I am a technical product leader with 15+ years of experience defining, building, and scaling complex technology products across med-tech, mining, defence, and digital industries. With a PhD in Robotics and a background in engineering leadership, I focus on transforming emerging technologies into commercial solutions with measurable business and social impact. For the past five years I have advised startups and enterprises on product strategy, roadmap definition, and software development with many repeat clients and multi-year engagements.
Typical situations I'm brought into
- We promoted our best engineer to manage the team but now they have no one to learn from here.
- I'm not confident that our engineering capabilities are sufficient to meet our company's aspirations.
- I keep being told things will take months to deliver and I need someone technical to determine if that's really true.
- Our engineers are great but they keep telling me the team is too small and they need more help. Should we build, buy, or outsource the development?
- This team is constantly busy but I have no idea what they do all day. Are they working on the right things?
- We've found product-market fit and now I need this team to mature and build things the right way, even if that means slowing down.
- We're too small to afford a full-time senior engineering leader, but we do need one - what could we achieve in a few days per week?
If any of these sound familiar, I've dealt with them before and can bring that experience to your company too. My engagements usually share a common structure: a high-intensity initial exploration, followed by a period of establishing stability, then a capability transfer to your team. Afterwards, I remain available in an advisor capacity or jump back in when there's a new challenge or program of work to be set up.
Tom's outstanding communications skills allow him to speak with confidence and authority equally well to an office full of developers as to a boardroom full of executives. It is exceptionally difficult to find people of his calibre. There is little more I can say by way of recommendation than I have already sought him out for multiple roles over his career and hope to work with him again in the future.
Core Capabilities
- Providing rapid clarity in technically ambiguous situations
- Alignment of business strategy, product direction, and engineering execution
- Stakeholder facilitation across executive leadership, product organisations, and engineering teams
- Presentations to executives and board members, facilitation of workshops, brainstorms, and project kick-offs
- Architecture reviews, capability mapping, and roadmap development
- Product management and technology strategy from rapid prototyping, POCs, & MVPs through to development of go-to-market plans, regulatory approvals, and product launches
- Customer interviews, requirements elicitation, journey mapping, value-chain analysis
- Project and/or program management
- Leadership of cross-functional engineering and product teams
- Data analytics, business intelligence, and data visualisation
Selected Clients and Projects
I'm working with the WMP in a fractional role as the Director of Applied R&D to uplift their engineering & science teams' capacity and performance as the organisation scales up. The WMP breeds mosquitos that carry the Wolbachia bacteria which significantly reduces their ability to pass on diseases such as Dengue fever to humans. This team works on the science and engineering needed to produce mosquitos in the hundreds of millions a week, and the mechanisms and processes to distribute and release those around the world.
Control Bionics specializes in creating cutting-edge devices that revolutionize the way people with disabilities interact with technology. Our flagship product, the NeuroNode, uses electromyography and accelerometer data to detect a user's intent and translate it into actions on a computer or tablet. We also develop a semi-autonomous driving upgrade for motorized wheelchairs to enhance mobility for those who need it most. Our mission is to create a more inclusive world by empowering people with disabilities to access technology with ease.
I have enjoyed a consulting relationship with Control Bionics for several years as a trusted advisor. Beginning with design and development of the first prototype of the DROVE autonomous wheelchair, I then hired and guided their software team, and managed the engineering roadmap in a fractional Head of Engineering role.
A three-month contract to establish the development processes for a team of software, electronics, mechanical, and machine-learning engineers developing a suite of optical radars for search and rescue, object detection, classification, and tracking applications. I also hired a few key members of the AI/ML team. I will watch their progress with a keen eye - they're building some seriously impressive tech!
I facilitated a series of meetings between ELT and board for a superannuation clearing house that needed to re-architect its underlying database structures, and I then proposed the architecture and hiring roadmap for this restructure.
Why hire me?
Quality Engineering Architecture
I have a strong design sense and the experience to know where and when to make trade-offs. The wide range of projects I've been involved in gives me many different patterns to work with, and a strong set of starting points for greenfield developments. I know when to lock down a design choice and when it's better to spend some additional effort to leave options open. And through years of mentoring and coaching, I also know how to teach this aesthetic sense to others, and to explain my designs and approaches to colleagues.
