DSEI is just around the corner, and our Technical Director Darren Boyle will be presenting a paper about the technology redefining undersea protection, including KraitSense, our key sonar capability for Anti-Submarine Warfare, Intelligence, Surveillance & Reconnaissance and Maritime Situational Awareness. We checked in with him to find out more about his leadership journey and emerging defence technology.
Can you tell us a bit more about yourself, your role at SEA and how you got there?
As the Technical Director at SEA, I’m accountable for making sure that we develop competitive products that align with our strategy and how we invest in technologies that help us grow. To do that, I work closely with our Business Development team to make sure our strategy fits within the UK and worldwide defence markets.
I started off at SEA about 20 years ago, and the way I’ve progressed at the company is by taking on extra opportunities one at a time, even if they were out of my comfort zone. That created a strong background for me to fall back on. As time went on, I became more strategic about which opportunities I took on.
In 2018, I already applied for the Technical Director position. I didn’t necessarily think I would get it, but I did gather crucial feedback, which helped me hone in on the things I was missing, work on them, and get that role now, seven years later.
What advice would you give to someone who wants to follow in your footsteps?
Start paving your way to chartership. Have a career planner that will look at all of the competencies required, and then look at the strengths and gaps you have, so you can really focus on your development needs. It’ll help you plot it through as you go from incorporated engineer to chartership and fellowship, it’s a good way to keep track of where you are.
Take any opportunities to have buddies or mentors, it’s always useful to get feedback, and it can be the hardest thing to get quality feedback. If you can work with other people around you as well, it really does help to get that perspective.
My leadership style is quite cooperative, I think it’s important to treat others with respect and take their advice seriously. Isolating yourself might work for some people, but quite often you lack the larger world perspective that way. So I’d recommend future leaders to stay open-minded.
Are there any emerging technologies that you’re excited about?
You can’t really talking about emerging technologies without mentioning AI, and we’re not just looking at how to integrate it into the end product, but also how we can use it to help us develop products in the first place to be as efficient as possible in a secure way.
Automation is becoming increasingly prevalent in products in defence, to remove people from being in danger and increase persistence. A big challenge in the industry is how do you support that? How do you bring in all the information from all these autonomous systems, with sensors, with effectors?
At DSEI, I’ll be talking about KraitSense, which is a flexible, scalable, modular, and small footprint sonar capability, that can fit on autonomous non-traditional ASW vessels. I’ll be talking about the technology underpinning KraitSense, and its possible applications.
Thank you, Darren.
You can find Darren at DSEI on stand N6-120 and his presentation will be on Tuesday 9 September at 16:00 in the Naval Forum.
