Regional electricity company:

• Neil’s last assignment for C&L was as testing manager for the client’s 1998 Programme, part of a highly-ambitious nationwide initiative to extend competition in electricity supply to all customers in England & Wales, involving replacing or significantly amending a high proportion of each organisation’s systems. His role included representing the client in national meetings of testing representatives, managing a team of around 15 staff, liaison with the incumbent facilities management company, co-ordination of the testing activities of a dozen or so projects, and testing of the integrated products from the programme as a whole. His decision to leave C&L came as the test scripts were being written; Neil worked his full 3-month notice period handing over to a project manager appointed from the client’s own staff, and handling liaison with the organisation’s year 2000 Programme.

• He had moved into this testing management position from an initial role as project manager of the business requirements definition and vendor procurement for systems to bill for "Distribution Use of System", ie for the use of this company’s cables, substations etc by other suppliers gaining customers in the area. This involved participation in national negotiations to define and agree an innovative mechanism for calculating DUoS charges.

• Quality Manager of a major mainframe-based client-server project to implement a national billing system for all domestic customers, to deadlines imposed by competitive legislation. This appointment followed a period of quality assurance consultancy during which he advised on testing strategy and change and problem management, also designing and facilitating risk management workshops, and managing post-implementation reviews and specific reviews of financial issues, technical documentation and business continuity planning. His main achievement was to tailor and integrate quality assurance processes into a coherent and pragmatic framework based on structured risk management.

• Neil launched the system and acceptance testing work for a customer information system being tailored by a package supplier. He organised and facilitated workshops to determine capabilities and requirements for testing, then managed the production of the testing strategy and plan and trained the C&L consultant who remained on-site and led the testing through acceptance to a successful implementation.

• He advised the company central to the industry's privatisation proposals on issues associated with change management, and on testing of the complex suite of train movement systems and their effect on access billing and performance billing systems.

• Preparation of approach to system and acceptance testing of a client-server based financial systems package, commencing with a structured workshop to refine options. This led to further involvement in managing initial test design and execution, and assistance with implementation planning.

• Neil wrote, prepared and delivered training courses (each lasting several days) in software testing, which included interactive workshop sessions to identify and address specific testing issues affecting each of the diverse railway systems represented.

• Review of software development estimates and replanning of implementation for a client-server architecture customer billing system.

• Neil produced an acceptance testing strategy for a business-critical, mainframe-based customer billing system to be implemented using object-oriented, rapid application development techniques. He went on to define detailed methods, plans and standards for test case specification, and recruited and mobilised the team. This resulted in his appointment to lead the acceptance testing activity, and perform quality assurance of later phases.

• The system went live on schedule, and Neil was retained as configuration manager for the initial period of operation and enhancements.

• He was subsequently asked back by this client to advise on configuration management issues for a major financial systems programme, and again on two occasions to review the risks facing the programme as it approached implementation, and to make remedial recommendations.

• Leadership of acceptance testing for a tailored-package payroll system being implemented nationwide. His role included co-ordination and motivation of all user representatives in the face of some resistance, and his team was for a time responsible for some of the activities normally undertaken by users. Neil was instrumental in rebuilding the credibility of the project after earlier setbacks, and the system went successfully live to the revised schedule.

• Neil reviewed and replanned a data centre relocation project in sensitive circumstances.

• Production of test strategy for key elements of an innovative distributed point-of-sale system.

• Assessment of system documentation and reverse engineering options to support proposed rationalisation of financial systems.

• Rapid review of IS department staff, procedures and projects as part of "due diligence" work preceding merger.

• Development of strategy and plan for formal requirements testing of settlement system, based on SSADM entity life histories.

• Following acceptance of his strategy by management, Neil worked with client staff to define the requirements for a Coopers Deloitte system providing computer-generated test cases and data. Use of this tool led to early identification of inconsistencies in requirements.

• Supervision of software development and testing of the nationwide settlement system, both interim and permanent (relational database) versions. Neil led a team whose role was to ensure (and demonstrate to industry representatives) that the systems and software companies produced a fully-tested system which was compliant with the innovative requirements, without affecting the tight timescales. Both systems went successfully live on schedule.

• Review of a strategically-important system project at a critical stage during the requirements analysis. The review covered information engineering methodology, required functionality, project management competence and expected benefits.

• Project management of key areas of a major development project. The system, developed using 4GL and database software on a small mainframe, was successfully implemented on schedule, and computerised the main operational functions of the business.

• Neil assisted in the production of a framework of standards and procedures to be applicable to IT projects worldwide, particularly those using 4GLs.

• For the same client, he later reviewed a shipping control project on behalf of senior management and subsequently assisted in replanning a similar project in another overseas subsidiary.

• Assistance with system performance monitoring and capacity planning for a nationally-important aluminium smelting and water desalination installation. This followed a review of progress made against earlier Coopers Deloitte recommendations for the whole IT function.

• Project leadership of the implementation of a tailored 4GL package for journal subscription control. This was achieved successfully and smoothly, and set the standards for other applications to follow.

• Review of the technical quality of a computerised capital project management system. The review included an evaluation of the system’s design to ensure it fully satisfied users' requirements and expectations.

• Co-ordination of a large data centre relocation project, involving over 100 staff and several mainframe systems vital to the business. Over a dozen processors, over 100 communications lines, hundreds of discs and thousands of tapes were moved or newly-installed without any unplanned interruption to service.

• For the same client, Neil reviewed the acceptance testing methodology for a new warehousing and distribution system, and produced a user guide for a networked in-store microcomputer system to be installed at over 250 locations.