Experience
I have spent my career close to the systems, platforms and organisations that technology leaders are ultimately accountable for.
The value of that experience is not the chronology. It is having led technology where scale, delivery, resilience, security and regulation have real business consequences.
01
My experience spans operating critical payment technology, leading urgent transformation, building regulated platforms and bringing inherited systems under operational control.
Operating at scale
Between 2018 and 2021, I held technology responsibility in a payments environment operating across multiple European markets, where platform resilience, availability and operational control had direct business consequences.
Infrastructure and software delivery were both critical to the operation of the business.
Leading under pressure
During COVID, a new government voucher programme had to launch within weeks. I led the analysis and technology response across databases, infrastructure and software to address scalability and response-time limitations exposed by an earlier programme.
Building from the ground up
I have led teams building new platforms from the ground up, covering architecture, software engineering, cloud infrastructure, automated deployment, automated testing, security and the operational practices needed beyond launch.
The approach created reusable foundations for subsequent platforms, reducing the need to solve the same engineering and infrastructure problems again.
Establishing control
Shortly before a platform became operational, responsibility passed to us after the original team had been disassembled. Working with two other developers, I helped understand and stabilise the software, then introduced monitoring, notifications and dashboards so the operation could become increasingly proactive.
02
My career started in 1998 in electronics engineering before moving through IT support, Windows and Linux administration, software development, databases and infrastructure.
By 2010, my responsibilities had moved into development leadership. A few years later I was recruiting and growing an engineering organisation from around four people to approximately thirty, with many joining early in their careers and needing teaching, mentoring and room to develop.
My responsibilities later expanded across development, operations, security and technology leadership.
That path is why I can work with senior management on direction and risk without becoming disconnected from engineering reality.
03
My involvement with PCI DSS began in 2015, when the first audit exposed significant gaps that required close work across internal teams and external providers.
Since then my responsibilities have included PCI DSS, ISO 27001, DORA, card-scheme requirements, security, audits and work with financial regulators. I have also spent several years building and maintaining ISMS documentation and have taken an organisation through its first ISO 27001 audit.
Regulatory expectations eventually become architecture, engineering, operational and organisational decisions.
04
Technology problems rarely stay inside one discipline. A delivery issue can expose an architecture problem. An operational issue can expose an ownership problem. A regulatory requirement can require an engineering change.
I have worked across those boundaries rather than observing them from one side.
That's why I work as a Transformation CTO.
View my LinkedIn profile →If your organisation needs senior technology leadership that can work across both the business and the engineering, let's talk.
Discuss your technology challenge →