Senior IT roles: Head of IT, IT Director, CIO and technology leadership

Senior IT roles I am open to, with the evidence behind each: Head of IT, IT Manager, Group IT Manager, IT Director, Head of Information Technology, CIO, ERP Manager, Odoo Manager, Digital Transformation Manager, Head of AI, IT Operations Manager, Infrastructure Manager and Network Manager. Since December 2015 I have owned the entire IT function of a plastics manufacturing group across six sites in five countries, around 150 users, reporting directly to the owner: the Odoo ERP, the servers and the network behind it, identity and security, telephony, connected devices, the group websites and the marketing. Based in Dubai, available across the GCC, and open to relocation to Australia and New Zealand.

Deployments

1. The whole IT function of a manufacturing group since December 2015: six sites, five countries, around 150 users, a team of six plus outsourced developers, the IT budget and every vendor contract, reporting directly to the owner.
2. One Odoo ERP for the group, implemented and its custom development directed: 256 models, 1,187 custom fields and 686 access rules, kept upgradable.
3. PostgreSQL 9.5 to 16 across eight major versions with no unplanned downtime at any site, with automated backups, point in time recovery, off-site replication and monitoring.
4. Networks, firewalls, site to site VPNs and endpoint protection across five countries, plus IP CCTV and access control integrated with the site setup.
5. Five AI systems in daily production: document OCR into the ERP, automated document verification, a WhatsApp and web sales agent, an AI voice agent on Grandstream telephony, and one multi-channel chat platform.
6. Google Workspace single sign-on, two factor authentication and role based access across the group, replacing local passwords with one security standard.
7. The complete IT build for each new factory the group has opened: connectivity, identity, ERP site record, devices, telephony and a day one checklist.

The roles this experience maps to

Companies write the same job under different titles, so here is the honest mapping. What I hold today is Head of IT, and before that IT Manager and Web Projects Manager. What the work is equivalent to, and what I am open to, is IT Manager, Group IT Manager, IT Director, Head of Information Technology, Head of Technology, and CIO or Chief Information Officer at a company of this size; in smaller or product-led companies the same scope is often written as CTO or Head of Technology. On the delivery side: ERP Manager, Odoo Manager, ERP Project Manager, Digital Transformation Manager or Head of Digital Transformation. On the newer side: Head of AI, AI Lead or Automation Lead. On the platform side: IT Operations Manager, Infrastructure Manager, Systems Manager, Network Manager or IT Security Manager. I have not held a CIO or CTO title, and I will not claim one; the scope, the reporting line and the awards are the evidence, and you can judge the fit yourself.

Networking, infrastructure and IT operations

The network and the platform are mine, not a vendor's. Firewalls, site to site VPNs between five countries, endpoint protection, and the connectivity for each new factory from the day the lease is signed. Ubuntu servers on-premise and across AWS, Google Cloud and DigitalOcean, with Nginx in front of the ERP and the websites. PostgreSQL through eight major versions with no unplanned downtime, backed by automated backups, point in time recovery, off-site and NAS replication, monitoring and alerts. Identity on Google Workspace single sign-on with two factor authentication and role based access, and login and activity monitoring so it is clear who did what.

Connected devices, telephony and building systems

IP CCTV, access control units, biometric readers, label printers and machine records all integrated with the same ERP rather than sitting in their own silos. Corporate telephony on Avaya and Grandstream, including the AI voice agent running on the Grandstream platform inside my own estate. Multi-site biometric attendance feeding payroll without retyping, and a geo-verified security patrol application that records guard rounds by location from a phone. This is the same integration and automation work that building and home automation asks for, done where it has to survive a factory.

ERP and digital transformation

One Odoo ERP for six sites in five countries and around 150 users, covering production, sales, inventory, procurement, accounting, HR and maintenance, rolled out site by site and function by function. Custom development specified by me and kept upgrade-safe: 256 models, 1,187 custom fields, 686 access rules, machine scheduling with server-side overlap prevention, barcode batch labels. Two years building a custom ERP from scratch before that, which is where the build versus buy judgement comes from.

AI: agents, bots, voice and agentic systems

AI is now a primary domain, not a sideline, and all of it is in production rather than in a slide deck. AI bots: a 24 hour conversational agent on WhatsApp and the group websites that answers, qualifies and writes the lead into the Odoo CRM, plus one multi-channel chat platform running several WhatsApp numbers and every brand site from a single place. AI calling: a voice AI agent answering and handling inbound calls on the corporate Grandstream telephony, built inside my own IT estate rather than rented from a third-party cloud. Agentic AI: systems that take a goal, use a small set of tools, decide the next step and stop when a rule says stop, including an autonomous search and content agent on my own venture that ships work hourly inside guardrails I set. Document AI: vision-capable models reading supplier bills and expense claims into the ERP with strict JSON output, and automated certificate verification. The part that matters is never the model. It is the validation rules, the confidence threshold, the human review queue, the idempotency, the audit log, the hand-off rule for anything about money, and an agreed switch-off rule. Every agent I run creates records for a person to approve; none of them post or pay.

