About me

The boring bit

During varied career from self-employment, a move into the Aerospace industry, IT and Management Consultancy and Training and finally to Higher & Further Education, I have accumulated a wide range of skills.

A professional approach has been required in each position that I have held. This diverse career has allowed me to developed excellent interpersonal and organisational skills. These allow me to relate well with people, whether they are colleagues, employers, employees, customers or students. I am thorough in my preparation of all aspects of any task undertaken. To achieve the best results I am prepared to contribute the necessary effort with regard to time and resources. From the start of my working life, I have sought to achieve a high understanding of the needs of business, from man-management (counselling and interviewing) to accounting and budgetary control. Many of these skills become evident in my organisational ability.

Throughout my life I have always tried to achieve the best with the aim of progressing my career. This can be shown by my achievements both inside and outside the work situation. Examples of this are that I qualified as an Approved Driving Instructor a year earlier than normally permitted. During my employment with Control Training Limited (1989 - 1991) I was awarded 'Employee of the Year' in my first full year with the company. Control Training Limited was a private training provider of IT and Computer training. Other achievements include my election to Chairperson of a local charity for Cerebral Palsy. During this role, I also undertook to be temporary Chairperson of a committee set up in-conjunction with a local authority. I also spent some time as a Governor to my daughters' school. Unfortunately I had to relinquish these activities when I commenced employment with Control Training due to the amount of travel involved.

It was my interest in teaching, and in particular that of Systems Analysis and Design that led me to apply to become and Examiner for the Information Systems Examination Board (ISEB). I was accepted to the panel of examiners in 1991. I was also an External Examiner for a FE College delivering BSc and FD awards for a University.

Maintaining this interest in education, I have been employed at the University of the West of England as a Visiting Lecturer in the Faculty of Engineering, teaching various aspects of IT including 'C' Programming. I later became a lecturer at the City of Bristol College in the Faculty of Computing and Information Technology. At the college I taught a range of subjects from Systems Analysis and Design, OOP, Robotics to various management based modules in Quality and Project Management. I have completed and achieved an OU course in Robotics and an on-line course in PRINCE 2 project management.

It was whilst at the City of Bristol College I developed this website for the benefit of my students as easy access point for handouts and other information on the subjects I taught. For a time it was well known in the college and featured in the college's library information.

Unfortunately in January 2010 I was made redundant from the City of Bristol College, hence the new look and limited content web site which I also use to test out ideas for others sites and run as a hobby platform.

Retirement leaves me free to do what I want to do and as a result I have re-kindled my interest in photography - feel free to browse the pages and if you have any comments I would love to hear them, just use my contact page.

Since retiring in 2010 I have enjoyed numerous cruises and holidays - some of the photos appear on this site. To further utilise my interest in photography and website building, I follow a brass band called Oldland Brass (www.oldlandbrass.com) this gives me a chance to publish some of my photos of the band.