Scott Gibson - CIO and SVP of Distribution & Strategic Services

Scott Gibson is the Chief Information Officer and the Senior Vice President of Distribution and Strategic Services. Gibson leads the Information Technology team, and also is responsible for global electronic channel distribution, central reservations delivery, and for providing strategic consulting, business planning and performance measurement services to the Board and the senior management team.

Gibson joined Best Western in 2005, bringing to this role more than 20 years of hotel and hotel information technology experience, along with a track record of planning and producing innovative technology solutions and capabilities.

Under his leadership, Best Western has become a technology leader in the travel industry, and bestwestern.com has been named the ”Best of the Web” among travel and hotel web sites. In 2010, Best Western’s IT team was included as one of InformationWeek's 250 most innovative business technology organizations. Gibson was named one of ComputerWorld’s Premier 100 IT Leaders for 2010.

Before joining Best Western, Gibson held a number of industry leadership positions, including senior vice president and chief information officer for Kerzner International Resorts, Inc., and senior vice president and chief information officer for Cendant Corporation’s hotel division, where he was responsible for delivering the technology needs for the hotel division and its nearly 6,000 franchisees. Gibson also has held positions with Ramada, Red Lion Hotels and Anasazi.

Gibson is married, with one grown son. As a child, he grew up in Ethiopia, Panama, Greece, Italy, and Washington, D.C., and served in the U.S. Army in Hawaii, New Zealand, Japan, and Korea.