Developing, running and leading the delivery of Services in the Multi Cloud.

Getting to the cloud is one thing, being there securely at a reasonable price point is another. All while supporting the journey to digital services. That’s been the role, needing the build out of an Architecture practice and its associated capability, along with the roll-out of a number of business changing projects, covering collaboration, security, Business Continuity infrastructure and whilst supporting the move of business services back in house. All the while, supporting the organisation's journey to hybrid working practices.

I had been watching as the technologies round the use of IoT was maturing and knowing that Hitachi were looking to lead the anticipated revolution in use of such devices, this seemed a good place to develop my career further. The rush for Digital, seemed to be suggesting that this was the new wave and IoT looked like it could be a part of fuelling it.I knew that whilst the excitement and focus in such environments is on the new technology, there would be a tendency to forget the hard won lessons of previous deliveries. Scope, Governance, Integration, Security, etc. would all be neglected. Which seemed to be an opportunity for me to create the delivery wrapper that would go round the new technology and deliver the leadership to industrialise the deliveries.This proved to be correct, allowing me to work on some interesting and highly demanding programmes to initially create the under pinning for the IoT offers. Then to go on and lead the development of solutions to specific customer needs, e.g. Footfall monitoring in Retail establishments.The attraction was not just about the technology. It was about the need to change people and processes to support the technology. Some of this would need the integration of partners and I welcomed the opportunity to define some of the commercial aims of the arrangements to be made with both long standing and new Hitachi partner organisations.At the same time, I could see that some parts of IoT were creating large pools of unstructured data, that needed management. That being especially true given the way that Legislators had caught with IT and the management of Data. With an increased need to tie Business value to IT delivery, the need for a cost effective Digital Content management solution became obvious. This allowed me to tie experience round Architecture, Business process, integration and delivery together to design the Hitachi Vantara “In A Box” solutions to solve problems left behind by partial Digital transformations.

My time at Capgemini had been great, I had transformed my career and I was greatly enjoying delivering to customers. I had broken away from the idea of being tied to a technology and wanted to experience more about transforming customers business. A redundancy round at Capgemini provided the Spur to setup by myself and use my network of contacts to find work. That work needed to be about solving complex problems that may or may not be due to technology. But involved using my Architecture and Leadership experience to communicate need and identify the solution. Often requiring communication with diverse groups in programmes, with specific interests and points of view.The roles I looked for were about providing the leadership to help business change and align itself to technology that would bring value. Using my architecture knowledge and experience gained on previous roles, along with the more personal skills, such as being bold and being prepared to take risks where the mitigation has been though through.The roles were varied, rolling out a Salesforce automation suite to 23 countries in EMEA for a major life sciences company, re establishing Architecture and Data Management in a Government Dept. prior to regulatory change, transitioning a Service Delivery Contract from outsourced to insourced operation. Pulling together the under pinning of a start-up bank and being part of getting them through the regulatory processes.

Final Role - Head of Enterprise Architecture Working as a Contractor had been good. I found that on every engagement I would start as a member of a team, then become its leader and eventually own the design. I had transformed by technical skill set from basic programming to a complex programming, Operating systems and being an Oracle DBA and having an excellent understanding of the technology landscape. But I could not break the cycle of selling myself as a leader. A friend at Oracle introduced me to people at Capgemini.Capgemini provided me with what I had been looking for, an accelerator in understanding. It allowed me to resurrect dormant skills from my time in the Navy and move into the role I had sought on entry which was as a Technical Manager in the Oracle space. I got back into people management and development, but it also gave me an insight into being in the Architecture space.Architecture and working in the Enterprise Architecture space filled in the last blanks for me at Capgemini. It allowed me to see the problem from multiple angles, aligned to the various stakeholders or not as the case may be. To help fill the gaps, to bridge understanding, to act as the Communicator. Using a pragmatic approach to Architecture, to give enough of a fact based view on the problem to pull together and present the answer.I had some standout moments, presenting at conferences, leading significant deliveries. But the best bit was being able to change things in a positive way for the customer. My favourite comment was, “previously it would take us 3 months to create the gas bill, now I just press a button”.

The pace of change in IT in 1990s was slow. I could see that joining a company, would be a risk of being stuck with legacy skills. Technology was changing quickly and ideas such as “One per desk” were clearly taking hold as companies automated to achieve savings. I knew I needed to follow the change to stay current.I worked to build my skills, adding System Admin capabilities to my core programming skills. I added knowledge of networking and writing safety critical system. Learned about writing requirements, so that they could be tested. I could also see that the Relational Database had arrived and knew that was the place to be, so I invested time and money in skilling up as an Oracle DBA.The great joy of this was getting to work on a range of programmes in Air Traffic Control, Logistics, Finance and Y2K. It introduced me to concepts that we are still implementing today, such as self-service applications. It showed me the challenges of running large projects where the technology is changing.The main thing for me was that it advanced me as a person. Satisfying my need to keep learning and also to be a part of the team owning and solving the problems.