Anita Virjala

Head of IT PMO & Architecture, Chief of Staff to CIO @Nutanix || Strategy & Planning || Sourcing & Procurement || Head of Office of the CIO || Business Operations

San Francisco Bay Area

About

Proven executive with experience in Data Centers, AI, SaaS, FinTech, Digital and Technology organizations from Silicon Valley companies Cisco, GE, E*Trade, NYSE/ICE/Ellie Mae, Jamf and Nutanix in building efficient organizations that are responsible for Strategy, Planning, Business Operations, Solution Delivery, PMO, Budgeting, M&A - Acquisition Integrations, Sourcing & Procurement, Vendor Management, Technical Leadership and Engineering. Experienced leader in o Establishing Program Management Office (PMO) o Defining strategy, long-term goals & OKRs in partnership with C-leaders/leadership team o Translating high-level strategy into operational plans, initiatives, and metrics o Leading sourcing & procurement organization (&VMO ~$300M) o Transformational programs using Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) - e.g: Quote to Cash, StateRamp o Being trusted advisor for CIO/CTO/CDO and support special projects & day-to-day business operations o Portfolio management, program management, project management, change management, communication o M&A - Acquisition Due Diligence, Integration from Announce to Close to Full Integration o Leading steering committees for executives collaboration and to remove roadblocks o Budget management, vendor mgmt, business operations reviews o Yearly and quarterly planning, org capacity planning, resource planning o Tracking performance metrics, defining OKRs & KPIs o Developing talent, mentoring, building high performing teams o Staff operations such hiring, retaining, location strategy o Presentations to C-level executives, board presentations o Navigating ambiguity and creating clarity

Experience

  • Head of IT PMO and Chief of Staff to CIO at Nutanix
    Oct 2025 - Present · 10 mos

    As a Head of PMO, Architecture & Chief of Staff reporting to CIO in Engineering org, I am responsible for:  Building PMO function with a high-performing team of Architects and TPMs  Leading long range plans, transformational plans, annual planning, budgeting, staff operations, technology strategy and planning  Be an advisor for CIO in all strategic and operational initiatives   Establishing governance, standardizing methodologies, solutioning architecture  End-to-end execution of all IT related programs & operations including : o Designed & deployed scalable GPU Clusters (HGX, MGX, B300, RTX 6000) in Nutanix Data Centers o AI Programs for Enterprise, identifying usecases, tool evaluation and implementation (Glean, Gemini, Copilot etc,.) o Datacenter deployment programs, networking, infrastructure (DC scalability, reservation system, lifecycle mgmt, asset inventory, network segmentation etc,.) o Cloud Operations & Mgmt including FinOps (AWS, Azure, GCP) o End user computing (ITOM, MDM, Software asset mgmt (SAM) etc,.) o Cybersecurity (AI Security, Zero Trust, conditional access, DLP etc,.) o Business Applications & Integrations (ServiceNow, Workato, Workday, Oracle, etc,.) o Stakeholder management, Communication and Change mgmt

  • Vice President, Strategy, Planning & Procurement || Chief of Staff to CIO || PMO at Jamf
    Mar 2022 - Oct 2025 · 3 yrs 8 mos

    1. HEAD OF OFFICE OF THE CIO reporting to CIO: • Lead Strategy & Planning org(~20+ team), help translate vision into strategy. • Be an advisor for CIO on all things related to technology strategy, roadmap, benchmarking w/Gartner tools, presentations, annual planning w/FP&A, review of actuals vs budget, T&E, resource planning, staff operations, performance mgmt., planning & execution supporting all functions reporting to CIO- InfoSec, IT, Applications, Facilities, Operations. • Lead Project & Program mgmt(PMO) of enterprise projects that impact all Jamf incl. transformational projects such as ERP implementation, Quote-to-Cash, StateRamp, transforming onboarding & offboarding experience, M&A - acquisition integration, agile transformation. • Established portfolio governance, intake framework, ServiceNow SPM, OKR, KPI & metrics-driven dashboards for throughput & project velocity. 2. HEAD OF GLOBAL PROCUREMENT in Finance: •Built centralized sourcing & procurement org w/scalable supplier ecosystems, category management for best-in-class pricing in all spend categories: hardware, software, cloud, legal services, temp workforce, telecom, infra, marketing events, facilities leases, HR’s Employee of Record (EOR) & more. •Defined sourcing & procurement strategy aligning to business goals, cost savings targets, governance, RFP framework, built policies, standards for vendor engagement, ESG, vendor relationships & QBRs. •Implemented AI-driven vendor risk mgmt(ORO Labs) reducing vendor onboarding time by 20%, dashboards & spend analysis for forecasting, cost transparency & real-time tracking. •Led procurement M&A integration, SLA enforcement, contract negotiations, contract dispute management, cost optimization, application rationalization, budget tracking, T&E policy enforcement (Concur) & risk compliance. •Led Procure-to-Pay transformation (Oracle Fusion) improving cycle time by 25%, streamlined payment process, contract review process, compliance& audit readiness.

