NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Alcoa (NYSE:AA) announced today that Chief Information Officer Nancy Wolk was recognized as one of the 2012 Top 10 Breakaway Leaders during the 2012 Global CIO Executive Summit this week. The prestigious award recognizes world-class IT leaders and their organizations and honor CIOs whose leadership elevates their people, partners and business.

“Nancy has demonstrated that she is a strong agent for change by consistently challenging conventional wisdom and setting significant goals for her team”

"Nancy has demonstrated that she is a strong agent for change by consistently challenging conventional wisdom and setting significant goals for her team," said Mark Davies, President, Alcoa Global Business Services. "She and her team have worked with our business leaders to understand their technology challenges, and have forged a long-term strategic plan that will markedly improve IT efficiency, expand the quality of Alcoa's IT infrastructure, and bring exciting new tools to the enterprise. We thank Nancy for her leadership and look forward to her continued contributions.”

Under Wolk's leadership a new five-year IT strategy was undertaken to focus on such areas as mobility, collaboration, analytics and smart manufacturing. In addition, Alcoa's IT group has focused on systems to support collaboration both within the company and with external stakeholders, and has deployed new, flexible business intelligence and analytics tools to enable its businesses to identify and focus on profitable opportunities.

A CIO panel of judges narrowed the field to 20 finalists and the CIO Executive Summit peer community cast their votes for the top 10 Breakaway Leaders.

About the CIO Executive Summit

The CIO Executive Summit operates in 29 cities across North America, as well as Sydney, Australia. It is complemented by the CIO Institute, a leadership development academy for technology executives selected to assume significant management responsibilities, and the Leadership Network, the industry's first invitation-only, online social networking site for corporate executives.

About Alcoa

Alcoa is the world's leading producer of primary aluminum, fabricated aluminum and alumina. In addition to inventing the modern-day aluminum industry, Alcoa innovation has been behind major milestones in the aerospace, automotive, packaging, building and construction, commercial transportation, consumer electronics and industrial markets over the past 120 years. Among the solutions Alcoa markets are flat-rolled products, hard alloy extrusions, and forgings, as well as Alcoa® wheels, fastening systems, precision and investment castings, and building systems in addition to its expertise in other light metals such as titanium and nickel-based super alloys. Sustainability is an integral part of Alcoa's operating practices and the product design and engineering it provides to customers. Alcoa has been a member of the Dow Jones Sustainability Index for 11 consecutive years and approximately 75 percent of all of the aluminum ever produced since 1888 is still in active use today. Alcoa employs approximately 61,000 people in 31 countries across the world. More information can be found at www.alcoa.com.