Seamus Birch
Operating leader: technology portfolio, cost and product value creation. Product leader: portfolio, pricing, operating model. Available now.
I find the technology spend that isn't earning its keep and move it to the work that will. Twenty years inside banks, a year inside utilities and construction, and software I build with teams of AI agents under controls a regulator would accept.
What I can do for you
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Stop paying for technology your strategy doesn't need. Every application and every dollar mapped to a business capability, with a named owner. At Scotiabank that redirected $102M and retired 533 applications.
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Give every system an owner who can retire it. Technology run as products, not projects: councils, KPIs to the Board, an app store. Reuse of existing applications doubled, from 20% of projects to 46%.
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Deploy daily and still pass the audit. The controls built into the pipeline once, so no team negotiates them again. Scotiabank's first public-cloud platform: deployments up 640%, support effort down 90%.
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Get more from what you already own. Applications, platforms, buildings and people you pay for and under-use. Reuse up, duplicates consolidated, four Kondor+ systems into one.
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Fewer outages. No surprise bills. Causes fixed instead of incidents, and vendors explaining their value. RBC market risk incidents down 83% in six months.
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AI that builds software your auditor can sign. Teams of AI agents working under a control framework, AITLA, with the controls at the action boundary, the way they are for people.
Who I do it for
Banks and capital markets. Wealth management. Insurance. Utilities, facilities and construction. Software companies selling to any of them.
Proof
$102M redirected · 533 applications retired · 25,000 engineers on one toolchain · deployments up 640% · outages down 83% · first public cloud at a Canadian bank
How I work
Numbers first. What does this capability cost, who uses it, what would change. Then the roadmap, with the Pragmatic Institute framework keeping the order right: market problem, positioning, business case, build. I don't delegate up. I lead across. I leave behind something the organisation can run without me.
Work with me
Two roles, three ways. As an operating leader I own the technology portfolio, its cost and the value it creates. As a product leader I own the portfolio, the pricing and the operating model. Either as a full-time, interim or contract executive; as an engagement through Seamus Birch Solutions (a portfolio review, a product operating model, a delivery or stability programme); or as capability-based costing through Strategy Go, with Omar Shakil. Toronto, and wherever the work is.
seamus@solutions.seamusbirch.com · +1 514 992 4294 · LinkedIn