  • Sr. Director IT - Head of Office of the CIO at Intercontinental Exchange (ICE)
    Sep 2019 - Feb 2022 · 2 yrs 6 mos

    Ellie Mae was acquired by New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) owner, Intercontinental Exchange (ICE). As a Head of Office of the CIO and a trusted advisor to CIO, I • Built the PMO organization that was responsible for delivering about 50+ strategic projects that were cross functional. • Led multiple acquisition integrations that impacted about 3500 employees’ tools, apps, and processes in 4 different countries. Built playbook, 30-60-90 day plans • Be a Chief of Staff to CIO in supporting special projects, taking care of staff operations, presentations, all hands, analytics & reports etc,. • Managed the organization’s annual budget. • Led sourcing and procurement org. Engaged multiple resellers & vendors for competitive pricing that resulted in 15% cost savings. Key responsibilities include:  Running the Office of the CIO o Budget management & approvals for the organization budget of ~ $75MM, own the P&L, vendor management o IT roadmap & strategy, IT Communications, Business operations, metrics, operational reviews o Staff Operations, hiring, retaining, location strategy, performance ratings o Annual and quarterly planning, IT Annual Reports, C-level presentations o Trusted advisor for CIO & leadership team  Leading PMO organization o Program and project management of IT Infra & Ops, InfoSec, back office, and front office applications projects with the project success rate of 100% o Portfolio management, governance & prioritization, capacity planning o Develop strategy to remove org inefficiencies o Change management, risk mgmt., BCP, DR plans o Partnerships with cross functional leadership teams such as Finance, HR, Security, Engineering, Cloud Operations, Legal  Leading Acquisition Integrations o Due Diligence, 30-60-90-day plans, playbook, integration roadmap o Gap analysis, documenting requirements & solutions, vendor evaluation, project execution, integration  Special Projects o Examples: Return to office readiness, security & compliance, Soc audits

  • Director, Technology Business Operations & Chief of Staff to CTO at E*TRADE
    Mar 2018 - Aug 2019 · 1 yr 6 mos

    Application Development(AppDev) org has 500+ resources responsible for delivering technology solutions for Etrade. My responsibilities as a Director, Biz Ops & Chief of Staff reporting to SVP of AppDev - CTO were: o Manage budget of $75MM/yr and staff operations of 500+ resources org o Own the business operations and P&L of AppDev org, be the trusted advisor for SVP of AppDev and leadership team, provide insights, recommendations, vision & mission o Product and Program management, drive operational excellence, agile adoption o Maintain confidentiality in handling sensitive information o Keep all orgs in AppDev aligned to key strategic priorities, define & measure KPIs o Manage contract negotiations, purchase orders, invoices, payments, vendor relationships o Define & drive strategic technical initiatives as Developer Productivity & special projects o Prepare presentations for board meetings, exec communications, o Drive growth, diversity hiring, interns & college hire, compensation discussions, performance rating calibration, and location strategy for the org o Lead talent mgmt, training, career development, coordinating with Head of Talent mgmt o Manage strategic off-sites, quarterly operations reviews, quarterly & yearly planning

  • Sr. Business Operations Leader - Office of the Chief Data Officer at GE Digital
    2016 - 2018 · 2 yrs

    Sr. Business Operations Leader – Data & Analytics Platform Responsible for • Being advisor for SVP on organizational strategy, special projects, process improvements • Managing ~$70M+ Budget, yearly planning, cost optimizations, metrics & reporting • Pricing strategy and Liquidation of Data Lake platform services such as Greenplum, Pivotal and Hortonwoks Hadoop, Talend licenses, Tableau licenses. • Client engagement with all GE business teams such as Power, Aviation, Finance, CoreTech etc,. regarding liquidation of Data Lake platform • Program management, cost reductions, process optimizations, strategy, resource planning, program planning, client engagement, metrics, KPIs and executive presentations • Contract negotiations, purchase orders creation and invoices mgmt • Staff operations, hiring, coaching and mentoring team members