Margaret Brisbane, a member of the SouthFloridaCIO team and director of the Information Technology Department for Miami Dade County in Florida, is the 2023 South Florida winner of the Large Enterprise ORBIE award. She received the award at a celebratory event on June 9, 2023, at The Diplomat Beach Resort.
The Large Enterprise Award
Brisbane received the Large Enterprise ORBIE for her work as the CIO/Director of Miami-Dade County’s Information Technology Department. This award is presented to CIOs of enterprises with over $5 billion in annual revenue. As CIO, Brisbane heads a team of IT professionals charged with servicing the county’s technology needs, chiefly in security, platforms, and applications. She also leads administrative staff in supporting the operations of county departments, providing enterprise solutions for financial, payroll, human resources, public safety, legislative, commerce, and PeopleSoft systems.
First Woman/Person Of Color to Serve as County’s CIO
Before becoming the CIO/Director of Miami-Dade’s IT department, Jamaican-born Margaret Brisbane was appointed as its interim CIO when the former CIO Angel Petisco retired, becoming the first woman and the first person of color to serve in that position. She was previously appointed the department’s
deputy director in 2020 and before that, she worked as the county’s assistant IT director under Petisco, who became CIO in 2009. During the 14 years she worked with Petisco, she supervised more than 250 staff members in support of critical systems and county agencies. She managed a budget of $57 million and developed the county’s enterprise and IT architecture strategies. Brisbane also led technology event programming such as eMerge, an annual technology and entrepreneurial conference that attracted over 15,000 participants in 2019.
Education and Experience
Brisbane attended St. Hilda’s Diocesan High School in Browns Town, Saint Ann, before attaining a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Florida International University (FIU), majoring in International Marketing. She also earned a master’s degree in Business Administration with Honors from Nova Southeastern University. Before working with the county, Brisbane was Director of Vendor Management and Service Delivery for Burger King where she led international outsourcing efforts in hardware, software, network, and support services.
Professional Achievements and Honors
Brisbane received the Torch Award from FIU and was named “Female Technology Leader of the Year” by the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce. She also received the “Ones to Watch” award from the CIO Executive Council. She is a member of the Technology Committee for the Greater Chamber of Commerce and the Beacon Council and has served as co-chair of the Community Services Committee for the Florida International University (FIU) Alumni Circle. She serves as co-chair for the yearly United Way Women’s Leadership breakfast event and chair of the IT Women Virtual Mentoring Program. She established a mentoring program involving the county IT department and the IT Academy of a local high school that has been operating for a decade. In 2007-2008, Brisbane was the chair of the Greater Chamber of Commerce Leadership Miami Program and a member of its executive committee for seven years.
Recognizing the importance of CIOs
The ORBIE Award was first presented in 1998 to honor Chief Information Officers (CIOs) who are central to business transformation in all organizations. As technology has increasingly served as the engine driving innovation and growth in all industries and sectors of the global economy, the ORBIEs recognize that it is the CIOs who facilitate change by enabling technology initiatives in their organizations. Since 1998, more than 500 individuals have been named CIO of the Year and presented with the ORBIE throughout the United States. In 2023, ORBIEs were presented to CIOs in Florida in the Global, Large Enterprise, Enterprise, Corporate, Nonprofit/Public Sector, and Leadership categories.