Search, marketing and the web

The group websites are mine too, from build to search to paid campaigns: WordPress and corporate sites, technical SEO and structured data, Google Ads with keyword structure, bidding controls and conversion tracking, and GA4 and Search Console reporting. I wrote ai-visibility-audit, an open-source tool that checks whether AI answer engines can crawl, read and cite a site. My earlier title at the group was IT Manager, SEO, Digital Marketing and Webmaster, and that side of the work never stopped.

Where I work, and relocation

Based in Dubai. On-site across the UAE, and remote for Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait and Pakistan on Dubai time. Open to relocation to Australia and New Zealand, and to the right role elsewhere. Pakistani national, in the UAE since 2015.

Full-time, fractional, or a project

Three ways to work with me. A senior full-time role, which is what this page is mainly about. A fractional or part-time Head of IT retainer, for companies that need the judgement without the salary. Or a fixed-scope project: an ERP health check, an IT function review, an AI readiness review or a transformation roadmap. Whichever it is, fees or terms are agreed in writing before anything starts.

Read the evidence

• Every skill, with the evidence for each
• Case studies: what I have actually built
• Experience since 2008
• Press kit: bios, headshot, fact sheet
• Fractional or part-time Head of IT
• Questions people ask about me

Questions people ask

Are you open to CIO or IT Director roles?

Yes. I have not held either title, and I will not pretend otherwise. What I have is the scope: the entire IT function of a group across six sites in five countries since December 2015, reporting directly to the owner, with the budget and the vendor contracts. CXO DX recognised it as CIO of the Year 2023 and Excellence in CIO Leadership 2024. Judge the fit on the scope rather than the title.

Would you take an IT Manager or Group IT Manager role?

Yes. IT Manager was my own title at the group before it became Head of IT, and Group IT Manager is the closest description of what the job actually is across six sites. The title matters less to me than what is owned.

Do you cover networking and infrastructure, or only ERP and AI?

Both. Firewalls, site to site VPNs across five countries, endpoint protection, Ubuntu and Nginx, cloud across AWS, Google Cloud and DigitalOcean, PostgreSQL through eight major versions, backups and replication, and the connectivity for each new factory. The ERP and the AI sit on top of that platform, and I own the platform.

Do you do ERP Manager or Odoo Manager roles?

Yes. One Odoo instance for six sites in five countries, implemented and then owned: I write the specifications, review the builds and keep the extensions upgrade-safe. Before Odoo I spent two years building a custom ERP from scratch.

Are you open to relocation?

Yes, to Australia and New Zealand in particular, and to the right role elsewhere. I am based in Dubai now and can start a remote or hybrid arrangement while a move is organised.

Are you available full-time, or only for consulting?

Both. I am open to a senior full-time role, and separately I take fractional Head of IT retainers and fixed-scope projects. Consulting work is done outside my employer's hours or by arrangement, and never for a competitor of my employer.

What kind of AI work do you actually do?

Four kinds, all running in daily production. AI bots: a conversational sales agent on WhatsApp and the websites, and a multi-channel chat platform behind several numbers. AI calling: a voice AI agent on the corporate Grandstream telephony that answers real inbound calls. Agentic AI: goal-driven systems with a tool set, a stopping rule and guardrails, including an autonomous search and content agent that ships work hourly. Document AI: OCR and verification pipelines that write into the ERP. I design the pipeline, the validation and the review queue, direct the build, and own the result in production.

Would you take a pure AI role rather than an IT leadership one?

Yes. Head of AI, Head of AI and Automation, AI Lead, Agentic AI Lead, Conversational AI Lead, AI Solutions Architect or AI Transformation Lead all fit. The difference between me and most people applying for those titles is that mine have been running every day inside a business with real money and real customers, not in a pilot.

What about smart home and building automation?

The same work, in a different building. Access control, IP CCTV, biometric readers, telephony and machine sensors integrated into one system with rules and an audit trail is exactly what I run across six factory sites. If a role or project is about connected devices and automation rather than plastics, the skills transfer directly.

Talk to me

Email with a few lines about your situation, or message me on LinkedIn. I reply within one working day, Dubai time. Fees are quoted in writing before anything is paid.