I'm James.
I'm a software engineer building for government by day and for the app stores by night, from Canberra, Australia.
I architect and deliver ServiceNow solutions for federal and territory government, and I design and ship Flutter apps under my own studio, JabTech. I sit in the overlap between engineering and design — comfortable leading a delivery team through a complex platform build, and equally happy obsessing over the corner radius of a button.
Where I've been
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Current role New chapter in progress 23~
Details landing here soon — the story so far steps down below.
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Fujitsu Australia Lead ServiceNow Application Developer 22–23
- Led technical workshops and authored project documentation covering current state, target state, and recommended pathways with resourcing and timeline estimates.
- Mentored and managed technical team members with constructive, timely feedback.
- Stepped into a project-manager role, liaising between the development team and the client to plan project kick-off.
- Built new HR capabilities replacing clients' manual processes with digitised, optimised versions.
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Australian Digital Health Agency Lead ServiceNow Solutions Architect 22
- Ran weekly touchpoints with stakeholders across the agency to grow platform understanding and maturity.
- Oversaw platform changes with quality assurance and reporting for executive stakeholders.
- Managed the daily responsibilities of a six-person development team against the product backlog.
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Dept. of the Prime Minister & Cabinet Lead Solutions Architect 20–22
- Managed complex ServiceNow projects top-to-tail: requirements, solution design, development, testing, and implementation.
- Transformed self-hosted instance management for major upgrades, rebases, and backups, ensuring reliable availability and security.
- Supervised, supported, and trained a team of technical staff, building a productive and sociable team culture.
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ACT Government Senior Consultant 20
- Conducted a targeted intervention into a troubled, high-risk project facing an impending deadline.
- Rebuilt a core IT service management function to land a timely, successful deployment.
- Instituted a knowledge-management strategy to reduce single points of failure.
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Dept. of the Prime Minister & Cabinet Associate Consultant 19–20
- Designed and maintained the ServiceNow CRM used by thousands of employees at PM&C and its subordinate agencies.
- Built custom applications with JavaScript, HTML, CSS, and Jelly.
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PwC Australia Technology Consultant · Salesforce Admin 18–19
- Applied technical and business-case expertise to lift client ROI; produced documentation, infographics, and icon sets.
- Delivered within Agile ceremonies — daily stand-ups and sprint planning.
How I work
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Build it real
Mock-ups only carry an idea so far. I get concepts into running code early — a thing you can click teaches you more in an hour than a deck does in a week.
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Live in the overlap
The best products come from people who care about both the architecture diagram and the corner radius. I refuse to pick a side.
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Accessible by default
Semantic markup, honest contrast, reduced-motion fallbacks. Not a compliance checkbox — just what building properly looks like.
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Ship and learn
Everything I make is subject to revision. Some ideas won't survive contact with real users — finding out quickly is the point.
Paper trail
Off the clock
When I'm not shipping, I'm usually kicking a football, sketching logos nobody asked for, or finding excuses to rebuild things that already worked. If any of this sounds like your kind of energy, say hi.