Deep Technical Knowledge
I have degrees in Engineering, Physics, and Robotics, along with real-world experience in multiple industries. That breadth lets me know where to start with any problem I might encounter, but my depth in product development, software architecture, and team dynamics gives me the confidence that my solutions will stand the test of time. There's a good chance I've worked with the programming language, technology, or design pattern you're using, and if not, I've likely worked with the foundational ideas behind it and can get to grips with it quickly enough to be effective. I can also help you choose the right technology stack for today and for the future, or guide you in making a decision to change.
Executive and Board Experience
For most of the latter half of my career I've worked closely with C-suite executives (or as one) and their boards of directors. I've prepared and led board presentations and am comfortable offering direct and blunt feedback when necessary. I have a good understanding of financial considerations and the typical business models encountered in engineering organisations, and can express concerns in the right level of detail or brevity for the situation.
Outside of work commitments I also sit on the board of a local public high school. I've previously been on the board of Kids Like Us, a not-for-profit social enterprise that helps gifted young people who also struggle with a disability or learning disorder, and my own business, Cubescape.
Innovative Solutions
If a Ph.D. gives you the skills to learn anything - even when it hasn't been discovered before! - then founding a startup gives you the skills to find solutions to whatever problems come your way. But I couple this with a recognition that this isn't academic research, so there's a job to be done or a product to be sold. Innovation for its own sake isn't helpful to your business, but if you have an intractable problem that needs an out-of-the-box solution, my skills in ideation, fostering brainstorming sessions, and field-testing innovative solutions will be invaluable.
Business Minded
While I'm a strong advocate for giving engineers the space they need to ideate and come up with creative solutions, I'm also aware you have a business to run and deadlines to hit. I've been the CTO in situations where competitors were better funded and starting from a better platform, and where the sales opportunities were on a strict deadline and were true make-or-break situations for the business. Those are the moments where your engineering team needs to trust that the leadership direction is well considered, and that if corners need to be cut or hard trade-offs must be made, that it's the right choice for the business. But by the same token, it's also where company management needs to be able to trust the engineering team when they say things can't be done, and you need someone who can explain the trade-offs and make recommendations that are in the best interests of the whole business, not just the engineering team.
Clear Communication
Many engineers are fantastic problem solvers, yet can't express their solutions to other engineers, let alone other humans. Not only can I translate Engineer into regular English, I can also write it down so that others can benefit from it in the future. I believe a strong wiki is a cornerstone of a successful engineering organisation, and I'm willing and able to do the hard yards to write documentation for everything that needs to live for posterity. I also recognise that having others contribute to that knowledge-sharing requires a strong cultural buy-in, and if I have the right relationship with the rest of your organisation, I can help drive that too.
My first role upon moving to Melbourne was with a consulting firm whose entire brand was predicated on getting to 'trusted partner' status with clients. Years later I still work with many of those colleagues, and I even founded a business with some of them. I've worked repeatedly with people I worked with back in academia two decades ago, or across different fields of industry, and at both startups and major corporations. I've placed developers I've worked with previously into roles with my own employers and with ex-colleagues I respect. I see every new client as an opportunity to extend that network and build a long-term relationship that can cross multiple business opportunities.
Strong Networks
As an engineer myself I've worked with hundreds of developers and I've made a point to stay in touch with those I can trust and respect. As a manager this proved invaluable in finding short-term and permanent staffing, especially for some of the niche skillsets that are needed for complex mechatronic product development.
I've also worked for or with a range of product development and software consultancies, and can make the right recommendations and introductions for the specific needs of your business. I've worked with overseas developers and remote/hybrid teams and can help to establish working patterns and IT infrastructure to facilitate this too.
Honest Negotiation
I've read enough contracts and negotiated enough MOUs, LOIs, and other TLAs to have a good grasp of what's required to emerge on the other side with the minimum of lawyers involved. My negotiation strategy is always to engage honestly and openly. If that strategy opens me up to exploitation in the short-term it's a cost I'll bear to avoid long-term engagements that aren't based on trust. Whether or not your business wants me negotiating on your behalf, you'll nonetheless appreciate my approach here as we work out how best to work together.
Frequently Asked Questions
People, Process, & Product are the core components of technical management. In larger corporations each facet is a role or discipline by itself, but in smaller businesses or startups you'll need leadership that can span all three. Competency and experience in all these areas is a rare combination that's hard to hire, but if you need additional expertise in any single area, that's a far easier hole to fill.
