Derek Brookes Email & Phone Number

London, England, Gb

Chestertons is one of London’s largest and oldest estate agents, with a range of services that go beyond the basic estate agency model. Its excellent service comes as standard and regularly have our customer service recognised by industry awards. The firm was an international business until 2023, when Emeria (an equity fund) acquired the UK part of the business. The business operates with multiple stakeholders due to the nature of the sales and lettings operations, business operations and geographically widespread offices. Turned around a failing project to split the international IT systems from the UK IT systems within 10 weeks.Review of all IT systems and processes to improve and upgrade the IT function delivery and suppliers.Radically changed the perception of IT with staff, teams, and the executive management.Migration of core on premise business client relationship management and integrated applications to fully cloud based CRM.Member of the Senior Management driving change, culture, efficiency, and profitability.Part of the executive team that delivered the sale of the business in October 2023.Orchestrated a comprehensive transition of IT systems to new business owners, integrating 15+ platforms whilst minimizing data loss risks and business disruption.Revitalised IT operations and communications to breakdown silos across business support departments and functions.

London, England, Gb

A prestigious world-renowned firm of patent attorneys, providing intellectual property advice and services globally with offices in London, Paris, Oxford, Cambridge, and Munich. Management role overseeing all IT services, operations, security, data protection and related functions across the business. Collaborating with the partners and business support stakeholders to significantly enhance and continuously develop the firm’s systems. Transformation of IT services, procedures, systems, and people to deliver the necessary improvements across the IT team, services, and infrastructure.Implementation of best practice across the IT team for planning, change control, IT security and cyber security.Directed the changes of IT processes and procedures relating to client support and business alignment. Adding improved project delivery, return on investment and cost control.Solution design and tender for the replacement of core business systems as part of an upgrade & refresh of IT and office relocation, providing enjoyable streamlined business working.Management of the development team delivering better systems usability, simplification of access to data, business reporting and system functionality.Led development of digital transformation systems. This led to less manual processing, paper output and achieving lower costs and operational efficiencies.Develop best practice within a matrix environment to bring about enhanced productivity, performance, and internal client productivity, including improved documentation, change and risk management.Engaged with stakeholders to reduce a silo culture across the business.Delivery of a new fully tested disaster recovery as a service for business continuity providing all services in the event of an incident. Full IT architectural review - system performance, stability, business applications and capacity reducing system downtime to almost zero, improved system and user performance and productivity.

Interim IT Director position for a logistics fulfilment business to resolve and transform an underperforming team and IT operations, processes, policies, and documentation. The deliverables included discovery, software compliance, documentation, preparation for ISO27001, mitigation of IT risks, implementation of new processes and procedures and engaging with outsourced IT suppliers.Short term consultancy engagements for several professional service companies, Fintech start-up and European commercial property company. Examples of engagements:Crowd funding investment platform for high-net-worth individuals.Advice regarding cyber-security, client relationship management selection and software as a service (SaaS).Review and replacement of a SaaS cloud-based finance system.Outsourcing IT systems and services.IT and cyber security

London, Gb

Hired to deliver a cultural and professionalism shift within business support operations and IT to position the firm as leader in its specialisms and among its competitors. Introduced the IT strategy and change management initiatives across internal and client-related services. Highlighted & drove value of technology to stakeholders to accelerate growth while leveraging alignment of IT and business operations & goals. Played an instrumental role in increasing profits through series of initiatives including operational efficiencies, replaced and sourcing of new suppliers, outsourcing and major IT service and system changes. Responsible for budgets exceeding £7m annually. Reduced business support operational costs significantly on year-on-year basis with no impacts to business operations or service quality. Overhaul of IT Operations to align to the requirements of the business as well the review of cyber security, BYOD, remote access, supplier management and measuring IT services and performance.Analysis of the IT Service Desk and support functions to drive general positive change across the IT team to deliver a reliable and trusted service across the business. Reduced IT related costs and reliability of network bandwidth through implementation of new data and communication links. Replaced outdated legacy IT infrastructure with modern virtualised server infrastructure & desktop systems. Developed an outsourced client deal room and extranet facilities, enhancing web & client services and ensuring retention of key clients. Introduced regular reporting, KPI’s and key metrics to demonstrate and communicate the value and IT improvements to the business and stakeholders.

Progressively grew with organisation, fuelling growth through involvement with strategic mergers and acquisitions, IT project implementation, system integrations and engaging with stakeholders to drive overall business strategy. Established IT as valued partner to all internal business units and produced a culture that supported IT initiatives. Responsible for operational budgets exceeding £2.5m and delivered mission-critical IT services to end-users with excellent levels of service and availability. Introduction of a case management system within 6 weeks from contract negotiations to delivery to meet external clients’ requirements, improving business services and profitability. Improved new client on-boarding efficiency and productivity project, delivering expected profit rise of 24%. Provision of a remote & working platform for 24x7 working from any location.Security strategy to protect the location & access of all data & information.Led process to open new fully integrated office space; moved five separate offices into single office while relocating 200+ employees with no impact on business operations or services to clients. Engaged with stakeholders, encouraging adoption of technology to further business objectives. Major cost savings through elimination and rationalisation relating to supplier changes and driving improved budget management. Directed integration of 5 mergers and other large team assimilations, aligning systems, processes and people. Firm-wide IT systems including document management and practice management systems, vital to the firm’s business operations and services. Successful delivery of a highly effective intranet providing business and social platform for teams, departments, regional offices and management.Provision of a several secure external client deal rooms and extranets.Assisted several of the firm’s clients with consultancy in relation to their systems integration, security, data sharing and IT services.