Waybear

waybear

See the wood for the trees.

Independent technology and change advisory for organisations that need a clear view of where they are and a workable route to where they are going.

Waybear is the practice of John Chappell: twenty five years leading complex technology and change programmes, and a decade before that building the systems by hand.

What Waybear does

Most organisations do not have a technology problem. They have an accumulation problem: systems that grew one sensible decision at a time until nothing quite fits, a change portfolio nobody can see the whole of, or a programme that has quietly stopped moving and nobody can say exactly why.

Waybear comes in, works out what is actually going on, and gives you an honest account of it along with a route forward you can afford and your people can deliver.

How that usually looks

Fractional technology leadership

Senior technology direction for organisations too small to need a full time CTO and too complex to manage without one. Typically a day or two a week during setup, then a half day a week to keep things on course.

Technology and systems review

An assessment of what you are running, where the friction actually comes from, and what to do about it in what order. Delivered as a written blueprint and a phased plan, not a slide deck.

Portfolio and programme governance

Building the structures that let leadership see the whole picture: what is in flight, what depends on what, what is at risk, and what it is all costing. Built to be used, not to be admired.

Programme recovery

Stepping into work that has stalled or lost confidence, establishing the real position quickly, and restoring momentum. Usually the least comfortable conversation an organisation has, and the most valuable.

The background behind it

The advice is grounded in having done the work rather than read about it.

  • Built the enterprise change function at Visa Europe, a pan European cooperative of 3,700 financial institutions, governing around 150 concurrent initiatives across seventeen markets, and led delivery on a programme running at 250 million euro a year.
  • Built the portfolio management function at Capita Software from nothing, across roughly 300 concurrent programmes, and surfaced and recovered a twelve million pound overspend that the governance in place had not been able to see.
  • Recovered two stalled programmes at Nationwide Building Society as an independent consultant, including a PCI DSS compliance programme, restoring delivery and stakeholder confidence within six months each.
  • Currently engaged as fractional technology lead for a national charity and its trading arm, assessing a fragmented systems estate and designing an integrated way forward.

Before all of that: ten years as a working developer and database specialist. It still shows, and clients tell me it is the difference between advice they can act on and advice they have to translate first.

Practical details

  • BasedSwindon, Wiltshire. Works UK wide and remotely.
  • QualificationsP3O Practitioner, PRINCE2, Certified Scrum Master, ITIL Foundation.
  • LanguagesEnglish, French and German to professional level.
  • SectorsFinancial services, payments, software, charity and social enterprise.
  • EngagementsFractional, interim, and fixed scope. Reduced rates for charities and CICs.

Getting in touch

If something here sounds like your situation, write and describe it. An initial conversation costs nothing and will usually tell us both fairly quickly whether there is something worth doing.

john@waybear.co.uk