What’s your background?

I left college and went to work at a local leisure centre. I worked there for ten and a half years, in that time I developed a lot of personal skills which eventually led to me becoming manager of the Gym. Things like personal training, GP referral scheme, looking after groups of people with special needs, young people, people with social behaviour issues.

From there I moved to the Friarage Hospital as an operating theatre technician, worked with patient transfers and setting up the theatre for operations.

After that the opportunity to work at razorblue presented itself, and from there I’ve never looked back! It’s been the most demanding, challenging and interesting job I’ve had. From a personal development perspective, it’s made me do things that I never thought I was capable of. No two days are the same!

What do you get involved in?

The general overview of the accounts I look after; ensuring that regular account meetings are scheduled, dealing with clients face to face. It is part of our policy to meet in person, you develop a better working relationship and understand our clients’ needs more thoroughly.

I’m involved in assisting the account management team in general, driving towards our overall targets. Day to day I deal with customer requirements and many are business critical solutions. Overall, I like to think I’m responsible for making sure our customers get the best possible service we can provide. It’s a fast paced environment, you need to be on your toes.

What’s the most interesting project you’ve been a part of?

I was responsible for replacing an eight-year-old server at a large client. It needed to be replaced, their emails were hosted on premise. We proposed two different options; remain on premise, or move to Office365 for email. They went for the move to the cloud.

Their data footprint reduced significantly and as a result they were able to make use of Cloud Backup, which was a nice addition for the customer as the boss previously had to take the disks to another location every Thursday once backups were complete. We freed up his time, the client was a very nice one to work with too!

I’ve also recently replaced the WiFi solution in a boutique hotel, starting from nothing but a floor plan. This project has spun into network security and improving connectivity too.

How would you describe your job to a total stranger?

I work for a fast growing well respected IT company helping businesses with business critical IT requirements.

As someone with a background in other industries, what’s the hardest part of working in IT?

Making sure that the planning that goes into our solutions is correct to the letter. There’s so much riding on it from a customer and our own reputational point of view.

What’s your favourite part of working in IT?

The team. Everyone is so helpful and nice, going out and meeting new people, the challenge of being out of my comfort zone. You just do what you gotta do!

What’s your favourite gadget?

Playstation 4. All day. No brainer.

What’s been the biggest life change since you started working in tech?

The job itself. Before that I had my wedding day, I’ve got two kids, and I was in a job that didn’t really challenge me. This job does, it was a leap of faith into the unknown and I’m glad I did it.

You have £3,000 to spend in PC World. What do you buy?

The biggest 4k TV I can get, with a sound bar…to maximise my Playstation 4. And a decent laptop to play Football Manager on, if it stretches that far.

Have you ever had to give tech advice to friends and relatives?

Yes, my mum on a daily basis! She thinks I’m like Steve Jobs. There was one time, when I was relatively new to razorblue I was keen to make a good impression. A woman asked me for help with a setup with a new router. I went along and installed it, it actually worked!

In my old job people were always asking me advice about their mobile phones. I’ve been the go to guy for tech stuff in previous lives anyway, I’m just better prepared for the answers now.