One of the goals I highlighted in my recent memory post was to share a little bit more about myself and so I thought the best way to do this would be to (re)introduce myself in a memory post!
I have been working in IT for what is now approaching some 28 years. I actually started my career journey back in 1998, with my first role being as a IT consultant for a large consulting firm in London. Whilst this did involve some projects where I was involved in the testing process it wasn't until I faced redundancy in 2003 that I took up a full time career as a software tester.
I first came across the Ministry of Testing in 2013 when I attended a TestBash conference. I'd taken my first leadership role a few years before this working as a Test Manager where I was managing a small independent team of software testers. My involvement in MoT and the wider testing community really helped moved my career in a better direction - not only did it encourage me to get back into hands-on exploratory testing it really helped with our transition from an independent testing team to one integrated into an agile development team.
In my current role as a Lead Quality Engineer I now have a much broader role where I oversee the day to day of the development team as well as being involved in exploratory testing, backlog refinement and product direction as well as supporting CI/CD and automation.
The first picture on left of this memory is a younger version of myself doing a 99 second talk at TestBash in 2016. As a result of work and reasons I gradually found myself getting less directly involved in the testing community after this point. But I'm pleased to say I decided to get involved again in 2024! The picture on the right is the current version of me doing my 99 second talk at MoTaCon last year!
For me right now my plan is to continue to build up my contribution to the community and learn more about AI and Quality Engineering. I am looking to contribute more though my writing, establish more direct contact with those out in the community and I hope in time to build my confidence to speak more about testing. I'm very much looking forward to my first in-person Leading with Quality day in Brighton later in the year.
Outside of work I'm a self-taught pianist and I enjoy composing music. One of my other hobbies is creating family movies using photographs and old cine films (for anniversaries and holidays) and I've been learning how to do this using Davinci Resolve. A more recent addition to my list of hobbies is building and collecting LEGO cars (this all started after getting an F1 car for Christmas!).
As I mentioned in my Goals for 2026 I would love to have more one to one conversations with others out in the MoTaverse. So please reach out to me on Slack if you would like to connect! I'm always happy to chat about Testing and Quality Engineering. I will in due course look at adding a calendar link to my profile.
