Profile

I believe there is more to one’s life than just having a job or a career. How we grow up as individuals is really important part as it takes up much of our life. And we often experience situations where we make mistakes, make great advances and have proud moments of success.

I believe we do best when we work to our strengths, from which we can learn other skills. This way, we are able to make choices that suit our own principles and beliefs, as well as those of the companies which employ is. Which means we are fundamentally happier with what we do with our lives.

I have two children aged 9 and 12, so when they are with me – half of the week – I only have free time to read a book before bedtime. I’m currently reading about five books all at once! I mix factual and fiction reading but don’t spend much time on social media, except LinkedIn, which is for business.

I enjoy making things with my hands – often not to make something beautiful, but to be practical. Sometimes my ideas come from watching or reading something. For instance, I copied the design for a wooden washing line after watching a Japanese Studio Ghibli animation film.

Because of my children, I’m interested in Minecraft, Among Us and the video content produced by Fortnite, Halo and Minecraft users. Seen most of the Marvel films (fave is still Deadpool), anything to do with dragons, anime series and films.

I live in farmland so have lots of sheep and wildlife as my neighbours!

I have an unusual career, which started as a mechanical engineer in the UK space industry, preparing satellite propulsion systems for launch. I also managed launch tables  for the European Launch site in French Guiana and then managed launch campaigns there.

I then left the space industry and spent the next 20 years learning about design; I wanted to become a graphic designer, but after several years I realised i was better at process and service design, rather than visual design.

In the last two years, I re-entered the space industry and started a new business where we design specialist equipment for launchsites, which draws on both my engineering expertise as well as my  design knowledge. The types of jobs I’ve had over my career include:

• Propulsion engineer for communication satellites
• Ariane launch table engineer
• Launch site operations manager
• Journalist and content editor (print)
• Website code developer and content editor
• Audio Visual content developer using video and still image editing
• Hospital admin clerk
• Medical Secretary
• Service improvement manager
• Digital health project manager
• Digital health service designer
• Medical technology operations manager
• Space engineer (part 2)!

I am a founding trustee of Exeter Science Centre, a STEM outreach organisation in Devon. I am currently working for a zero-G rocket company from Norfolk, who have asked for help with finding a useful payload for their maiden flight this year, so we are going to put a science project onboard.

Because of this, I would like to fly a HAB (high altitude balloon) where we video the mission and conduct an experiment, perhaps with some lego characters to help us on our way! I then want to edit the footage so the Science Centre can use it to promote their activities next year.

Find out more here:

European Astrotech Ltd High Altitude Balloons

GravitiLab Aerospace Ltd – (they fly sub-orbital rockets from Scotland!!)

Exeter Science Centre