Technology at scale. Thirty years, five industries, four continents.
Delivery at Group Director and VP level: FTSE 250, AIM-listed life sciences, government programmes, including a service that went on to distribute £2.7 billion a year. FBCS. Lay Member, ICAEW Regulation & Conduct Board.
Two kinds of mandate I take on: an enterprise-wide transformation or programme director role that needs an owner (digital operating model, supplier and portfolio governance, ERP integration), interim or permanent; or a Chief Digital Officer, Digital Director, COO or CIO seat in a public-interest organisation. UK based, internationally mobile. Current availability on request.
I walked into a life sciences company where revenue growth had stalled after four consecutive years of double digits. Everyone said it was a technology problem. It wasn't. The dev teams had deskilled, lost confidence, and couldn't deploy properly. I promised the CMO monthly deliveries, didn't say what; by the end we were shipping weekly. Devs started seeing their work connect to business outcomes for the first time. Double-digit growth came back, with delivery restored on the only route to revenue. The stack under the shopfront barely changed; the rails did, with the AWS migration and a staged Oracle programme for finance and HR.
At a FTSE 250 I brought all the group's brands together under a single delivery function for the first time. Nobody could see what anyone else was doing. Then the Ukraine invasion happened and our entire digital operation depended on one Ukrainian partner. I set direction: people first, operations second. Stepped back and let the permanent team lead what needed their relationships. Sourced alternatives in parallel. All 100 colleagues kept safe, business continuity maintained throughout, and a business with choices it didn't have before.
In government I wrote governance principles for agile delivery that are still published on GOV.UK more than a decade later. Coached the team that replaced paper driving licence counterparts for 40 million people. Led a 150-person cross-supplier team delivering the digital service that went on to distribute £2.7 billion a year in levy funds.
Since then: interim CEO of CyberSafeSchools (2022 to 2024), a SaaS cyber safety provider helping UK schools meet DfE and NCSC cyber security standards. Co-founded beò, a research company on what technology does to human cognition, which has shipped Flourish, a digital-wellbeing app. Authored CHART, a published framework for evidencing meaningful human oversight of AI under Article 14 of the EU AI Act, built on a cognitive health assessment. Appointed to the ICAEW Regulation & Conduct Board as a lay member. The through-line hasn't changed.
The pattern is always the same: everyone says it's a technology problem. Knowing when it is, and when it isn't, is the judgement I'm hired for.
AI governance, when the mandate needs it
When a mandate runs into AI governance, and more of them do, I bring more than an opinion. I authored CHART (Cognitive Health Assessment for Responsible Technology), a framework for evidencing the meaningful human oversight the EU AI Act requires. The framework is openly published; commercial engagements run through beò, the research company I co-founded, separately from my interim practice.
Get in touch
If your organisation has a technology problem that isn't really a technology problem, let's talk.
The short version
FBCS. Lay Member (Transformation), ICAEW Regulation & Conduct Board; leads its Technology and Transformation Working Group. MSc Psychology (Distinction), University of Strathclyde. Visiting Researcher, University of Strathclyde, 2019 to 2021. BSc Computer Studies. Data Science for Executives (Columbia via edX). Quantum Computing (Linux Foundation). GDS, Cabinet Office, HMRC, ESFA, Abcam, Cognizant, Travis Perkins, CyberSafeSchools, JP Morgan, American Express, BBC, Barclays, Tesco, Sky, The Guardian, Royal London, Ordnance Survey. Agile Alliance sponsor, named adviser and collaborator on PRINCE2 Agile (AXELOS), contributor to AXELOS best-practice guidance, CTO Craft panel member. Keynote speaker.