Advertise on podcast: Talking with Tech Leaders

Our latest episode is all about the power of tech to do good for our communities, as we meet Kirsty McIntosh of the Scottish Tech Army. The charity was founded during the pandemic to bring tech-savvy volunteers together with third-sector organisations in need of support – on everything from managing websites to bolstering cyber security. With over 2,500 volunteers supporting 300 organisations (so far!), it’s vital work. Together with host Michael Phair, Kirsty discusses the Tech Army’s activities, growth and impact – as well as her role as Head of Partnerships. As ever, we also get to know the person behind the role, charting Kirsty’s journey through the tech sector and into her current position as a tech leader.  And, finally, Michael puts Kirsty on the spot with a few personal questions around her motivations and recommendations. All in all, it’s a great episode – we hope you enjoy listening to it as much as we did producing it!

In this episode of Talking with Tech Leaders, Alan Mayberry chats host Michael Phair through his journey from the early days of his career in his hometown of Dunoon to the top tier of software engineering with Planet DDS today. It’s quite the journey, not only stopping off at the places you might expect, with roles at the likes of Brightree, Amec and Global, but also taking a few detours that might surprise, with a stint on a fishing boat and a role working on a cruise ship. It's all a far cry from the challenges he’s faced in senior roles like Director of Engineering at Planet DDS. We hear all about scaling a SaaS business – how to strike the between meeting demand and chasing growth, between building a team quickly and maintaining a vibrant, positive culture.  And, as we always do, we’re keen to meet the human behind the leader – getting to know the real Allan with a few personal questions about his motivations, hobbies and dream dinner party guests.

In many ways, Hamish Grierson is the archetypal tech entrepreneur: sharp, single-minded and innovative. But, as this episode of Talking with Tech Leaders shows, that’s really just a tiny part of his story. For starters, we chat through a career that is varied, to say the least – from studying international politics and paying his way through university with landscape gardening, to pursuing roles in advertising and starting a skiing business. As we said: varied. A stint with the New Entrepreneurs Foundation put him firmly on today’s path. He talks about the lessons he learned and support he received, before co-founding Thriva Healthcare with two others in 2016. Hamish chats us through the Thriva story since then: the rounds of investment, supporting the health service through the pandemic and their plans for the years ahead. He also offers some wise words around founding businesses and entrepreneurship, overcoming imposter syndrome and achieving the right balance between professional passions and home life.   It’s insightful, fascinating and well worth an hour of your time. Enjoy!

For most of the tech leaders we’ve interviewed on this show, one career is enough. But Brian Reid, Director of Corporate Transformation & Workplace at the Scottish Government, seems to be onto his fourth or fifth career now. In this episode of Talking with Tech Leaders, he tells us all about the story of his first career – with the 30+ years he spent with Standard Life, working his way up from entry level to executive level. He also discusses some of what he calls his shadow careers. First, as a Taekwondo instructor, guiding others on the tenets and principles still clearly important to him today. Then, as a wedding photographer, having grown from the “amateur who annoys the professional”, to doing a favour for a friend, to doing around 80 weddings. And he also shares more about his role today, having swapped financial services and travel & tourism for the public sector. With host Michael Phair, he chats through how different (and not so different) it can be, as well as describing some of the transformation he’s driving there.  Along the way, we hear all about the discipline of project and change management – how methodologies could never be a one-size-fits-all solution, the role of technology and the qualities you need to succeed – and get to hear more about what makes Brian tick. It’s must-listen stuff. Enjoy!

When we’re not Talking with Tech Leaders, we’re at our day jobs at Be-IT – Scotland’s largest independent Technology Recruiters. And, if you’ve heard anything about Be-IT, you’ve probably heard that we’ve recently celebrated our 10th birthday. So, to mark the milestone, we’ve had a chat with our very own Tech Leader: our CEO, Nikola Kelly. Having spent more than 20 years in the world of recruitment, she not only sits on the board of Career Ready and the Scotland IS Diversity & Inclusion group, but she has been recognised as the Young Star by Scottish Women in Business and nominated for both the APSCo Business Leader of the year and Businesswoman of the Year at the Scottish Women’s Awards. We chat through her career journey and, along the way, chart the growth of Be-IT through Nik’s eyes – from the early days of the setting up a Glasgow office all the way through the pandemic and, in the last few months, our MBO. We may be biased, but it’s a fascinating chat with an inspirational lady. Enjoy!

As you might expect, we are huge fans of CodeClan. After all, they’re in the business of bringing talent into Scotland’s tech sector, and that’s something that drives us every day in our recruitment day jobs. So it’s a real privilege to have CEO, Loral Quinn, as our guest for episode 29 of Talking with Tech Leaders. We take a tour of Loral’s career, chatting through her brief roles in advertising and music management in London and, following her return to Edinburgh, her time with Aberdeen Asset Management. She tells us about her experiences of co-founding Sustainably, a charitable giving app which won multiple industry awards, including Richard Branson’s startup of the year 2019. And she shares some of her plans for the future of CodeClan. Much like Karen Meechan in our last episode, Loral is someone passionate about closing the tech skills gap in Scotland. She tells us about some of the great work CodeClan are doing to do just that, with some fantastic stories of careers remade in the tech sector. Get listening and get inspired...

