I’m Michael Bamford. I live on the Gold Goast, Australia, where I design and build web sites that people love.

I’m a full-stack web developer, consultant and educator. I love to build innovative web sites and unique digital properties that create great value and which people love to use.

I’ve been infatuated with technology since 1983 when I first learnt to program. That was on an Apple II. It’s been a love affair ever since. I’ve progressed in coding from BASIC, to Pascal, to Cobol(!), to C, to C++, to assembly, to Java, to the web, Javascript and Ruby and Rails. It’s been and continues to be a fantastic voyage.

I’m so very thankful to a huge number of people who have make this possible. The very first person to thank is Mr Andrews, my computer labs teacher at high school. His coding lessons were what got me started on this career. He taught me to program a ball bouncing off the edges of the Apple II screen in BASIC. I loved that program.

My career has taken me to the heart of software technology in Silicon Valley and New York, where I contributed to some of the most innovative companies in the world. I've worked on large enterprise systems, and cutting-edge defense, financial, and ecommerce web sites.

A pivotal meeting in my development was in 2001: it was in the boardroom of the tallest, most prestigious office building in San Francisco with an extraordinary 270‐degree view of San Francisco Bay, the Pacific, the Golden Gate, the city, and the Bay Bridge. The engineers, senior management, and the vice president of engineering were all there, discussing a deeply technical problem. Harvard, Brown, Stanford, Berkley, MIT, CalTech: graduates of which were all present. Intimidated, I kept my mouth shut and thought to myself: “I’m the dumbest person in this room.”

Over time, I realised that I was, in fact, not the dumbest in that room. It was that the engineers at that meeting had been trained in models: business models, engineering models, commercial models. They were able to apply these models to the problem at hand, communicate deeply technical details succinctly to business people, and come up with solutions that was technically sound, commercially reasonable, and aligned with the business’ strategy. I realised that I had been missing this critical piece of the puzzle. I had been focused on the technology, but I hadn't been thinking about the business side of things.

Consequently, I added a University of Sydney MBA to my coder know-how to lead software engineering teams, and to provide strategic technical leadership to a business. As a technologist, coder and engineering lead, I specialise in bridging the gap between business strategy and software innovation. I only deploy mature, reliable, commercially sound technologies like Ruby on Rails, PostgreSQL, and AWS, and I always make sure my code is scalable, predictable, efficient, and that it succinctly solves a business process.

I love to contribute to engineering teams through mentorship, fostering a mindset that aligns technology delivery with business goals. I code with a mindset and behaviours to best deliver commercial value, and I thoroughly enjoy supporting organisations in navigating technical complexities while ensuring sustainable growth. I’m passionate about technology, and I love to share my knowledge with others.

Let’s work together on something great that people will love!