People News
Our People: Tom Collins.
At the forefront of digital innovation.
Tom joined us in January as Head of Digital Engineering.
Since joining Hoare Lea…
…time has flown! I have been welcomed with open arms to a firm that is dedicated to adopting new and exciting technologies.
My background…
…isn’t in engineering. I come from the retail sector with a primary focus on financial technology.
I moved over from a renewal energy supplier where I developed new digital experiences for their customers – bringing together software development, user experience and marketing.
Now at Hoare Lea, I’m excited to bring my mix of experience and principles to a new industry and support a business that is pushing boundaries and challenging current norms.
I’ve seen how digital innovation provides real opportunity to add value to people’s lives.
The current situation…
…is proving that the digital world is more important than ever. With traditional ways of working terminated for the foreseeable future, we’re starting to see the true potential of digital technologies.
My team and I have experienced a huge acceleration in our plans. Many of our objectives that were deemed long-term goals are now our focus.
Digital innovations excite me…
…because we can use technology to make our lives not only easier, but better! Digital innovation is helping us even now to work remotely, remain connected with loved ones, and even assist through AI to create new vaccines.
Our digital future is…
…closer than we think. It is incredible to look at the almost exponential increase in digital capability over the last few decades and there’s no sign of that slowing down. The next shift is away from ‘traditional’ screen interactions and more widespread natural use of voice and augmented reality interactions. The gap between analogue and digital will become so small it’ll be virtually impossible to notice in our daily lives.
It is important for firms to digitalise…
…to ensure they do not get left behind. It is a cliché but being ‘digitally-savvy’ is important. However, I’m a big believer that the digital world can be the perfect counterpart to our organic one.
We can use immense computational power to automate much of what we would spend hours on and, instead, exercise our brilliant creative human minds.
A digitised firm gives its people the time and focus to do what they do best; build relationships, develop creative ideas and see the bigger picture.
In my free time…
…I am a full-time father to two young children; 5-year-old Anwen and 7-year-old Theodore. I am also a proud owner of a beautiful golden retriever called Dewi. We’re currently in lockdown and we’re keeping ourselves busy with plenty of government-permitted walks and hotly contested boardgames!
