It’s 6:47 AM, and I’m already at my desk with a cup of coffee, staring at three monitors displaying evidence logs, source code repositories, and deployment histories from a failed integration project. The solicitor’s letter of instruction arrived two days ago. The client needs answers: Did the supplier deliver what was promised? Were industry standards followed? Should we proceed to litigation?
27 years into my software engineering career, I’ve finally found work that doesn’t slowly wear away at my insides.
The Hollow Years
For decades, I scratched about in different roles: developer, business analyst, consultant. Always competent, usually successful, but never quite fulfilled. There was always this subtle emptiness, difficult to explain to others or even to myself. I loved software engineering, but the work itself? That was another matter entirely.
Then three years ago, everything changed. Not because I wanted it to, but because I had no choice.
My daughter with complex support needs required a specialist school. What followed was a multi-year legal battle that thrust me into courtrooms, tribunals, and mediation sessions. Expensive lawyers gave way to self-representation. I learned to draft responses to case management orders, negotiate settlements, and advocate in ways I’d never imagined.
During one particularly difficult counselling session (because yes, legal proceedings and counselling were simultaneous interests), the counsellor suggested something that’s stayed with me: “Perhaps you keep going because of your strong sense of justice?”
That question unlocked something.
Finding the Pattern
Looking back, the signs were always there. The procurement exams completed with keen interest in contract management. Every John Grisham novel devoured, every Law and Order episode watched. The natural facility for investigating problems, gathering evidence, and seeing issues from multiple angles.
As a consultant, I’d spent years doing exactly this work, just without the legal framework. When technology projects went wrong, I was the one interviewing stakeholders, analysing codebases, tracing deployment failures, and producing reports that explained, in plain English, what actually happened and why.
The difference now? I’m doing it with CPR Part 35 compliance, TCC Pre-Action Protocol standards, and a clear understanding of my duties to the court.
What the Work Actually Looks Like
This morning’s task involves examining a bespoke financial system that went live prematurely. The client alleges inadequate testing and missing functionality. The supplier claims scope creep and constantly shifting requirements.
Both could be right. Both could be wrong. My job isn’t to take sides — it’s to establish technical truth.
I start with the project artifacts: requirements documents, test plans, change logs, email chains. There’s usually a story hidden in the timestamps and version histories. Today, I’m looking for evidence of when testing was conducted, what was tested, and what was knowingly left incomplete.
By mid-morning, I’ve identified three areas requiring deeper investigation. I draft questions for the solicitor to put to the supplier under the Pre-Action Protocol. Clear, specific, impossible to dodge with corporate language.
Then comes the codebase analysis. This is where software engineering meets forensic investigation. I’m not just looking for bugs — I’m looking for patterns that reveal development practices, quality assurance discipline, and whether industry standards were followed.
Did they have automated tests? Were there code reviews? Can I trace requirements to implementation? The answers tell a story about professional competence and contractual performance.
The Privilege of Objectivity
Around lunchtime, I write up preliminary findings. This is where my training from Bond Solon becomes crucial: expressing technical opinions clearly, supporting them with evidence, and maintaining absolute independence.
If the evidence shows my client’s case is weak, I say so. Early and unequivocally. The court requires this. Professional integrity demands it. And paradoxically, this objectivity makes the work more valuable, not less.
Most IT disputes settle before trial, often because a thorough expert report eliminates uncertainty and makes the path forward obvious. Good technical discovery during the pre-litigation phase saves both parties enormous costs and years of their lives.
I would know. I’ve lived through three years of legal proceedings. Every avoided trial is a gift.
Why This Work Fits
By late afternoon, I’m on a video call with the instructing solicitor, explaining my findings in terms the court will understand. “Imagine the judge is a reasonably intelligent ten-year-old,” my instructor at Bond Solon told us. The lawyers in the room laughed, then we were told never to mention it during proceedings.
But the principle is sound: explain your expertise, don’t assume it. Educate the reader. Show your working. An expert witness who cannot communicate clearly is worthless, regardless of technical brilliance.
This work combines everything I’m naturally good at: systematic investigation, pattern recognition, clear writing, and the ability to see technical issues from multiple professional perspectives. After decades of roles that never quite fit, I’ve found the one that does.
I’m gathering evidence. Looking at it from different angles. Offering unbiased professional opinion. Applying engineering rigour with legal discipline.
This is the career I imagined after university. It just took 27 years to get there.
The Personal Transformation
There’s a conversation I had with my daughter that I can’t shake. We were in the car, discussing something trivial about indicating when turning into the driveway.
“None of it matters, really,” I said, in one of those throwaway parental moments. “You fill your time, then pass away.”
She disagreed immediately. “That’s not true Dad. You leave behind the results of your actions. That’s how you’ll be remembered.”
I didn’t want to hear that. But she was right.
The legal battles forced me to develop skills I didn’t know I needed. The counselling helped me understand why justice matters to me. The expert witness training gave me the framework to apply everything I’d learned in a way that actually makes a difference.
Now, as a software expert witness, I’m using technical knowledge acquired over 20 years, combined with legal understanding forged in a personal crisis. The work helps others navigate the exact disputes I once helped resolve as a consultant, this time with proper procedural discipline and independence.
A Different Kind of Evening
It’s 6:30 PM, and I’m wrapping up today’s work. The preliminary technical discovery report is drafted, ready for review tomorrow. Three questions were prepared for the PAP correspondence. Evidence timeline updated with new findings.
For solicitors and corporate clients facing IT disputes, the pre-litigation phase is where many cases are won or lost. Early technical discovery establishes facts before positions harden, informs strategy before costs escalate, and often reveals the path to settlement before litigation becomes inevitable.
My technical advisory and expert witness practice provides that clarity: systematic investigation of software systems, objective analysis of causation, and reports written to standards that support later expert witness instruction if needed.
But more than that, and this is what keeps me at my desk from early morning until evening: this work matters. It establishes truth in situations where truth has become obscured by commercial conflict and technical complexity. It helps people move forward from failed projects and costly disputes.
Two decades of consulting taught me to investigate software failures. The personal legal proceedings of recent years showed me why justice matters. The Bond Solon Expert Witness Training brought the two into a framework I could actually use.
At 47, I’m finally starting my real career. The hollow years are behind me. Happiness couldn’t be higher.
Every report I write, every case I work on, leaves behind the results of my actions.
That’s how I’ll be remembered.