What made you want to do the work you do? Please share the full story.
I trained as a chemist, not a technologist. Ended up in banking infrastructure at Rothschild in Sydney almost by accident. Schools needed that same rigor with none of the budget, and something about that gap wouldn’t let me go. Twenty years later, still here.
How is AI changing your business? What changes are you making to adapt?
Schools are ahead of the policy on this, not behind it. I’ve had staff using AI marking tools before anyone in leadership signed off. So I wrote our own safeguarding guidance before the DfE published theirs, because waiting wasn’t an option.
If AI is impacting your business, please tell us 3 things you expect to change in the near future.
Procurement checks will need to ask AI-specific questions, most don’t yet. Training budgets shift hard toward AI literacy, I’d guess 30% within two years. And schools without in-house IT lean on outsourced support even more than they already do.
What are the three things you need in work to achieve purpose? Why are they important to you?
Clear scope, so nobody’s guessing what we own. Trust that’s earned over years, never sold in a pitch. And proof a school’s actually safer, not just compliant on a form. That third one’s the reason I still check in on jobs I finished months ago.
Tell us about a time where you saw a surprising outcome that you did not expect.
Ran a routine audit at a secondary school last year, found ransomware sitting quiet in their systems for weeks. Nobody there had a clue. Changed how we audit everywhere now, we assume something’s wrong until we’ve proven otherwise.
What is the biggest challenge you face each day and how do you handle it?
Schools need real security on a school budget, which is never much. I’ve been doing this long enough to know you triage by what actually stops teaching, not what looks worst on a report. That’s the call, every day.
What is a habit you try to stick to and how has it helped you?
Every DfE cyber advisory, read the morning it drops, coffee first. Small habit. But it means we’re flagging a risk before most schools have even heard the term for it. Clients notice that gap eventually.
What achievement are you the proudest of and why?
Getting Classroom365 onto the DfE’s approved framework. Nearly three years of compliance work most clients never see or think about. It’s proof the model holds at scale, not just for one lucky school.
What is your favorite book and why?
“Thinking, Fast and Slow.” Not what people expect from someone in IT. It’s shaped how I tell a gut feeling apart from an actual risk, and in this job that difference matters more than people assume.
If you could go back 2 years and give yourself advice, what would it be?
Slow down on hiring, speed up on training. Took me a while to figure that out, and it cost us a rough six months mid-growth. Investing in people earlier would’ve spared a lot of that pain.
Who has been your biggest mentor in life (personal or professional) and how have they helped you?
A manager at Rothschild, early on, taught me to hold structure when everything’s on fire. I still run every school project on that same lesson, almost without thinking about it now.
Just for fun, what is your favorite dessert?
Sticky toffee pudding.