About Me

I'm a project and product manager with a background in edtech. I also explore modern web tools like React, Next.js, Flask, Bootstrap and Tailwind to build websites and learning tools.

I graduated in 2004 with a Bachelors degree in English Literature from the University of Exeter in the UK. I decided to pursue a career in publishing believing I had a good eye-for-detail and that a career in editing would be a good match for me and enable me to make good use of my degree. As a side-project, I also decided at this time to take up evening Spanish classes and realise an ambition to speak a foregin langauge that I had held since I was young.

Little did I know that the ambition to learn a language would occupy the majority of my career gradually pushing the publishing / editorial path to the sidelines. After a spell with a business to business publisher as an advertising and editorial manager in the UK, I moved to Japan to try my hand at language teaching and experience living abroard. I took the opportunity to begin learning Japanese. After one year of teaching a position came up where I would be able to combined my interest in language learning and editorial work as a writer/editor on the curriculum department of one of Japan's largest private langauge schools, Gaba Corporation.

After 2-3 years of helping the organisation write a brand new curriculum covering 10 levels for both business and daily conversation learners, the manager's position on the department became avaialble and I was fortunate enough to be considered suitable for the position. This was spring 2012 and I would hold the position until the summer of 2018. It was an exciting time as the smartphone and social media revolution took hold and a host of possibilities arose for developing new products in the field of language learning. Some of the most interesting projects I worked on at that time are listed here in my portfolio.

I took a step back from Gaba in 2018 after 10 years with the company. After a spell working for the Japanese e-commerce company, Rakuten, as project manager for an email security implimentation - how far had I come from the editior idea! - I took an opportunity with the British Council in Tokyo to work on their conference series for langauge assessment which was being held in Yokhama in December of that year. This was an interesting experience and enabled me to take my project management skills that I had learnt at Gaba and Rakuten and in my recently completed Project Management Professional (PMP) certification to the next level.

In 2022 I returned to the UK and continue to work on the conference series whilst exploring learning application development and web technologies.