From specialist team to dependable delivery organisation
As Chief Technology Officer for Kantar Retail Virtual Reality, I led the technology and delivery organisation responsible for the next generation of virtual-reality software for the retail market. The organisation had evolved from Red Dot Square Solutions, where I had previously worked with Zahir Mazhar.
The group grew from four people to 35, covering the full delivery lifecycle and working with offshore partners to balance capability and cost. I introduced agile ways of working while giving the team room to shape the process around its own needs, made quality assurance part of development rather than a final gate, and established DevOps practices for faster, more reliable delivery.
The role extended beyond engineering management. I worked with customers and partners across Kantar and WPP, guided product and technology strategy, and oversaw the security and compliance work needed to deliver enterprise software in a corporate environment. I remained close to architecture and implementation throughout, using technical depth to make strategic decisions concrete.
Outcomes and responsibilities
- Grew and shaped a multidisciplinary software delivery team
- Established agile, QA and DevOps practices
- Directed product architecture and longer-term technology strategy
- Managed distributed delivery, budgets, security and compliance
- Bridged customer goals, commercial constraints and engineering reality