George Tunnicliffe

Part of the IT Leaders 100 - a list of the most influential IT leaders in the UK in 2023.

George is a passionate technology management professional with leadership and strategy experience. He is both practised and certified in cloud, strategy, service and architecture design, and previously led IT at the National Theatre before taking on his new role at CV-Library in 2020, where he has led 30% traffic growth and introduced new technologies like Kubernetes, Puppet and Terraform.

How did you get into IT?

Luckily someone spotted my potential! I had always enjoyed aspects of computers and particularly enjoyed graphic design. Upon joining a company in 2000 I began to help and enjoy others with their issues and processes, then the IT manager made it a part-time and then a full-time thing.

How do you ensure diversity is taken into account in your IT recruitment?

Focusing on people's value beyond their experience skillsets. On a more practical level, ensuring neutral language is used, promoting the role in groups for under-represented people in IT, and using remote work as an enabler to support different lifestyles.

Which technology are you currently most excited by?

AIOps - the ability to have a complex platform at least partially managed or supported by AI, enabled to make choices and determination on courses of action, is both an excitement and a driver. How can we make this happen?

What would an outsider find the most surprising part of your job?

The amount of success that achieved purely by people. Despite all the technology and fancy platforms, it's people that really make the difference.

What's your secret talent?

My ability to try any number of outdoor sports and not be that great at any of them, but still having a lot of fun!

What makes you laugh?

Definitely myself! And if it has to be something else it would have to be all the different ways people pronounce and spell my surname!