I improve business outcomes for engineering organisations by focussing on the intersections between these disciplines; Management, Development, and Product Ownership. Each of these intersections is a role in itself, and I've been a people manager, a lead developer, and product owner across my career. Now as a consultant I bring my experience in each to help your organisation with challenges in any and all of these areas, and also to advise you on when to bring in a full-time engineering leader with the skillset to handle all of them, or dedicated practitioners for just a few.
A typical engagement with me would start with a face-to-face meeting or video call to discuss your organisation and the biggest challenges you face. That might require follow-up calls or I may need to meet with other people in the business to get other sides of the story. Once I've got a good feel for where I'm needed and what I can do, I'll put together a project proposal with a few options, either with a fixed fee based on the value delivered, or a daily rate and a commitment of X days per week. If we're a good fit for each other, you may wish to switch to a retained services model that gives me some certainty of income, and gives your team someone they can call on whenever problems arise rather than negotiating a new scope of work each time.
No. My working life is a portfolio of projects and opportunities at any given time, some of which are obligations I can't easily unwind, and others that are big parts of what I value in life and don't want to give up. My ability to successfully juggle all these responsibilities is proof that I'm good at project management and prioritisation. In general, if my slate is clear of other clients I'm able to devote up to four days per week to your business. In a lot of cases that can be more than enough to make a difference.
In my experience, many startups don't actually need a full-time CTO in the early stages. You may well want full-time people management, but once a technology strategy is in place and well understood, a CTO could be under-utilised until you achieve a level of scale that requires changes to the team structure or culture of the organisation. I can help you identify the point at which you need full-time technical leadership, and the specific skills your business requires of them. At that point I can also help you find the right person.
Yes, and increasingly in the world of agentic AIs this is now a very viable path even if I'm only engaged part-time. For a long time I'd have said no because in a part-time capacity I could have ended up as a bottleneck to your development, but I've now found that I can setup AI development systems that work with and for us to deliver software effectively.
My key software strengths are in Python for embedded and application development, and algorithm design and prototyping. I'm much more keen on building a proof-of-concept or tech demo than polishing software to a customer-ready state. I've done the initial development on multiple occasions and then handed over to an existing or newly formed team to extend or rewrite into a fully fledged product.
As many startups will attest, there's the potential for a lot of pain in transforming academic code or a technical demo into a real software product. But that transition has been the heart of my career for over a decade, and I enjoy working with other developers to strengthen my ideas into the solid foundation for a successful product.
I provide consulting services as an independent contractor, sending you invoices every 14 days with 7 day payment terms. I hold infotech liability insurances (professional indemnity and broadform liability) and provide my own standard tools. You engage me on either a daily rate or a retained basis. If you hire me for a day, it's exclusive to you. I don't sell more days than I have, and I generally charge between AUD$1600 to 2400 per day.
A retainer allows you unlimited access to me for advice or consultation by the relevant people in your organisation. We agree on the number of days a week to expect, and I'll be onsite or at my office between core hours on those days. I'm also available remotely the rest of the week, but not exclusively to you. If there's regularly more work than can fit in the retained days then we can discuss increasing the retainer or I'll charge my daily rate for the excess. It's a quid pro quo - if there's an intense week every so often its likely balanced by a few easier ones. In five years I think I've charged for excess days only twice.
My rates for retained services are lower than what I charge for individual days, as it's better for both of us if there's a continuity of service. Most of my clients start out with a specific project in mind and engage me for a number of days to do that work. We switch to a retained basis once we're comfortable working together and have a better idea of what will be involved in an ongoing capacity.
Increasingly, the business world is seeing the value of "fractional" engagements (e.g. a long-term partnership at 0.4 to 0.8 of FTE) where you get most of the value of a senior executive immediately but not the full salary and overhead costs. Several of my retained clients have essentially been that model of work, and it's something I'm keen to continue.
Yes! I've had several 'rescue mission' experiences where key staff have left suddenly or significant issues have only just become visible. In my view the vital responses are to set expectations about what's possible and what it might take, and then to assess the problems using a likelihood vs impact approach. I will quickly evaluate the situation, triage and prioritise the responses required, and then work with the remaining team to get people, process, and product back in order. With the critical fires put out, I can then work with you and your team to bring on a full-time CTO and other necessary roles.