As this is my first post, I was tempted to launch into a long ramble about my background, hobbies, and what makes me tick. But let’s be honest — you didn’t come here to read my autobiography. So instead, here’s the abridged version:
I’ve worked in and around IT since 1997, but even before that I was fascinated by how technology shapes our lives. As a teenager, I remember typing hundreds of lines of code into a Spectrum 48k with a mate just to make it whistle out the Hamlet cigar tune. Later, I lost an entire Sunday afternoon racing Gran Turismo in “real time” with my brother-in-law-to-be… only to crash spectacularly near the finish. And don’t even get me started on late-night Halo multiplayer sessions.
Now, I’m not a developer. I can’t code. But I am — proudly — “quite nerdy.” I like to understand how things work. I’ve spent countless hours watching YouTube tutorials to figure out everything from fixing my TV to putting up a shed to (yes) attaching a domain name to this very blog. That same curiosity has carried over into my professional life, where I spend a lot of time with business owners diagnosing why their numbers aren’t stacking up — and finding ways to fix it through new tools, processes, or tech.
Which brings us neatly onto the big one: Artificial Intelligence.
Why AI Feels Different
It’s easy to dismiss AI as “just another trend.” After all, we’ve seen big shifts before:
- The move from physical servers to hypervisors.
- The great migration from on-premises to the Cloud (and for some, a quiet shuffle back again).
- SaaS platforms like Microsoft 365 and Salesforce replacing old client/server systems.
All of these were game-changers — but mostly for people already working in tech.
AI is different. AI is spilling out of the IT department and into every department. With the possible exception of the internet itself (and maybe social media), we’ve never seen a technology so quickly reshape both work and culture.
If you’re in Sales, Marketing, Legal, Finance, or Healthcare — AI is already rewriting parts of your job. If you’re in IT, HR, Customer Services, or pretty much any role where you look at information, make decisions, and communicate — the AI ripple is heading your way.
The C-Suite Gets Curious
And here’s where it gets really interesting. Traditionally, boards only really cared about IT when:
- Something expensive needed signing off.
- A new system was required for growth.
- Or, let’s be honest, they couldn’t get the boardroom screen to work before the football match.
But AI bucks this trend. Suddenly, CEOs and CFOs are leaning forward asking:
- “So… what’s our AI strategy?”
- “What opportunities are we missing?”
- “Whose responsibility is this, anyway?”
And in many organisations, those questions are met with awkward silences. For once, change isn’t bubbling up from the bottom — it’s rolling downhill from the top.
Where Next?
I’m not here to declare whether AI is good or bad, or to advise you to steer your kids towards plumbing instead of programming. But I do think AI represents one of those rare technological moments where everyone — from interns to CEOs — has to stop and pay attention.
And that’s what this blog will be about: unpacking what’s happening, sharing ideas, and hopefully sparking conversations about how we navigate it all.
So, welcome. Let’s see where this goes.
Simon
