Lead the global Speech Center of Excellence (product group) through agility transformation, technology modernisation, and reforming the product roadmap with speech & AI technologies. Supported sales and solution delivery with Fortune 500 companies with 1B calls annually. Initiated, developed and launched Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant products with integration to the company's Conversational AI chatbot engine. Drove adoption of the leading speech-to-text, text-to-speech and voice biometrics technologies with integration to IVR and Conversational AI to reduce both solution cost and time-to-market.

Co-created and launched Corius as an innovative online product delivering professional coaching to executives and managers. The interactive, self-paced product increased self-awareness and provided insights that helped develop individuals, teams and organisations.

Provision of diverse business and technology advice and services. Specialties include big data, start-ups, software product management and other software development processes.Big data analytics clients included Australia’s largest retail network, leading banks, government departments and medium-to-large business. Projects covered geo-analysis, consumer behaviour, point-of-sale analysis, quantitative market research, strategic impact analysis.Provided mentoring to a range of software-focussed start-ups. The contributions included strategic advice, financial modelling, sales and marketing, product management, rapid prototyping, and establishment of software capabilities.

Accountable for Holly’s financial systems, reporting, legal, tax, compliance, HR and board reporting (CFO role was Acting for compliance reasons). Took on the role during the GFC recovery and was a key executive in the turn-around of the business' financial performance. Led the company restructure, eliminated cash burn and responded to major currency fluctuations. I closed and renegotiated customer contracts; streamlined administrative processes; restructured employee incentives, options and share schemes; retained key employees through the business transformation. I led the M&A on sale of the business to West Corporation, a Fortune 500 based in Omaha, Nebraska with responsibility for the M&A processes. Involved presentation of company financials, strategy and technology to potential acquirers and VCs world-wide; in-depth due diligence; legal documentation; logistics of the sale including staff and other shareholder communication. The acquirer's M&A group described the M&A transaction as the "best ever" executed by a smaller business.

This broad was was 2IC for Holly. Responsibilities included product management; management of all product development (software, testing, documentation, project management etc.); 24x7 operations and global technical support, marketing (2005-2008), recruitment and sales support.Through this period, Holly delivered dramatic improvements in product quality, market readiness and developer productivity: Introduced key procedures and functions to Holly including hiring a high-calibre testing team; instituted product roadmaps, product scoping and release procedures; consistent processes for project management and task coordination; design and review processes; drove SCM and build improvements; encouraged substantial improvement in density and scalability; greatly improved documentation.Major contributor to sales in Australia, US and Europe: Established major sales opportunities for Holly with US companies including American Express, US Airways and West Corporation. Presented in over 150 sales and business development opportunities in 5 years around the world or by conference call. Excellent track record of creating interest and sales through close collaboration with Account Executives.Acted as the last resort “Mr Fix It” for major customer crises and escalations with excellent internal coordination of resources and effective comms to customers; responsible for rebranding Holly including authoring all copy for a new web site; improvement of internal communication (wiki etc).

Specialist Consultancy on Speech Self-Service (Sydney/Melbourne) contract to develop Telstra’s roadmap/strategy for self-service application delivery with coverage of business and technology. Telstra implemented the key recommendations from this consultancy over the following 5 years resulting in greater speed of project delivery, increased supplier competitiveness, innovation and reduced CapEx.• Telstra’s delivery competency: recommended areas for organisational growth to ensure cost-effective and timely delivery of internal and external self-service applications plus recommended vendor engagement models for outsourcing of key delivery components.• Defined application roadmap: expounded the schedule and scope of speech self-service to accelerate cost savings as part of a broader program of improving customer satisfaction.• Infrastructure & architecture: guided Telstra on optimal use of existing investments in speech technology and IVR infrastructure.

Drive adoption of speech products to key regional partners, telcos and large enterprise. Displaced incumbent leader in the largest accounts (Telstra, Vodafone) and established strong partnerships with leading regional systems integrators and resellers (Dimension Data, VeCommerce, Holly). With sales executives, booked record $2M US sales in 2003; 80+% pipeline growth. Delivered sophisticated telephone speech solutions to Qantas, Telstra, Vodafone, and NSW Govt. Track record of satisfied customers through a focus on quality on time delivery of custom solutions in multi-vendor contracts integrating a local delivery team with US expertise.

Led the team delivering the core SpeechWorks (now Nuance) product portfolio of speech recognition products. Direct management of 10 staff of project managers and developers plus, through projects, oversight of 25+ including QA, documentation and matrixed specialist R&D engineers. Responsibilities covered all resourcing, scheduling, feature prioritisation, sales support and marketing coordination for all speech recognition products. • Leadership & Strategy: Respected and widely recognised technical leader across the company for driving new programs and processes that emphasised planning for on-time delivery of high quality product software with a multi-year delivery cycle. The results include strong product preference through IVR channels and successful transition of the product portfolio to open standards.• Staff development: Devolved responsibility to individual developers and managers to deliver on schedule, quality and features and established processes and communication to ensure coordination across diverse teams.• Innovation: Created a new product line for a web-based reporting and analysis tool, OpenSpeech Insight. Championed the tool from proof-of-concept through the approval, development, launch and maintenance phases. It is now a key product differentiator. Several US patents granted.As Director of Speech Standards I represented SpeechWorks in multiple international standards bodies including the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). Internally I oversaw develop of multiple new standards-based products. Externally I represented the company to customers, at conferences and in the standards organisations. SpeechWorks became recognised as the world leader in driving and delivering speech technology standards. Standards required strategic insight, technical excellence, skilful negotiation, establishing respect and credibility, and building collaborative relationships with dozens of other participating companies, including direct competitors.