Martin Vine

Background

About Martin Vine

As a school leaver, I had no idea where I wanted to go or what I wanted to do, so after securing a University place to study for a BSc. Hons in Business Computing, I decided to take some time out and travel to Australia with long time friends from school. Moving away from my family, comfort zone, familiar environments, etc, was a brilliant, eye-opening and inspired, but scary and challenging decision. It was before the days of mobile phones and social media - the pen was king and airmail was slow. This basically meant I had to learn how to deal with adversity, fall-outs, my own emotions and my own finances! It was a 12 month rollercoaster that ultimately shaped me and my behaviours to allow me to get to where I am today.I'm a dad to two grown-up, live-at-home boys, that fill me with pride and pleasure, step dad to an 11-year-old who teaches me all about life inside the head of a sporty, Xbox gaming, carefree mind, and husband to the woman that has supported and encouraged me to achieve personal and professional successes over the last few years. The years of the COVID pandemic have changed my daily routine significantly. From rising early to beat the traffic on the numerous long commutes I have had in the past, I now rise early to get a pre-work workout in most days of the week and instead of 50+ miles of traffic jams and Radio 2, my daily commute is across the landing to the converted spare room / office that I share with my wife.I'm currently in the most demanding role I've ever taken on; arriving at Interserve as Head of Infrastructure, I was thrown straight into a post-cyber attack team with a brief to salvage whatever we could from the significant event. Alongside this, with the company in administration, a sale had been agreed with a competitor and the divestiture and separation of all IT systems had to be planned and executed in quick time. The company had been allowed to self-destruct over a number of years and the disgruntlement of the bloated team was obstructing the recovery. For the last 18 months, my work life has consisted of mostly 11+ hour days, coaching and encouraging a negatively impacted workforce, building a new IT environment for the new company to thrive and succeed and meeting the expectations of a very supportive, but demanding CIO. With the impossible almost being achieved, I can look back on a successful and enjoyable tenure and look forward to employing my skills and experiences in a new role.I can't tell it any other way; I'm as happy as I could ever dream to be. Life is good.