Posts

In engineering and product organisations, design documents are a vital but oft-hated set of assets to be produced and maintained. In the world of the MSP, I come cross design documents of all shapes and sizes - both created by us and also those created by customers and other organisations. There is one thing they all have in common, they are all long and as difficult to read as they are to write. In the age of AI and high-levels of automation surely there are things that we can do to improve these assets and make them better and more valuable for everyone. ...

As I look forward to 2026, I am expecting plenty of work changes, but also some consistency as I continue to progress on all those things started in 2025. 2026 is the year I turn 40 years old, so it is expected that I’ll be a little more reflective, a bit more focused on who I want to be over the next decade and therefore I expect new goals to emerge over time but here are a few to get the year started. ...

2025 - you’re basically done. A year shaped by one project. In some ways a year very similar to the last but in some smaller ways so very different. A year of growth, maybe, a year of reflection certainly. Project-R I spent most of my year focused on this one project for one new customer. It shaped everything. New service descriptions were written, new portal features developed and new documentation authored. I was so deep into ITIL and it’s edge cases with this customer that there were times when I almost forgot who I worked for. It was the exciting springboard upon which the business grew and I with it. I have worked on projects of this size before but this one was different, this one was about service design and experience as much as it was about migration and onboarding. There will be others in the future like this but this was the first and set the foundations of what is to come. ...

Over the years, I’ve had countless conversations about product strategy and direction. One topic that always comes up is the product roadmap. It’s a tool that’s become so ingrained in how teams communicate that it’s treated as an unquestioned necessity — a tick-box exercise that stakeholders expect, even demand. But here’s my honest confession: I hate product roadmaps. Not because I don’t like planning, or because I don’t believe in transparency, but because traditional product roadmaps often do more harm than good. They create illusions, mislead teams, and set false expectations. Today, I want to break down why I think product roadmaps fail us, and what we might do instead. ...

I attended this year’s Dubai FinTech Summit on a bit of an exploration mission as we start to expand further out into the region. I’m not new to what goes on in the UAE, but there is still a lot for me to learn about Dubai, the UAE and other countries in MENA and this seemed like a great opportunity to have lots of interesting discussions that will help me shape our next steps. ...

As one of my lighter blog posts, I’ll be telling that story that every engineer gets to tell as some point: the reason why I got into this whole thing in the first place. It’s a topic that comes up from time to time so I thought I’d write it here for posterity. Catching the bug As a child of late 1980s, I grew up during the period where computers were there in schools and starting to appear in homes. But I started my journey a little earlier when, as a 6-year old, I used an old second-hand typewriter my mother bought for me to type out pages from my favourite books and to write little stories. I have these fond memories of grabbing a few ladybird books, taking the typewriter out of it’s little bag and pressing each of the keys. These smooth cream coloured keys, the sound of the line change and the smell of ink. I’m an overly nostalgic hipster who still owns one of these old machines, but I understand the nostalgia as it really is the first thing that got me hooked on being able to type words and create a thing. ...

It’s 2025 and AI is here, and just about the only thing people in tech can talk about, but let’s flash back to 2010 when Public Cloud was the latest trend and the only thing tech could talk about. Can we follow this historical trend to predict the future of AI? How does the general public perceive AI? I’m pretty sure your non-tech neighbours can tell you what ChatGPT is, but do they know what AWS is? So, what’s different this time? ...

I have been fortunate enough over the past few years to have some excellent coaching, some helpful mentors and one or two pretty good therapists. As a result I have been able to get to know myself quite well and as part of one of my goals of 2025 I want to do a little bit more sharing of my thoughts, my ideas and therefore more of myself in public. ...

As for many others, the new year and the first weeks of January are a time for reflection, goals setting and aspiring to be a newer, better version of ourselves. Despite being someone who is very driven by personal growth, I have never really felt the need to partake in this ritual. That is not to say that I have not undertaken many self-improvement activities and those of you looking through my posts of 2024 will know that I spent quite a bit of time habit stacking more things into my routine. ...

As the night draws in, Christmas draws ever closer and the year 2024 comes speeding to a close, I thought that for the first time I would take some time to reflect on the year. The role-r-coaster This year was certainly a year with some twists and turns. I started with one role, survived a drastic management re-org to eventually land in the new role of Deputy CTO and somehow just about managed to figure out what that role actually meant. I spent more time writing product documents and writing code than I had done before, I spent more time talking to customers this year than I had done for several years and overall I’m pleased with the progress. There was a moment where it was glibly described as “Harry Potter let out from under the stairs” and I have to agree that for a while it certainly felt that way. It has been the case in every time in my career journey I have found myself going through the typical periods of “Yes I can do this!”, “Wait, do what? What is this job?” and “Ok, maybe I sorta get this now”. As the year ends I’m phasing into the later. ...