Shilpa Visrolia
Auckland,New Zealand
Summary
Resilience and continuity leader with over a decade of experience strengthening technology recovery and risk oversight/assurance across complex, regulated banking environments. Recognised across Westpac Group for delivering measurable results, embedding resilient by design practices, and meeting the highest standards of regulatory compliance. Brings technical depth, trusted stakeholder relationships, and a forward-looking approach that integrates innovation, automation, and continuous improvement into disaster recovery. Passionate about creating systems and teams that stay calm, coordinated, and capable under pressure.
Overview
20
20
years of professional experience
1
1
Certification
Work History
Service Owner - Disaster Recovery
Westpac New Zealand
01.2016 - 12.2025
- Enhanced regulatory compliance: Ensured 100% alignment with RBNZ and APRA standards, embedding governance and control frameworks that lifted resilience maturity scores by 40% over three years, aligning with global best practices.
- Strengthened risk oversight: Partnered with first- and second-line risk functions, increasing risk assurance coverage from 60% to 95% of critical processes, ensuring proactive identification and mitigation of technology and operational risks.
- Technology risk remediation: Supported Westpac technology in achieving 95%+ adherence to DR risk appetite metrics, driving remediation initiatives that returned technology risk to appetite initiatives.
- Trusted advisory and external representation: Acted as trusted advisor to Group Resilience and Technology leaders; represented Westpac NZ in 4 major external reviews, including the IBM Red Hat independent panel (UK/US) and 2019 APRA interview, resulting in only minor findings, promptly remediated.
- Automated resiliency implementation: Delivered continuous uplift programs embedding automated resiliency into design & engineering; achieved 100% critical-application failover readiness, up from 0% in 2016.
- OBR and Bank Separation leadership: Led Operational Business Resilience (OBR) and Bank Separation readiness from strategy to simulation, partnering with SLT and cross-functional teams; validated governance, communication, and operational execution across 40+ critical processes.
- Regulatory attestations and audit excellence: Provided quarterly attestations and risk evidence to regulators and auditors, sustaining a 5 year record with zero material DR findings.
- Collaborate across Group Westpac to contribute NZ's resilience insights into regional forums; advocate for continuous assurance, automation, and resilient-by-design practices.
- Delivered end-to-end DR and continuity governance for tier-one clients in banking, telecommunications, and FMCG sectors.
- Designed and implemented DR frameworks that improved test pass rates, recovery times, and audit outcomes.
- Led multi-party failover exercises and vendor coordination, producing actionable reporting and remediation plans.
- Advised client account leaders on contractual resilience obligations and aligned outcomes to service KPIs.
- Supported HP internal BCP and continuity reviews.
- Embedded business continuity across business units, delivering refreshed BCPs and test schedules aligned to operational risk priorities.
- Implemented a structured assurance cadence for control validation, scenario testing, and dependency mapping.
- Planned, tested, and invoked DR exercises for major enterprise clients; served as data centre authority to invoke during recovery activation.
- Delivered comprehensive continuity programs including BIA, recovery documentation, supplier readiness, and audit evidence management.
- Coordinated cross-functional recovery teams ensuring repeatable, verified recovery outcomes.
Continuity Services Specialist (DR/BCM)
Hewlett-Packard (HP) New Zealand
01.2011 - 12.2016
- Coordinated large-scale platform migration from Wang VS to ISeries AS400 for Royal Bank of Scotland invoice finance enabling the strategic re-platforming of their factoring origination and servicing systems.
- Delivered and executed Hong Kong whole DC site failover plan for HP/Macquarie Bank.
- Consolidated a complex, high volume Business Continuity Plan (BCP) into a single, actionable one-page response, improving clarity and accelerating decision-making for Telecom (Spark) customer service units.
- Delivered 100% critical banking applications failover testing readiness across Westpac's Key platforms, embedding automation, testing cadence, and governance uplift across multiple technology domains.
- Supported WNZL Technology in achieving risk appetite metrics for Disaster Recovery, driving remediation initiatives and returning technology risk to appetite through strategic governance and stakeholder engagement.
- Ensured full adherence to RBNZ resilience standards, including governance, risk management, and operational resilience requirements issued under the Deposit Takers Act (DTA) and APRA-aligned guidelines.
- Maintained five years of clean audit outcomes with no material DR findings across RBNZ and APRA reviews, including IBM independent assessments.
Operations Risk Manager
Spark New Zealand (formerly Telecom)
01.2009 - 12.2011
Business Continuity & Risk Manager
Computer Science Corporation, UK
01.2006 - 12.2009
Education
Higher National Diploma - Computer Science
London South Bank University
London, United Kingdom01.2000
Skills
- Operational Resilience
- BCM
- DR
- Technology Risk
- Technology Recovery
- Risk & Assurance
- Regulatory Compliance
- Risk & Audit Governance
- Disaster Recovery (DR)
- Business Continuity (BCM)
- Regulatory Compliance (RBNZ/APRA)
- Service Assurance/ ITSM
- Open Bank Resolution (OBR) Readiness
- Automated failover Design
- Stakeholder Influence
- Vendor Governance
- Strategic Communication & Coaching
Certification
- Member of Business Continuity Institute (International) with AMBCI, 2016 - Present
- Member of Disaster Recovery Institute (International), 2006 - Present
- ITIL3 Foundation, 2016
- Member of ISRM
Timeline
Service Owner - Disaster Recovery
Westpac New Zealand
01.2016 - 12.2025
Continuity Services Specialist (DR/BCM)
Hewlett-Packard (HP) New Zealand
01.2011 - 12.2016
Operations Risk Manager
Spark New Zealand (formerly Telecom)
01.2009 - 12.2011
Business Continuity & Risk Manager
Computer Science Corporation, UK
01.2006 - 12.2009
Higher National Diploma - Computer Science
London South Bank University