Head of Engineering
2019 - PRESENTWolters Kluwer TAA Europe- Led the transformation of engineering practice and cloud integration (Azure) for a SaaS accounting platform managed across three locations in NL, Ukraine, and India.
- Worked on reporting and management of a multi-million dollar development budget.
- Ran projects towards improving applications and infrastructure, and worked on compliance and vendor management.
Product Owner (contract) and DevOps Coach
2017 - 2019Nationale Nederlanden (NN)- Recruited and built a local/remote DevOps team responsible for CI/CD toolchain within NN Group.
- Coached upwards of ten teams towards DevOps maturity through the use of Agile/Scrum and CI/CD tooling.
- Led the build of AWS infrastructure zero-touch solutions (EC2, S3, RDS, terraform, ansible) for the rollout of CI/CD tools (Artifactory, Sonarqube, Xray, Gitlab).
- Worked with stakeholders from across IT management, business and architecture to define a roadmap and best practice for DevOps tooling.
- Worked with software vendors on licensing and support models (build vs. buy).
Owner
2015 - 2019Xyglo- Created an irrigation management system featuring a mobile app (Ionic/Angular/Node.js) with back-end and IoT integration. This is a fully customized stack built for the client.
- Developed the iOS and Android apps as both native and cross-platform using Angular and Ionic framework.
- Provided consultancy and integration work for clients in the Netherlands and the UK.
Senior Devops Consultant (contract)
2016 - 2017Swiss Re- Designed and developed accounting rules as part of the Corporate Solutions projects.
- Provided Agile and Scrum coaching, Git training, and Atlassian toolchain knowledge for developers.
- Built and maintained CI/CD pipelines for CorSo project.
- Worked across the organization to improve DevOps capability.
- Integrated Aptitude (low code platform) into source control and build systems.
Build and Configuration Manager (contract)
2015 - 2016Shell (Projects and Technology)- Led CI/CD migration project for developers towards VSTS/Azure DevOps (2,500 seats).
- Built and supported CI/CD pipelines in JetBrains TeamCity and VSTS.
- Provided Agile and DevOps coaching and support for development teams across P&T.
Configuration and Release Manager (contract)
2014 - 2015Philips- Created release strategies for Teradata DWH project team and aligned with Philips release management.
- Developed Teradata training and outreach.
- Assisted project team with data warehouse and ETL design and release strategies.
- Performed stakeholder review and recommendations for best-fit processes for DWH releasing.
Senior Business Analyst
2013 - 2014ING- Used Aptitude business rules to build and roll out general ledger accounting solutions for commercial banking in ING.
- Performed gap analysis from existing systems (OST) and provided optimizations in new designs and business processes with the new system.
- Introduction and training for Scrum and Agile processes within DevOps teams.
- Led automation of rollout new system alongside the old system.
Project Manager/Senior Developer (contract)
2007 - 2013Rabobank- Provided project management for regulatory reporting LCM replacement of over 30 Citrix based reporting instances.
- Served as the team lead for regulatory reporting DevOps team and led development team effort.
- Worked as a senior developer in accounting and finance for accounting rules generation and DWH build.
- Designed the data warehouse (DWH); delivered ETL design and development.
- Sat on the GFS architecture board–responsible for global financial systems.
Richard Bown
Project Manager in Amsterdam, Netherlands
Member since August 25, 2015
Richard is a highly skilled engineering manager with 25 years of hands-on experience in running global digital transformation projects from startup product organizations to blue chips. He's specialized in accounting, banking, and insurance and has also worked for energy, telecom, retail. Richard is an automation and cloud superfan with experience in the latest DevOps and CI/CD technologies as well as AWS, Azure, and GCP. In addition, he's created native mobile and JS web apps for clients.
Richard is now available for hire
Project Highlights
- Building DevOps infrastructure (CI/CD toolchain) team and solution in AWS cloud for bank and insurer.
- Replacing local reporting infrastructure on Citrix for 30+ global regions.
- Coaching 10+ teams as part of an Agile transformation to better improve their use of Scrum and DevOps tooling.
Expertise
- Azure DevOps
- Banking & Finance
- Certified Scrum Master
- Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO)
- Compliance
- DevOps
- Linux
- Scrum
Education
- University of Bath
- University of Bath
Select Certifications
- Amazon Web Services
- Scrum.org
Employment
Project History
- Project Manager/Product OwnerBuilding DevOps infrastructure (CI/CD toolchain) team and solution in AWS cloud for bank and insurer.
Project to build a zero-touch DevOps toolchain infrastructure in AWS alongside hiring and building the team to improve it and take it forwards.
- Project Manager Lifecycle ManagementReplacing local reporting infrastructure on Citrix for 30+ global regions.
Led the team who performed LCM in-place upgrade for local regulatory reporting while keeping all stakeholders involved. Challenging and long-overdue projects completed ahead of time and with minimal disruption to service.
- DevOps and Agile CoachCoaching 10+ teams as part of an Agile transformation to better improve their use of Scrum and DevOps tooling.
Using Azure DevOps/VSTS and Gitlab, JIRA, Artifactory, and Sonarqube to bring all the elements of Agile and DevOps and CI/CD together to improve efficiency, quality, and ownership in DevOps teams.
- Senior DevOps ConsultantArchitecture and delivery of finance transformation project using low code platforms.
Guiding teams to use DevOps and CI/CD techniques (Atlassian stack) with accounting and finance projects (ETL, databases, and low code platforms).
- Rosegarden Notation Editor and DAWLeading developers on this highly successful Linux audio project that started in 1995. This MIDI and audio sequencer (DAW) and notation editor is still operational and maintained today. Owning MIDI and audio systems design.
Architecting the software from previous (IRIX) iterations, deciding on core technologies (KDE/Qt, C++), and designing and building from scratch. Marketing included Linux audio conventions and demoing. The codebase rapidly grew from 2000-2003 and we released a bootable CD-ROM (Studio to Go!) based on Rosegarden and other audio tools.
Education
- Master of Engineering degree in Electronic and Electrical Engineering1990 - 1995University of Bath - Bath, United Kingdom
- Bachelor of Science degree in Electronic and Electrical Engineering1990 - 1994University of Bath - Bath, United Kingdom
Certifications
- AWS Certified Solutions Architect AssociateFEBRUARY 2019 - FEBRUARY 2021Amazon Web Services
- Professional Scrum Master Level I (PSM I)OCTOBER 2018 - PRESENTScrum.org