Let’s face it, a show about the Tech Sector in Scotland probably should’ve had Karen Meechan on a whole lot sooner. As the CEO of ScotlandIS, she has an insight and understanding of our world that few others do. She knows the country’s challenges, problems and priorities when it comes to IT & Digital jobs – which this episode well worth your time, all by itself. But, it just so happens that Karen’s own story is pretty inspirational too. Having left school to jump straight into the workplace via a YTS (the modern apprenticeship of its day), she has truly worked her way up in tech – including spending almost two decades with ScotlandIS, taking on the mantle of CEO in 2021.  As she says, it’s the kind of role she never dreamed about as a child. But it’s a role we think she was born for: you simply won’t find anyone more passionate about the tech sector in Scotland. (Especially when it comes to opening doors to fantastic career paths for bright young minds.) We’re delighted she could join us – it’s a fantastic and fascinating chat.

It’s always fun to consider how far computing has come, even in the space of one career. When Tony McClelland was getting started, programming was a skill you could learn with punch cards, industry ran on paper tapes and rendering cute cartoons involve a supercomputer and a sleeping bag. Which is to say that Tony has some incredible experience. And he’s happy to share it in this episode of Talking with Tech Leaders. He talks about working on pan-European research before cheap air travel, shares stories of multi-million pound periscopes and shares some memories of Graham Technology – back in the days when they almost became a billion-pound firm and a Scottish Tech unicorn. We touch on the culture that made Graham Technology (or Sword Ciboodle, as it was re-named) what it was, with another mention of the famous Golden Knob award – as mentioned by Adam Dallis in episode 10. Tony also tells us a similar story about one project that had a ‘Scapegoat of the Day’.  And we chat through his current role as CIO of the ACCA – what he calls the world’s smallest multinational, with 650 mostly based in Glasgow, and thousands of students and members right across the globe.  As ever, we also look behind the leader, getting to know what makes Tony tick, with a few searching questions on everything from book recommendations to dinner party guests.

For this episode of Talking with Tech Leaders, we’re talking all about the insights and values to be gleaned from the bits and bytes flowing through our everyday lives – to paraphrase our guest, Andy McMahon. The award-winning Data Scientist and Machine Learning expert takes us through his own career journey, from his academic roots with Imperial College, into the private sector with Streamba, Aggreko and now NatWest. We explore data in depth, chatting through the power and possibilities of machine learning. As you might expect, we touch on what Chat GPT means for organisations like NatWest (and the threat is can represent for organisations like Samsung). For those of us who aren’t Data Scientists or Machine Learning Engineers, he offers a brilliant breakdown of the different roles involved, as well as explaining the real-world impact of what can seem (to outsiders like us!) like an abstract area of tech. We also cover his brief foray into television work, as a consultant for a discovery channel show at the crazy end of the science spectrum and chat about his incredible book, Machine Learning Engineering with Python. Throughout it all, Andy is thoughtful, insightful and engaging – a perfect tech leader to talk to...

Just for a second, think about the biggest challenge you might face in your career. How’s about launching a digital TV service? Or integrating two colossal financial institutions? Or facing a year-long multi-million-pound high court case? You might say that Scott Mackay – CTO, Technology Strategist and CRM Guru – has seen more ups and downs in tech than most. You might also say that would make him a great guest for episode 25 of Talking with Tech Leaders. And you’d be right.  With a career that includes so many huge developments at Sky, Barclays, ABRDN and others, it’s no surprise that this is such a bumper episode. But, with entertaining anecdotes, fascinating reveals and a few personal insights, it’s well worth your time.  If you have any suggestions, feedback or you’d like to take your turn in the TWTL hotseat, please get in touch with our host, Michael Phair at [email protected]

Technical innovation is nothing without the human application. How the two elements work together is what the podcast is all about, which is what makes Simon Sear – Strategy & Innovation Expert – such a fascinating guest for episode 24.   Joining host Michael Phair, Simon discusses how his education in Psychology played a role in his early career, takes us through a few career highlights, including CIO at BP, writing books about the Euro, working with Enron (yes, that Enron), and starting SPARCK with BJSS. He offers views and insights on everything from automation to team building, explains how people are just like cars (sort of ) and answers a few quickfire personal questions too. There’s even time for a story about a lost dog finding their way home. It’s all well worth a listen. 

He says it himself – Bob Keiller doesn’t quite qualify for the ‘tech’ part of ‘Talking with Tech Leaders’. So it’s perhaps worth renaming this episode Talking with Values Leaders, or Talking with Storytelling Leaders. Whatever we’re calling it, it’s well worth listening to. He chats through his career with host Michael Phair, charting his journey from Heriot Watt University, through a series of roles in the oil & gas sector. Bob describes how he led a $280millon MBO of the Halliburton division he managed, then sold it to Wood Group, becoming their CEO – responsible for more than 50,000 employees, before taking on chairmanship of Scottish Enterprise, Entrepreneurial Scotland and various trade bodies.  Through it all, there’s a golden thread around communications and culture. There’s nobody who better understands the importance of strong values and engaging storytelling as incredibly powerful leadership tools. Plug in, sit back and enjoy.