Beyond the titles: leading change as an individual contributor

20th October 2025
  • Locked
Barry Ehigiator's profile
Barry Ehigiator

Test Team Lead @BBC

Beyond the titles: leading change as an individual contributor image
Talk Description

Leadership in software development isn’t just for people with management titles. In this talk, Barry Ehigiator shows how anyone can influence change and improve quality by applying transformational leadership principles.

Using real stories from Margaret Hamilton’s work on Apollo 11 to the creation of the BBC iPlayer, Barry demonstrates how individual contributors can lead through expertise, collaboration, and action. He introduces a practical change model built on four steps: align your proposal to team and business goals, appeal to reasoning, act and call others to action, and provide ongoing support. You’ll also learn how reflection, feedback, and authenticity help sustain progress.

By the end of this session, you'll be able to:

  • Explain how leadership and change can come from any role, not only management positions.
  • Explain how leadership and change can come from any role, not only management positions.
  • Use a practical change model based on transformational leadership to design, communicate, and support quality improvement initiatives.
  • Develop strategies to lead change authentically through reflection, feedback, and experimentation.
Test Team Lead @BBC
A seasoned professional in software testing and quality engineering, who is passionate about empowering individuals and teams to deliver quality software products to their clients.
Sign in to comment
Suggested Content
Explore MoT
Leading With Quality Lean Coffee image
Quality leadership conversations
Cognitive Biases In Software Testing image
Learn how to recognise cognitive biases, explain what they are and use them to your advantage in your testing
This Week in Quality image
Debrief the week in Quality via a community radio show hosted by Simon Tomes and members of the community
Subscribe to our newsletter
We'll keep you up to date on all the testing trends.