After only 10 months in the job, Balfour made her resignation public this week.

Balfour's surprise departure led to an e-mail being issued to Telstra staff stating that she left the company to "pursue other opportunities."

The e-mail, from the telco's chief operations officer (COO) Greg Winn, implies that Balfour is planning to take up a new position although Telstra was unwilling to elaborate on Balfour's employment contract and why it came to such a premature end.

Telstra spends more than A$1.5 billion (US$1.16 billion) each year on IT and Balfour was charged with overseeing a massive consolidation project at the telco which included the implementation of a new billing system and customer service platform.

Balfour's departure follows the resignation of deputy CIO Vish Padmanabham less than six months ago. No replacement was sought as Telstra abolished the position leaving the Balfour to oversee a five year IT overhaul at the telco.