Bristol, England, United Kingdom
With over 20 years of delivery and senior leadership experience across Government, Financial Services, Oil & Gas, and Gaming industries. I bring a proven ability to work with teams and understand and improve the whole delivery environment to ensure the best results for customers and the organisation. Combining strategic vision with a diverse range of skills, I work closely with teams and all levels of leadership to apply pragmatic, bespoke solutions that drive organisational success and foster high-performance. I am passionate about achieving meaningful impact, I thrive on capitalising on challenges and opportunities to grow teams and organisations and foster innovation while delivering the outcomes organisations and their customers need.
Planning, designing and delivering training in Agile Engineering Practices and Agile Procurement to over 100 students with average NPS of 40+ Supporting Delivery Community of Practice with multi-industry experience on how to build, grow and support Agile Delivery Teams at all stages of maturity.
In my role as Development Director for Project Zanaris I led the product as a "mini" Executive Producer, leading the technical and product strategy for the ambitious project. Leading a team of over 30 people and building in production rigour we successfully delivered the first 3 milestones of the previously beleaguered project.
In my role as Development Director for RuneScape at Jagex I was accountable for the timely delivery of all game and engine features relating to the maintenance and improvement of the 20 year old award winning MMORPG. I lead a team of 9 Producers at all levels of seniority who worked within each of the workstreams of the the game, from content development to engine maintenance and improvement. In addition to this I lead the QA function for RuneScape, building them from a purely manual testing based group of over 20 QAs to an automation-first team of around 12. This not only reduced costs in terms of personnel but also resulted in massive reductions in time to market via automation of previously labour-intensive manual testing. Where previously it took over 2 weeks to verify a release it was now possible in 4-5 hours. As a member of the RuneScape Leadership Team I was responsible for formulating and guiding content and technical strategies for the game. Assisting in the introduction of seasons and the move to a formalised, reusable event structure.
In my role as Director of Production for the Publishing Platform at Jagex I was accountable for the timely delivery of all features relating to the maintenance and improvement of websites, subscription and payment services, and IT systems for the studio. I lead a team of 8 Delivery Leads who worked within each of the workstreams of the Publishing Platform. As a member of the Technology Leadership Team I was responsible for formulating and guiding strategies for the Publishing Platform.
In my role as the Head of Agile Transformation & Services I was responsible for: - Leading a centralised team of over 150 Scrum Masters, Agile Delivery Leads, and Agile Coaches across the business and IT - Leading Aviva's Agile Transformation - Advising c-suite and executives on ways of working, OD, funding models, and overarching IT delivery strategy (run and change) A highlight of my time in this role was that I was awarded the 2018 Global Inspirational Leader for the Aviva CIO
Responsible for uplifting capability of Suncorp group teams in Agile values, principles and practices for the planning and execution of business value. Key responsibilities include: - Coach and develop all levels of staff and leadership on how to implement and sustain the Agile principles & practices - Teach and mentor teams to understand the difference between the Agile mindset (“Being Agile") and Agile Practices (“Doing Agile”) and the characteristics needed in individuals, teams and organisations to embrace, promote & manifest the mindset of agility - Facilitate workshops and innovation days to assist in building high performing teams that are focused on customer value and outcomes - Develop a culture that supports team engagement and high performance - Supporting strategic initiatives across the group and coaching projects and programs - Provide thought leadership in new ways of working together with our customers Highlights: - Stood up over 80 teams - Integrated technical and business teams into end to end delivery squads including embedding customers in delivery squads - Coached teams on multi stakeholder prioritisation and capacity-based charging - Coached senior leaders on and lead implementation of agile scaling techniques utilising cross functional squads into shared-purpose, customer-centric tribes across 400 person business intelligence domain. Implemented over 6 month period with enormous success and customer advocacy - Lead an end 2 end delivery team in Suncorp Labs to experiment and build an online portal to assist customers in making good choices surrounding vehicle purchases
Responsible for the uplifting capability of the Suncorp group teams in Agile values, principles and practices for the planning and execution of business value in relation to coaching, mentoring & educating. - Lead Iteration Manager (Scrum Master) Mentoring Program across BT teams; uplifting Agile capability within BT by focusing on mentoring Iteration Managers, Teams, and Product Owners - Supporting teams in the capacity of Iteration Manager where required - Supporting strategic initiatives across the group and coaching projects and programs - Establishing and leading group-wide Iteration Management guild/Community of Practice Highlights: - Stood up over 40 teams progressing them from beginner / regressive level delivery teams to advanced/ sustainable level. Embedding sustainable product ownership, agile cadence, and continuous improvement culture. - Coached delivery of an extra-large program of work ($10 million Aud) from non-delivery status to delivery to production every iteration/sprint by mentoring teams in technical practices such as release trains, continuous integration and test automation, and coaching general agile techniques and practices as well as utilising squadification. - Trained and mentored over 40 iteration managers (scrum masters) from both technical and business teams