In the conversation.
On the platform
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IBM Distinguished Engineers Global Leadership
The first non-IBM person to present at this globally streamed event. Invited by the president of IBM’s Distinguished Engineering team.
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Confluence Global Telecoms Leadership
Discussing the future telecoms industry with the global team at Confluence.
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Google European Banking & Finance
A fireside chat on experience in banking, and how work at a global telco relates.
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EU Lifelong Learning & Education Initiative
UK representative on a Europe-wide initiative to create a “passport” holding an individual’s learning, credentials, education and business qualifications, and the companies they have worked for.
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Wired magazine roundtable
Discussing the future of telecoms and the move from Communications Service Provider to Digital Service Provider, with a group of senior technologists.
Built for the room, not delivered from a deck.
- What AI adoption is doing to the people on the other side of the decision
- Governing technology at board level without a technology background
- Why the workaround tells you more than the system
- Designing for the specific human rather than the average user
Take what you need. No form.
Neil Catton is an independent technology strategist with thirty-nine years across more than twenty industry sectors, working on a fractional and advisory basis with organisations facing high-stakes technology decisions. He writes on technology, ethics and human purpose, and is the author of four books, most recently Predictive Purpose (2026).
Longer biography
Neil Catton is an independent technology strategist with thirty-nine years across more than twenty industry sectors, from computer operator to Group CTO and, along the way, CISO. He works on a fractional and advisory basis: fractional CTO and CIO roles, board briefings, technology due diligence and interim leadership, including Group CTO/CIO advisory to the Global Consortium Group on AI and data strategy for public safety.
He is the author of Predictive Purpose (2026), the trilogy The Next Evolution, The Cognitive Crucible and The Shadow System, and the ebook Working as Designed. He writes the Substack The Next Evolution. His argument, across all of it, is a single one: technology has to be designed for the individual human being, not the organisation deploying it, and not the efficiency metric justifying it.
How to describe the practice
An independent technology practice, trading under Neil’s own name. Thirty-nine years in the industry across more than twenty sectors. The work is fractional and advisory. Several engagements run at the same time, across different sectors. It is a portfolio, not a single post, and no one client is the headline.
Contributed to
Lord Patel’s Breaking Barriers report on transforming the NHS: technical author.
SmarterGovs Initiative: contributing author