About Laurie Young, contract CTO, London.

I like making complicated things make sense.

That thread runs through everything I've done, from physics, to building software, to running a technology company. Take something that feels opaque, and make it clear.

These days I do that as a contract CTO, for people who run businesses that depend on technology but don't come from a technical background.

How I got here

I started in physics at Imperial College, then stayed on for a PhD in computing. What hooked me wasn't the code itself. It was watching computers make things faster, clearer, and more accurate.

From there I spent years in the software world: as a developer, then leading teams, then helping run a development agency. When that agency became the London office of an international company, I became its managing director, responsible for the work and the business behind it.

Along the way I kept noticing the same thing. The hardest problems were rarely technical. They came from the people building the technology and the people running the business not quite understanding each other. It turned out I was good at standing in the middle and translating.

I've worked with everyone from well-known names to small companies just finding their feet. The smaller ones taught me the most about what actually makes a technology project succeed or fail.

How I work

I believe the most expensive technology problems are almost never technical. They're what happens when no one has closed the gap between the business and the technology inside it.

So my job is rarely just to fix the technology. It's to make it make sense to you, enough that you can lead it with confidence, ask better questions, and know when something is right.

I'll never hide behind jargon, overcomplicate something to look clever, or make you feel foolish for not knowing. If I can't explain it plainly, I don't understand it well enough yet.