Background and Experience

Job title

Director and sole shareholder for Ropley Information Technology Ltd. Sean is an independent software engineering and development consultant, and a chartered engineer. For a full curriculum vitae, please send an email to sdsmith@ropley.com indicating who you are and why you would like to see a curriculum vitae. A brief synopsis of his background and experience follows below.

Professional and other qualifications

Degrees and Chartered Institute Qualifications

BSc Hons, PhD

C.Eng (Chartered Engineer), MIET (Member of the Institute of Engineering and Technology)

Certifications with the DevOps Institute

        

Key areas of expertise

Recent consultancies have focused on the implementation and troubleshooting of agile practice, particularly Scrum, within various companies. Responsibilities extend from establishing scrum teams and providing training and mentoring through assisting an organisation to achieve cultural change at high levels within the organisation. In particular, recent contracts have explored in-depth strategies for aligning governance and compliance approaches with Scrum agile methods, and with establishing workable outsourcing models for operation of, quality control for, and financing of sub-contracted Scrum partners. Most recent organisations (2017/8/9) where this work has taken place or is ongoing include Rolls-Royce, Pramerica Donegal, Glaxo Smith Kline, and Jaguar Land Rover.

A major long-term consultancy ending in summer 2016 saw Sean working as Agile Delivery Manager for the Customer Technology division at Transport for London, followed by acting as a scrum consultant to the Analytics department of Customer Technology. This involved managing a team of around 55 developers divided into 6 Scrum Agile teams, delivering the next generation contactless ticketing solution for use on London Transport. Worked as development manager on this project for just under four years, building the team and establishing the Scrum and other software development processes.

Outside of these larger contracts, Sean has been responsible for the provision of consulting and contract services to software houses, to pharmaceutical corporations, to and telecommunications/electronics companies. Particular areas of expertise are:

 

  • Agile software development using Scrum or XP based methodologies, as well as semi-agile approaches.
  • Using, scripting, customising and training in the use of TFS and VSTS (now known as "Azure DevOps Services").
  • Windows application development, especially: back office server systems and network programming using C# and/or C++.
  • Multi-tier web site and Web service development using WebAPI (REST/JSON),, ASP.NET Core MVC, and legacy Microsoft Web technology.
  • Office automation applications using .NET and WPF
  • Professional C#, C++, Java and assembler programming experience
  • Object-oriented analysis and design, Unified Process based methods, systems modelling with UML.
  • Highly experienced lecturer/instructor/course author, responsible for several courses offered by Learning Tree International

 

Selected examples of other consultancies or contracts

Examples of consulting and contract services carried out in the past few years, some of which are ongoing:

  • Development of strong-naming secure signature server for siging .NET assemblies prior to product deployment. Work carried out for Aveva Solutions plc in Cambridge, England.
  • Design and development of updates to system test software for aircraft safety lighting systems. Work carried out for Ash Communications Ltd.
  • Agile process mentoring and troubleshooting for the Customer Technology Analytics department for Transport for London (London Underground and London buses).
  • Provision of consultancy services to the IT departments of Essex and Kent police forces on the capture and construction of use-case based requirements for a future integrated police workflow application.
  • Consultant on processes for and documentation of software development for MCP Felixstowe

 

Current Learning Tree Attachments

Contracts with Learning Tree International

  • Course author for Course 933: Agile Developer Hands-On (ICAgile certified course)
  • Course author for Course 1801: Modern Agile Software Design with UML: Hands-On
  • Active instructor for software engineering courses on: Agile Project management with Scrum; Gathering User Requirements; Agile Software Development and Business Modelling.
  • Active instructor for software development courses: C# and C++ programming; Design and best practice for .NET application development.
  • Technical Editor for course 419 "Hands-on introduction to C#", and for course 944: ICAgile certified course in Agile Software Design.

 

Personal interests

Away from the company, Sean's recreational interests include tower bell ringing, music (especially choral and playing church organ music) and walking. If you are looking for non-company-related content in these areas, you will need to look elsewhere.