UC San Diego Names Pierre Ouillet Vice Chancellor and Chief Financial Officer

Pierre Ouillet

Pierre Ouillet has been appointed UC San Diego’s first Vice Chancellor and Chief Financial Officer, serving as the senior executive officer for all of the campus’s financial resources. A member of the Chancellor’s executive cabinet, Ouillet will join UC San Diego in November 2014. His selection follows an international search.

Ouillet will oversee several areas that are being brought together under a single Vice Chancellor for the first time: the campus budget office; financial analysis office; business and financial services; human resources; operational and strategic initiatives; real estate; administrative computing and telecommunications; and housing, dining and hospitality.

“With extensive experience managing large budgets, building high-performance teams and driving change in complex organizations, Pierre Ouillet is the ideal choice for VC and CFO,” said UC San Diego Chancellor Pradeep K. Khosla. “We look forward to welcoming Vice Chancellor Ouillet to campus and working with him to ensure a stable financial framework for UC San Diego.”

Ouillet comes from the University of British Columbia (UBC) in Vancouver, Canada, where he served as the Vice President of Finance, Resources and Operations, overseeing a $2 billion budget, $6 billion in capital assets and $3 billion in financial assets. Over the last several years, he has helped UBC absorb the impact of the global financial crisis and declining public funding by identifying and realizing annual savings and new revenues through collaboration with faculty. He also created an integrated finance function to better support academic and administrative leaders and increased student housing to 12,000 beds in mixed use facilities, the largest university offering in Canada. Previously, Ouillet served as Vice President of Finance for Best Buy International and Best Buy Canada.

“I have always had a great admiration for the incredible impact achieved by UC San Diego in just a few decades, and I am proud to join its team at a time of renewed ambition,” said Ouillet. “I see the finance function as an enabler for the academic vision of the university, and I look forward to working very closely and collaboratively with my new colleagues and with the entire academic and student body.”

Collaborating with the senior leadership team, Ouillet will create an integrated multi-year, multi-funds financial plan and ensure that the university’s financial and human resources support institutional priorities articulated in the strategic plan. He will also implement business process improvements, information technology infrastructure enhancements and financial reporting systems that will support effective planning for the entire enterprise.