Phil Richards Email & Phone Number

Bristol, England, Gb

Executive leader at the UK's premier digital education and research body, delivering to 18M+ users. Initiatives I have nurtured and driven include: creation of R&D function in newly-formed Jisc organisation; national learning analytics service improving learner outcomes and wellbeing; national regulatory data visualisation (Heidi+); national data maturity and digital capability profiling; research data curation; and major research equipment inventorisation; edtech start-up and acceleration programme leading to partnership with Emerge Education. Instigator and deliverer of scalable cloud-native national regulatory data collection system (HESA data platform). Skilled negotiator and fixer adept at working across organisational boundaries to deliver the most challenging national programmes (e.g. Data Futures). Initiator of horizon scanning in deep-tech such as potential for distributed quantum computing via Janet network, and AI in post-16 curriculum design and delivery. Steering group member and contributor to national policy inquiries and reports on ethical data and AI for education and student support. Thought leader and occasional writer.

Loughborough, Leicestershire, Gb

Key achievement: first hybrid-cloud infrastructure in European HE, award-winning, saving 600 tonnes CO2 per annum. Executive-level responsibility for Information Strategy and Systems, Policy and Compliance, Service Delivery, Infrastructure and Procurement to 30,000+ users, 160+ staff, £25M+ budget, adding competitive advantage to research, learning, knowledge transfer and administration at the UK's #1 University for student experience. Other achievements: supporting pioneering live digital broadcast of elite student sport via Janet network; hybrid-cloud won national THE award and showed unique power of Janet network by employing layer two containerisation to deliver high business continuity via near real-time failover between Loughborough and Slough data centres; personally led on lobbying for key change of Janet connection policy, to embrace third stream activities alongside teaching and research - the first Janet connected not-for-profit was Loughborough SportPark, and the first Janet connected spin-out company was Laser Optical Engineering Ltd, then located in Loughborough Enterprise Park.

Plymouth, Devon, Gb

Key achievements: first IT infrastructure off balance sheet with guaranteed tech refresh and first leased PC fleet in UK HE. Lead responsibility for IT Strategy, Policy, Service Delivery and Infrastructure to 40,000+ users, 100+ staff, £10M+ budget, across the south-west peninsula, adding value to learning, research and administration. Other achievements: leading the establishment of Peninsula Medical School telematic lecture theatre network across the region; delivering the first UK HE 'leased fleet' approach for desktop, laptop and multi-function device provision, improving service quality and significantly reducing Total Cost of Ownership (TCO); extending that financial model by taking the entire IT infrastructure off the balance sheet via operating lease, guaranteeing technology refresh and delivering significant service improvement and TCO reduction via consistent architecture and systematic elimination of ad-hocery and obsolescence.

Aberystwyth, Ceredigion, Gb

Key achievement: creation of largest fully-bilingual (Welsh-English) institutional Web site. Senior manager leading Learning Technology & Media Services Division of converged information service. Other achievements: revamping all-Wales video network to use IP-based conferencing technology via the Janet network, and brokering extension of its community use to certain civil proceedings in rural areas as part of Lord Justice Woolf's reforms to reduce barriers to justice. Pastoral care of 1,100 students as warden of hall of residence - which taught me as much about people management as any 'day-job' ever could.

London, Greater London, Gb

Key achievement: devised UK HE's first formally-agreed institutional Computer Assisted Learning Strategy, with core funding, directly mapping the significant investment in student-facing IT on to the intuition's strategic goal to have all its teaching judged excellent via quality review. Role equivalent to Head of E-Learning, leading a combination of top-down and bottom-up approaches to enabling academics to integrate appropriate technology into curricula.

Kingston Upon Hull, East Riding Of Yorkshire, Gb

Working with academics bottom-up to facilitate greater use of education technology in curricula. Key achievements: 'CalWin' environment, delivering full working library of TLTP and other CAL software direct to the academic and student desktop; first scalable UK application of interactive Web CGI technology to course evaluation and formative assessment.

Cardiff, Wales, Gb

Designing, implementing and evaluating undergraduate-level courseware for HEFC TLTP-funded, European EASA award-winning, Software Teaching of Modular Physics (SToMP) Project. Key achievement: bringing to life derivation of wave and oscillation equations, traditionally among the driest parts of the subject, through interactive animations.

Ma Dphil, Physics

Post-Graduate Diploma In Higher Education Teaching (Hetdip), In-Service, Accredited By Seda