of the Year ORBIE Awards is the premier technology executive recognition program in the U.S. Since 1998, over 500 CIO of the Year winners have received the prestigious ORBIE Award. The ORBIE honors CIOs who have demonstrated excellence in technology leadership. Finalists and winners are selected by an independent peer review process, led by prior ORBIE recipients, based upon:

• Leadership and management effectiveness
• Business value created by technology innovation
• Engagement in industry and community endeavors

The AlabamaCIO ORBIE Awards keynote was delivered by Bob DeRodes, Retired Fortune 500 CIO. Nearly 250 guests attended, representing leading Alabama organizations and their technology partners.