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Welcome!


I can help with...

AI Implementation
Safety & Governance · Deployment Strategy
Engineering Leadership
Promoting Growth · Technical Mentoring
Azure Architecture & Security
Terraform · PCI DSS 4.0 · CI/CD
Business Automation
Process Refinement · Efficiency Gains
Data Engineering
Data Migrations · ETL Optimisation

About Me

Who I am

Engineering leader with 10 years of experience building teams, systems, and capability, often from scratch. I joined Hood Group as a support analyst and have grown into leading four disciplines: cloud infrastructure, data engineering, AI, and IT engineering, taking ownership and building where neither existed before.

I care most about enabling my team: identifying the right people, building roles around their strengths, and creating an environment where curiosity and honest failure are both encouraged. Outside of that, I focus on delivering things that matter: resilient systems, measurable automation, and technology the wider business can actually use.

I'm ready to bring that same pattern to an organisation preparing for its next step: modernising infrastructure, introducing real automation, or building the engineering capability to scale. I work best where the gap between technical decisions and business outcomes is short, and where there's space to build the right team alongside the right systems.

My Experience

2022 - Current
Hood Group Ltd.

Cloud & Data Solutions Manager

Engineering Lead: Cloud, Data, AI & IT

  • Built the engineering team almost entirely from within: identified and developed four individuals from support roles into substantive engineering positions, with zero attrition over four years.
  • Currently leading a full on-premises to Azure migration, completing within 6–9 months.
  • Requested and granted early access to Azure OpenAI models at European launch; built two production apps — a GPT-4 platform registered to 250+ staff with 100+ active weekly users saving 100+ staff-hours per week, and a RAG-powered HR assistant on Azure AI Search cutting query response from 72 hours to instant.
  • Delivered a Customer Service RAG PoC surfacing real-time answers during live calls, directly contributing to a multi-million-pound contract win.
  • Currently leading Microsoft 365 Copilot rollout organisation-wide, including policy, security governance, custom knowledge bases, and onboarding hubs; delivering AI enablement sessions to senior stakeholders, including VP-level external partners.
  • Drove £500k+ in documented process automation savings (~4 FTE equivalent over six years) across business operations and engineering workflows.
2020 - 2022
Hood Group Ltd.

Cloud Infrastructure Analyst

  • Acted as highest technical escalation point; consistently resolved P1 incidents, including legacy system failures with zero documentation.
  • Transformed the Azure estate from an unmanaged single subscription to a Terraform-managed, PCI DSS 4.0-compliant environment of 300+ resources across dev/test/prod, with CI/CD pipelines and 99.99% SLA on critical services.
  • Introduced Terraform and mirrored dev/test/prod environments from scratch, alongside PowerShell automation to eliminate manual provisioning; laid the architectural groundwork for the full PCI DSS 4.0 overhaul.
  • Eliminated all manual deployments via Azure DevOps CI/CD pipelines, freeing engineering teams from release management overhead and giving them back time to focus on code quality and feature delivery.
  • Embedded vulnerability scanning, static code analysis, and security and quality gates into CI/CD workflows, shifting security left and catching issues before they reached production.
  • Automated PCI DSS compliance processes, including automated web vulnerability scanning.
2018 - 2020
Hood Group Ltd.

Application Support Analyst

  • Delivered the initial document fulfilment automation, replacing two FTE with a resilient automated workflow now generating thousands of personalised communications per week.
  • Managed specialist insurance applications and database environments; built foundational security awareness through hands-on red team exercises and web application penetration testing, informing the security-first approach carried through all subsequent infrastructure work.
  • Maintained and developed internal and external company websites, including intranet platforms and a PHP-based consumer-facing homepage.
2016 - 2018
Southend University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust

IT Support Analyst

  • Provided IT support across a large hospital environment; built internal web tools to automate daily workflows and KPI reporting dashboards for clinical departments.

Education & Certifications

In Progress
Microsoft

Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert (AZ-305)

In Progress — Awaiting Exam

In Progress
Microsoft

Microsoft Certified: DevOps Engineer Expert (AZ-400)

In Progress — Awaiting Exam

In Progress
Microsoft

Microsoft Certified: Developing AI Apps and Agents on Azure (AI-103)

In Progress — Awaiting Exam

2021
Microsoft

Microsoft Certified: Azure Fundamentals (AZ-900)

2014 - 2016
Chelmsford College

IT Application Development — Level 3 Diploma

Application & Web Development · Computer Networking · Information Security

2012 - 2013
Chelmsford College

Forensic Science — Level 3 Diploma

Forensic Investigation · Criminology · Applied Science

Skills

DevOps & Engineering
Microsoft Azure Azure DevOps Terraform / IaC CI/CD App Services Azure Functions Logic Apps Azure Key Vault Application Insights Cloudflare DevSecOps PowerShell Docker Linux Git / GitHub REST APIs
AI & Automation
Azure OpenAI Azure AI Foundry Azure AI Search RAG / Vector Search Copilot Studio MS 365 & Copilot Claude Code
Data
SQL Server / MSSQL PostgreSQL CosmosDB Database Administration Data Pipeline Design Modern Data Architecture
Identity & Security
Entra ID Conditional Access SSO / SAML Intune / MDM PCI DSS 4.0 GDPR Microsoft Defender for Endpoint CrowdStrike SonarCloud Penetration Testing Incident Response Vulnerability Management CIRP
Leadership & Strategy
Engineering Leadership IT Strategy Digital Transformation Technical Strategy DevOps Culture Building SDLC Consulting Talent Development Agile / Scrum Change Management Stakeholder Engagement Vendor Management

Get in Touch

I'm always open to discuss new opportunities; Whether you have a role in mind or just want to connect, feel free to reach out.

Download CV

Available in two formats: a PDF version (recommended), and a DOCX file for uploading directly into your ATS / HR systems.