ABOUT
Fall Forward - This is my story
Built on falling forward, learning fast, getting back up, and moving on with clarity and courage.
I started working with computers and programming at a very young age. As a teenager, I built my first software program and, in 1992, began my professional career at Randstad Holding as an HR Manager. Early on, I developed a strong belief that technology and people are inseparable drivers of organizational progress.
By 1995, I was training young IT professionals while simultaneously earning one of the most demanding certifications of that time, Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer. This combination of hands-on expertise and leadership capability led me, at the age of 25, to Delta Lloyd Bank, where I worked as a network engineer on OS/2 Warp and NT4 platforms and as a payments engineer responsible for the Interpay landscape across all customer propositions, from retail savings to private banking.
After repeatedly seeking growth and responsibility, I made a deliberate decision to move on and joined Bank Labouchere as Manager ICT Services. Within six months, I was promoted and entrusted with leading the IT Services organization and key strategic initiatives. This period included the merger with Kempen & Co into what became Dexia Bank, a formative experience in large-scale integration and change.
I then stepped outside the financial sector to join a travel organization facing an existential challenge: digitize rapidly or disappear. With over 200 physical offices and no meaningful digital presence, the organization required immediate optimization across search, booking, and operational processes. This experience reinforced my conviction that technology only creates value when it enables business survival and growth.
At Dell Netherlands, I advised C-level leaders across industries on workplace services, infrastructure, security, continuity, and private cloud strategies, operating as a trusted advisor at the intersection of technology and executive decision-making. To further broaden my impact, I joined ConQuaestor Consulting (now part of KPMG Consulting firm) as a Senior Management Consultant, focusing on online business models, operational risk, IT compliance, and outsourcing within the financial services sector.
This work led to some of the most defining assignments of my career: building banks from the ground up. Together with business leaders from banking and insurance, I was asked to step in and help create and operationalize a next-generation, online-only bank. What started as the “Bank van Morgen” initiative became Knab Bank, where I served as CIO and COO through launch and growth.
Seeking the next level of complexity, I joined NIBC Bank as CIO and Managing Director, responsible for large-scale transformation across multiple countries. This was followed by my role as International CIO at NN Group, overseeing technology across 11 countries and leading several cross-border M&A integrations.
Driven by curiosity, I then deliberately stepped outside financial services once more to join KPN, where technology is not an enabler but the core business itself. In the aftermath of COVID, the question was whether telecom could translate its economic relevance into sustained strategic leadership. After two years, amid board changes and a major reorganization, I chose to move on or how I would like to put it: move forward.
Today, I work as an Interim CxO, Guest Lecturer, Public Speaker, Advisor, Supervisory Board Member, and Member of Boards of Trustees. This phase has given me independence, distance, and perspective and most importantly, time: time to reflect, realign, and reinvent, in service of the organizations, leaders, and societal systems I engage with.
Throughout my career, progress was never linear. I learned to fall forward to treat setbacks as momentum, and ambition as responsibility. Even when I aimed for the moon and missed, I moved closer to the stars.
Artie M. Debidien
