From Belfast to the Middle East and back again (via Naples!) Caseflow’s new manager ruminates on the importance of robust coding… and pizza. 🍕
There’s nothing like a high-pressure role to entice you to take up a hobby that’s the exact opposite in terms of importance and levity — so while my days have been filled with the pressure and excitement of looking after our premium Caseflow product, my nights and weekends are taking up perfecting my Italian cooking! It’s fair to say that I’ve embraced my new pastime, having recently acquired a pizza oven and a pasta maker.
My hobby has also helped to ground me into a routine back in Belfast after many years of flitting around the globe. I know we say this often enough, but we’re really proud of being able to operate one of the largest and most successful solutions providers to the rehabilitation and well-being industry out of Belfast. From my perspective, I feel pretty lucky to be able to find an interesting role locally after a few years spent in far-flung locations. There really is nowhere quite like home!
That said, one of the great joys of working in a diverse sector such as IT solutions is that you can learn a lot from different companies and locations. I feel very fortunate after graduating from the University of Ulster in Software Engineering in 2017, to go straight into work as a Business Analyst. The real treat for me was spending a considerable amount of time in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
As my boss, Robert Roemer, Blue Zinc’s Corporate Division Manager has pointed out, there are a lot of synergies to be picked up in studying the workings of large data projects. Working in the Middle East, I was thrown into the deep end, deploying my time on the intricate software and coding that was needed to support the power plants across the region.
In that sector, I learned the importance of reliability, because — trust me — you really don’t want to get bugs in a system when you’re dealing with plants that can reach temperatures into the thousands of degrees centigrade. Likewise, in a healthcare setting, when people’s well-being is at stake, it’s vital that the solutions we deliver are robust and capable of delivering what’s expected of them.
So, I feel that I’m probably in one of the most important roles in IT – overseeing a solution that many funders, case managers, practices and patients rely on to ensure the smooth running of the care and rehabilitation process. We run a solution where perfection isn’t just expected, it’s a necessity. As regards to my pizza, I can deal with the risk of a burnt crust!
About Lewis Bodel, Product Owner at Caseflow
I’m a motivated and enthusiastic Product Owner with excellent interpersonal skills. I enjoy working with people to build strong relationships with an analytical approach to tasks. I’d say my strongest ability is adapting to new situations quickly and find solutions with a positive outcome. As a former business analyst, I’ve built up my knowledge and experience in requirement gathering and project management.
