About me
Programme strategy, governance and execution - ecommerce, digital and AI
I got into the internet before most people knew what it was. In the mid-nineties, while still at collage, I was working at one of the UK's first internet cafés coding on physically connected machines, building early chat rooms, teaching myself HTML, ASP and Perl, and figuring out how websites worked.
When Tarmac approached the café wanting a website, I built it. That turned into more websites for construction companies across the Midlands. Then, in 1999, I was brought in to build Dyson's first ecommerce platform to sell their early DC01 range at shop.dyson.com. Four of us built the entire thing from design through to database, with no pre-built platforms to lean on and no established playbook for how ecommerce was supposed to work. I was team lead, and very quickly became the person managing the client relationship with Dyson directly.
That transition - from the person building the thing to the person responsible for the outcome - happened naturally, and it's defined how I've worked ever since.
The journey
My career has moved between agencies, consultancies, brands, and SaaS businesses, and across roles that have variously been titled CTO, VP, product lead, programme and project manager. The title has always been secondary to the work of delivery.
Connecting all of these has been my focus ecommerce and digital commerce, at scale and in complexity. I've led internationalisation programmes for major brands and thousands of small marketplaces sellers, built and managed partnerships with the likes of Amazon, eBay, Walmart, and PayPal, lead teams in substantial digital transformation programmes, and delivered data and loyalty solutions for some of the UK's most recognised retailers. At Webinterpret I spent nearly a decade in a senior leadership role spanning product, partnerships, and commercial.
A significant part of that journey has been in consulting, with more than twenty engagements across fashion, grocery, pharmacy, financial services, and marketplaces. Walking into programmes at different stages, reading the situation quickly, and finding a way through.
What I believe
Having been inside ecommerce through every major shift, the dot-com era, the marketplace explosion, platform consolidation, the composable and headless wave, and now agentic commerce, I've formed some views that shape how I approach transformation work.
The first is that the hype that comes with a new technology is often not overblown, but sometimes early. Almost everything the dot-com bubble promised eventually happened. I think about that when people say AI is overhyped or the current conversations about there being not much real Agentic Commerce. I don't believe the question is whether it will change commerce, more when, and in what form.
The second is that agentic commerce is already here, in layers. AI-driven product discovery, personalised search and merchandising, intelligent pricing, these live today across many products. The next layer, new consumer interfaces and entirely new brand relationships, is evolving now, consumer driven. Nobody knows exactly what shape it will take. Which means the work right now isn't only building for what's known, it's building the process and data foundations, the adaptable architecture, and the organisational culture to move well when the landscape shifts again. And it will shift again, much more quickly than we've seen in those previous waves.
The third is that most transformations don't fail on strategy or technology. They fail in the space between the two, on delivery leadership, where decisions have to be made by someone who understands both, and who has seen enough to know what questions haven't been asked yet. That's the space I've worked in for a long time, and it's where I'm most useful.
How I work
I've spent most of my career working as a consultant and freelancer, moving between startups and large enterprises, and taking on whatever the role required: VP, CTO, product lead, marketing and sales leadership, sole contributor PM. I've led teams of dozens of developers and managed projects with no direct team, navigating complex matrix environments where influence matters more than authority.
What's remained constant throughout is the work itself, leading ecommerce and digital programmes, and doing what it takes to deliver them.
I'm comfortable operating at a strategic level - shaping direction, establishing governance, aligning senior stakeholders - but I don't see that as separate from the hands-on work. In my experience the best programme leaders are able to stay close to the detail while keeping a commercial view. I'm as likely to be working through a delivery plan or sitting in a team stand-up as I am presenting to a board.
I try not to overclaim. What I can say honestly is that I've been brought into difficult situations more than once and found a way through, and that I care about the outcome, not just the process.
immerced
I operate through Immerced, my consultancy. Engagements vary; some are strategic, focused on direction-setting and governance design; others are hands-on, with day-to-day delivery ownership. Most are somewhere in between.
Where the scope requires it, I'm able to bring in trusted specialists, people I've worked with and can vouch for, so clients get the right expertise without having to build a team themselves.
If you're looking for someone experienced, straightforward, and genuinely invested in making your programme work, I'd be glad to have a conversation.