Leader’s Corner: Danny Attias, London Business School

From childhood fascination to leading digital transformations, discover the principles that shape Danny Attias’ leadership and his vision for the future.

London Business School's Chief Digital Information Officer, Danny Attias, paints his career journey with one word: targeted. Describing it as methodical and clear in direction, Attias attributes his success to a purposeful approach, shaped by a childhood fascination with technology.

Watch the full Leader's Corner interview with Danny Attias:

Leader’s Corner insights with Danny Attias

From an early age, Attias was drawn to the transformative power of technology, recalling his affinity for the BBC micro, B computer at the age of eight. 

Despite his passion, he chose to pursue a degree in Chemical Engineering, only to find that technology was his true calling. Opting for a career in technology, Attias discovered both enjoyment and challenges.

“Some might say tech is not always easy. I would say the tech is always easy. The people are hard, the culture is hard, the politics is hard.”

There are always going to be some challenges with technology, but Danny argued that, relatively speaking, technology is the “easiest part of the formula when it comes to tech management or tech leadership.”

As a result Danny puts most of his energy into the people, not the technology, and allows them the space, tools and opportunities to grow and develop into the technologists they want to become. 

“Different people want to be managed in a different way and so you adapt that and you learn from it.”

When considering how to stay ahead of the curve when it comes to trends and innovations, he argued that: “You can go down rabbit holes if you are just becoming obsessive about Gen AI or historically around blockchain or quantum computing.”

He wants technology leaders to consider whether or not they are utilising the technology they have at their disposal. “Are we thinking about process efficiency? Are we applying automation in a sensible way? Are we managing our data?”

When it comes to organisational priorities for the future, he commented that being a decades old educational establishment, London Business School “has not been at the forefront of digital innovation”.

His plan is to start taking care of basic hygiene, also focusing on the student staff, and alumni experience. “So starting with that end goal in mind, how can we make incremental improvements to the customer journey, the customer experience?”

When thinking about the next Danny Attias, he said: 

“My advice to anyone who is in a technical role… downplay the tech, bring up the people, bring up the culture, understand the business, understand the finances and really think about communication, storytelling and influencing.”