Meet our Member: Melanie Gilhooly, Enterprise Risk Manager at Ocado

Melanie Gilhooly joined Ocado to support their risk function in May 2024 and became a member of Risk Leadership Network shortly afterwards. Read the interview to learn more about the biggest challenges she's faced in her first six months in role and how she's tackling them.

Meet Melanie

Melanie Gilhooly

Enterprise Risk Manager, Ocado Group

The interview:

1. What's your role at Ocado? Can you describe your main responsibilities?

Since joining Ocado in May 2024 my priorities (amongst many things) have been to support and evolve the Principal Risk process. I have been building relationships, looking for areas of improvement, and working across the business to ensure the relevant risks are identified, assessed and have effective mitigation strategies in place.

2. You recently took the role of Enterprise Risk Manager — what are you looking forward to bringing to this role?

I have a varied background working across major infrastructure programmes, running quantitative schedule and cost analysis and also working within a large and complex organisation. This offers me a diverse range of skills and experience and lots of ideas on how best to shape and embed an effective risk framework in an evolving technology company.

3. How did you get into risk management? And what do you enjoy about it?

On finishing my degree, I found a job working for a local authority in their safety, emergency and risk management unit. I had the benefit of working alongside a risk leader who is considered an expert within the industry. Their passion and encouragement gave me a solid foundation which I was fortunate enough to build upon. I found that the role offered a huge amount of variety and a bird's eye view of an organisation, which is something I really enjoyed.

4. Have you faced any particular challenges being relatively new in the role?

Ocado has evolved from being primarily a retailer to now focusing on developing technology to offer retail solutions which can support mass online capabilities; so in many ways we are considered a start-up company. Finding the balance between a culture of innovation and informed risk taking has been my biggest challenge to date.

5. What do you think are the main challenges facing risk leaders in the years ahead — and in your sector specifically?

The biggest challenge I see for risk managers is understanding how to harness and exploit the opportunities that Generative AI technologies present. For example, these tools could open up opportunities for automating the production of risk reports, or quickly summarising data to help us streamline our work. However, we also need to remember that AI cannot influence the most important skills for our role; building relationships and collaborating well with others across the organisation.

6. What are you doing at Ocado to make sure that you're in the best place to address those challenges?

I intend to address the challenge by ensuring I am well informed about how the industry and peers are utilising AI technology — Risk Leadership Network have already been supporting me with this by arranging collaborative meetings, case study presentations from peers, and creating bespoke benchmarks. 

I also have the opportunity to shape the AI governance process at Ocado and will use the experts within my own organisation to ensure that the risk function continues to support the business to to the best of our ability.

7. How long have Ocado been a member of Risk Leadership Network? And why did you join? 

Ocado have been a member of Risk Leadership Network since July 2024, a couple of months after I started at the company. I joined through word of mouth, having spoken with other risk professionals who had told me what a valuable service Risk Leadership Network provides for them.

I work within a small risk team and so having access to all the tools, resources and assistance that the network provides has been massively helpful.

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7. What's the biggest value add you get from membership?

I find the opportunities for collaboration extremely helpful. I am often asked within Ocado, what are our peers doing? So being able to 'swap notes' with peers has meant I have been able to gain insights that would have been so difficult to obtain otherwise.

I also find the research and virtual network meetings informative and well timed, as many of us navigate new priorities on a similar timeline (i.e. AI, UK Corporate Governance Code changes).

I also find the support of our Risk Engagement Manager, Duncan, at Risk Leadership Network invaluable. Duncan is proactive and knowledgeable and is very supportive in organising interventions so I can meet my deadlines.

8. Is Risk Leadership Network worth the membership fee? 

Absolutely! So many resources within easy reach, and our Risk Engagement Manager, Duncan, feels like an additional team member supporting our agenda.

9. What would you say to anyone new in their role, thinking of joining Risk Leadership Network?

I would highly recommend any company to join. We all work in small teams in an evolving risk landscape. Having the support of a team of people focused specifically on our goals has been invaluable and a resource I value very highly.

Melanie's risk engagement manager

Upon joining Risk Leadership Network, Melanie's risk team was given a dedicated risk engagement manager from our team, Duncan. Through onboarding and regular catch-ups, Duncan has worked to gain a clear understanding of Ocado's risk priorities and facilitates targeted collaboration to support the team and Melanie directly.

Melanie is a highly experienced risk leader who has been really involved in the network since joining. She attends a lot of collaborative workshops to keep up to date with how her peers are tackling challenges. I also arrange bespoke collaborations specifically to tackle Ocado's risk priorities. Melanie understands the value of giving back and regularly contributes to bespoke benchmarks and collaborations when she has knowledge and practical experiences to share."

Duncan Wood

Melanie's risk engagement manager, Risk Leadership Network

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