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Profile: Making IT work at PetSmart

Pete Jorgenson travelled a long and winding path to his current position as vice president of Information Systems Technical Operations for PetSmart Inc., the nation's largest pet specialty retailer.

2015-03-25

Pete Jorgenson traveled a long and winding path to his current position as vice president of Information Systems Technical Operations for PetSmart Inc., the nation's largest pet specialty retailer. "I tell people I've had somewhat of a checkered past," Jorgenson says. "I've bounced between consulting, supply chain and IT."

Since 2011, he has shared that experience as a member of the Department of Information Systems’ Executive Advisory Board as well as the board's five-person executive council, founded in the fall of 2014. The executive council has direct involvement in the student experience and in faculty.

"There is clearly a lot of good foundational work that the department does in preparing its graduates for moving into roles in business," he says. "We recruit at the school, and we are interested in establishing an even stronger connection and a bigger pipeline. We have a couple of interns who are coming this summer, and we certainly plan on having more in the future," he says.

Breadth of experience

Jorgenson began his undergraduate studies at the United States Coast Guard Academy in 1975, but after two-and-a-half years transferred to Arizona State University, where he earned a B.S. in Health Science. After graduation, he worked as a trainer for the Oakland Invaders of the United States Football League, an upstart pro league that challenged the NFL before folding in 1985.

He next found work in computer programming, which he had learned in college, and then returned to ASU, where he earned a master's degree in industrial engineering.

His career then branched in multiple directions. As a consultant, he worked in manufacturing, computer systems and supply chain management. He also held management positions at Allied Waste Industries Inc. and Honeywell Aerospace.

Jorgenson began working at PetSmart in early 2006 as a consultant. "The CIO at the time asked me if I could hold the job as head of IS infrastructure and security for three or four months while they looked for somebody who would be permanent," Jorgenson recalls. "So they started searching and after six months said they liked me better than any of the candidates they had seen. I kind of worked my way into the job."

Jorgenson had never worked for any retail company before his consulting assignment at PetSmart.

"Most of my background was in services or aerospace and defense," he says. "The last consulting engagement I had before PetSmart was at the Mayo Clinic, which, of course, is health care. In that instance, I had leveraged my undergraduate degree in health science to understand what was going on in the health care world."

Jorgenson says his engineering background has helped him greatly in his current post.

"The things I learned in the engineering world gave me insight into some parts of the business we have at PetSmart," he says. "As a result of my getting an industrial engineering degree, I had worked for three years in a supply chain role at what was then AlliedSignal. In a retail business it helps to know about supply chain, and from my perspective, understanding the business better helps to make me a better leader."

Competitive advantage in information systems

PetSmart has more than 1,400 stores and seven distribution centers in the United States and Canada. The company was founded in 1986 in Phoenix, which is still the company's U.S. headquarters. (On March 11, a consortium led by BC Partners completed the acquisition of the company and Michael J. Massey was named president and chief executive officer.)

When Jorgenson arrived at the company a little more than nine years ago, he found an information infrastructure in need of attention.

"There were a lot of issues with systems," he recalls. "At our data center, we had used all of the available power, so we literally couldn't plug in any new systems, which left a whole bunch of projects on hold."

The systems also were unreliable, according to Jorgenson. "We’d had a couple of network outages and a couple of email system outages. Some of our core systems were going down from one to four times a week. The first phase of my job here was really just making sure things didn't break as often."

Once the situation had stabilized, Jorgenson turned to strengthening the company's information systems and deploying them to enhance the company's competitive advantage.

"We started doing things that gave us leverage," Jorgenson says. "We wanted to have systems available that were capable of putting the business in a position of strength."

One of the Jorgenson's first initiatives was to standardize PetSmart's phone system across the chain. When he arrived, there were nine or 10 different phone systems for stores in the chain.

"Once we completed that fix, we were in a better position to market the company," he says. "We had the marketing folks give us messages to put in the phone greeting that would be used across the whole chain. It seems like a simple thing, but it wasn't possible to implement until we standardized the system. Once we did that, we could send marketing and recall alert messages to the entire chain instantly."

Staying out of the headlines

Jorgenson developed his expertise in information systems through a combination of his academic training and work experience. ASU’s industrial engineering program emphasized computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacturing. He also received formal training in computer programming and systems at Accenture PLC, the global consulting and technology services company where he worked after he received his master's degree.

As head of infrastructure for PetSmart, Jorgenson manages about a hundred people and a multi-million dollar budget.

"I'm responsible for all hardware inside PetSmart, and that includes everything from desktops and laptops to servers and storage, as well as our network and data centers. It includes cash registers and telephones and the networks inside each individual store," he says.

Jorgenson is also charged with the critical and sensitive task of safeguarding the data the company collects. "I'm responsible for security and compliance, which means protecting consumer and associate data, particularly credit card data, which is a hot topic in the retail space these days," he says.

Other large retailers — including the Target Corporation, Neiman Marcus and T.J.Maxx — have suffered major security breaches, but PetSmart, so far, has escaped.

"Clearly, with all of the breaches that have occurred in retail, it's a pretty big area of focus for us to make sure that our environment is as secure as it can be," Jorgenson says. "We’re doing our best to stay out of the headlines."

School ties

Jorgenson grew up in Prescott and has lived in Arizona most of his life.

His wife has undergraduate and master's degrees from Arizona State and his daughter is currently an undergraduate at the school. "Clearly we have a family connection to the school," he says.

Since joining the Department of Information Systems Advisory Board, Jorgenson has made regular visits to campus to meet with students and make presentations to classes. "I've done that a number of times. I really enjoy the opportunity to interact with the students and participate in the energy on campus," he says.

Jorgenson says he hopes to see the relationship between the Department of Information Systems and PetSmart grow.

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