Hi, I’m Sat, FutureGov’s new CTO.

I’ve been working with FutureGov since March 2020, officially moving into the CTO role on the first of October last year. Previously, I was CTO of a design and technology consultancy called RMA Consulting, leading a team that designed and built bespoke user-centred computer systems. We worked with banks, insurance, healthcare, media and the energy sector, and I’ve always worked very closely with design teams.

Well designed technology enables transformation

I’m incredibly interested and passionate about how humans interact with each other and how we interact with technology. It has a unique power to make our lives better and more efficient, and it can even help us do our jobs better. But if designed poorly it can also overwhelm us and get in the way of making and actioning decisions.

By taking a human-centred approach to technology, not only can we create delightful solutions that help people do things more easily, we can also build new models to deliver better public services. Further innovation can be achieved by considering how we organise ourselves in organisations. Our technology architectures are, after all, shaped by the organisations they are created for.

People often think of well-designed technology as the veneer, in terms of it looking good. However, it’s not just that. Well designed products might look good, but just as important, if not more important, is how it behaves. How intuitively does it let us discover what we need and enable us to make and action decisions — whenever and wherever we need to.

Great technology builds trust with users by providing us with what we need, not just by looking pretty. Providing transformative experiences for people goes all the way from the back-end to the front-end (the user interface) and includes data, including how we turn plentiful data into wisdom and insight.

The future of technology at FutureGov

When I started looking for a new role, it was important that it be something with meaning. I wanted a role that I could be passionate about and deliver valuable change to society.

I’ve done lots of private sector work and one of the big draws to FutureGov was the type of work we do. The focus, the ethos and critically, the mission. The work we do every day is worth it, because we create great things that are helping build a better world. We’re really forward-looking, and that’s so important.

At FutureGov, I want to create a different type of practice, team and organisation model. Moving forward, we’re looking to develop the technology practice to complement the capabilities we have within the team already. We’re fantastic at service design and consulting and we’ve got a great tech team, as well. But it’s a small team and we’d like to grow that.

Over the coming months we’ll be building teams focused on Technology Consulting, Technology Delivery and Product Management. These teams will work closely with our designers, consultants and delivery managers to deliver real impact for our partners, in alignment with our vision.

In terms of the sector, I’d like to bring independent technology consulting to our partners. This means providing a truly impartial view of technology solutions, and starting with the service or product we’re creating and selecting the appropriate architecture and technologies for it.

We can design a great service blueprint or product, but unless you can make that a reality, you’ll continue to stumble through legacy services and technology. We want to not only assist our partners with technology development, strategy, capabilities and the transition to more agile ways of working, but also help them build their own practice that’s design-driven and user-centred so they can continue growing their ambitions once we’re gone.

That’s the crucial thing for me, going from idea through to tangible reality. A real thing, a real impact, helping create real and long-lasting change.

My next steps will be building out the capability within the team to take our partners on that complete journey, from beginning to end. And I’m really looking forward it.


Welcoming Sat Ubhi, our new CTO was originally published in FutureGov on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Original source – FutureGov

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