About Tall Projects

Tall Projects is owned and managed by me, Edward Kay. I specialise in providing and managing digital platforms for membership-based organisations. My passion is developing long-term relationships with my clients to maximise their success.

I have over 15 years’ experience as a software engineer, digital project manager and technology leader. I understand both the technology specifics and the business of running a membership body.

When you work with Tall Projects, I bring my experience to your team as your Chief Technology Officer (CTO) or Product Manager. I provide both the strategic overview and hands-on implementation your organisation needs to be successful, at a fraction of the cost of resourcing this in-house.

You work directly with me. I bring in additional expertise from trusted partners and associates as required.

This means Tall Projects is uniquely placed to provide you with the digital tools and services you require to succeed right now, as well as supporting your ongoing operational success.

Some of my membership clients

Scottish Association of Landlords

The Scottish Association of Landlords (SAL) came to Tall Projects in 2016 after two other companies were unable to deliver the required membership technology.

We started by understanding how SAL works and the real needs of their members. We then planned and implemented a completely new membership digital platform to meet these needs and maximise member value.

This includes a new member-led website with online joining, member self-service (inc. renewals), event registration (inc. discounts for specific members) and a wealth of member-only content.

SAL’s new digital platform is centred around the Sheep membership management system, fully integrated with the new WordPress website and best-of-breed services including Stripe (card payments), GoCardless (direct debit payments) and MailChimp.

We launched the new platform in January 2018.

I continue to enjoy working as part of the SAL team, maintaining and optimising their membership technology to deliver greater member value, benefits and efficiencies. SAL benefit from a single point of contact for their complete platform, ensuring everything runs smoothly.

“Ed at Tall Projects is an excellent project manager. We particularly appreciated the way he approached and ran the work on our digital project and kept it on track and on budget.

What stands out for me about Ed and his approach is how he took the time to understand what we needed and how to provide that, where other companies had tried to sell us a product and make our needs fit that.” Judith Dunn, Director, Scottish Association of Landlords

Professional Speaking Association

Tall Projects provides full digital platform management for the Professional Speaking Association (PSA).

The PSA independently grew their own digital stack using many of my preferred tools: WordPress, Sheep, Stripe, Xero and MailChimp.

Staff changes in 2017 created a technical skills gap for the PSA. Tall Projects was the natural partner to address this challenge.

I work alongside the PSA’s management team ensuring their technology keeps pace with this rapidly growing membership organisation. This covers ongoing support and maintenance, as well as delivering a number of new digital projects.

“Ed has been a tremendous support to our organisation and is clearly an expert in digital tech for membership organisations.

Frankly, until we met Ed, our use of technology was rather limited. Since he started working for us he has transformed our operations and significantly improved our use of technology.

On top of all that, Ed is supportive, friendly and a joy to work with. We are so glad we found him.” Graham Jones, Chief Executive Officer, Professional Speaking Association

Year Out Group

Year Out Group (YOG) is the trade association for providers of gap year experiences.

YOG came to Tall Projects with an inflexible, slow and out-of-date website. This old website was severely impacting their effectiveness as a trade body, but resources for procuring a replacement were limited.

Tall Projects stepped in where others could not.

I provided a framework WordPress website instead of the more traditional design-and-build approach. This enables YOG to create the majority of the templates, content and structure of the site themselves, with support on hand when required.

My work focuses on the more complex elements of the project. The result is a fresh, flexible and fast site providing YOG with the digital presence they deserve.

“It’s a pleasure working with Tall Projects. They are easy to work with and helped us produce a website fit for purpose and future-proofed.

During the course of the project we’ve picked up all the skills and knowledge necessary to keep the site fresh and relevant to our audience.” Stefan Wathan, Chief Executive Officer, Year Out Group

Selected additional experience

Buy Any Part

Buy Any Part is a marketplace for spare parts. Chris Hansen (founder) asked Tall Projects to review their digital platform as they were having problems scaling the product base. It was quickly apparent the technical implementation wasn’t fit for purpose.

Together, we:

• reviewed the business model to identify the real requirements (and some operational improvements)
• scoped a new technical approach to meet these requirements
• sourced the development skills needed
• built and relaunched the Buy Any Part marketplace.

Buy Any Part now has the technology needed to run their business. The site offers over 400,000 parts for sale, along with automated operations for payments, order fulfilment and inventory management.

“I have worked with Ed and Tall Projects for several years across a variety of my own and other business interests.

Tall Projects’ scoping documents are concise yet comprehensive, delivery is transparent and organised, communication is clear and in a language that I understand.

Ed can work from ground up or integrate and augment existing processes. He understands businesses and how to operate effectively within them. It is a unique blend of expertise, energy, pragmatism, commerciality and curiosity.

In short Ed has become a trusted partner in my businesses. He understands me and I rely upon him.” Chris Hansen, Owner and Founder, Buy Any Part

Torchbox

Before starting Tall Projects in 2014, I was Head of Production at Torchbox, an award-winning digital agency. It was here I found my passion for digital project management and process improvement. I pioneered a process of incremental change that trebled the revenue per developer while fostering a culture of genuine collaboration.

University of Oxford

I project managed the redevelopment of the main University of Oxford website, which launched successfully in April 2014. The site was named Education Website of the Year in 2015 and 2016. See the Drupal case study for more details of this high-profile Torchbox project.

“Ed has been a highly efficient project manager throughout the redevelopment of the University of Oxford website.

His ability to both translate the highly technical aspects of the redevelopment process and understand the university’s business requirements made him a highly effective interface between the client and the supplier. Ed has been extremely reliable and helpful throughout the process, which is invaluable in a large scale project with multiple stakeholders.

Ed was integral to the success of our web redevelopment and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend him.” Suzi Ardley, Head of Digital Communications, University of Oxford

CLIC Sargent

CLIC Sargent is the UK’s leading charity for children with cancer.

I was responsible for the CLIC Sargent website redevelopment project at Torchbox from start to finish. This included user research, scoping the build project, technical strategy, managing the design and development phases and handling the launch.

WWF

WWF needed a redesign of their UK adoptions and donations site, which provides an important income stream for this charity. I led the project at Torchbox that completely redesigned the user journey, making it easier to adopt an animal or make a simple donation. The redesign also improved the site’s look and feel.

The outcome: donations income doubled and the site won a Third Sector Excellence Award.

SMI-LabHut

I spent five years as a developer for chemistry consumables distributor SMI-LabHut. My work included the design, custom development and optimisation of international e-commerce platforms and customer management systems. This gave SMI-LabHut considerable competitive advantage resulting in substantial business growth, recognised by the Queen’s Award for Enterprise in 2009.

MEng in Computer Systems

I have a first-class MEng Computer Systems Engineering degree from the University of Bristol. This ensures I fully understand the technical details of any project, setting me apart from many other digital project managers.

Why ‘Tall Projects’?

The name came to me where I do my best thinking: out on a run. There are natural links to the large, complex projects I’ve successfully delivered and to me – I’m 6’ 7”.