My Decade at Sky
10 years, 4 months. One career that became several.
In February 2014, I started working for Sky as a Home Service Field Engineer.
When I left in May 2024, 10 years and 4 months later, I wasn't quite the same engineer who had started.
During that decade I installed and repaired home technology, coached other engineers, worked in technical assurance and product safety, helped develop field technology, learned software development, supported hundreds of engineers with their mental wellbeing, and sat down with senior leaders to advocate for the people working out in the field.
Looking back, Sky didn't just teach me how to be an engineer.
It taught me to question how things work, how they could work better, and how the people using them should be supported.
That thinking has followed me everywhere since.
It Started at the Front Door
My main role throughout those ten years was Home Service Field Engineer.
It was a genuinely varied engineering job.
I installed, serviced and troubleshot Sky home systems, but the technology behind those systems meant working with far more than simply a satellite dish and television.
I worked with coaxial cabling, Cat5e, telephone cabling, mesh networking and matrix systems, alongside the associated hardware and equipment.
And I did it in customers' homes.
That's an important distinction.
You can understand the technology perfectly, but field service requires another set of skills entirely.
You're walking into someone's home, often because something isn't working. They might be frustrated. They might not understand the technology. They might have already tried everything they can think of.
You need to diagnose the technical problem while also understanding the human one.
So I learned to listen, investigate, explain and take ownership.
The job wasn't finished when the equipment worked. It was finished when the customer was happy with the service they'd received.
The Van Was My Office
For most of that decade, my workplace had four wheels.
Working in the field meant being responsible for my own day, equipment and stock. I placed stock orders, handled the associated administration and maintained the correct levels required to complete my work.
That taught me something I've become increasingly interested in since:
The right stock.
The right information.
The right tools.
The right training.
The right systems.
Get those things right and an engineer can concentrate on solving the customer's problem.
Get them wrong and you've created problems before the engineer has even knocked on the door.
I didn't know it at the time, but those experiences would eventually influence the way I think about field-service systems today.
Then I Started Looking Beyond My Own Jobs
As I became more experienced, my role expanded.
I became a team coach, supporting and guiding fellow engineers rather than concentrating solely on my own development.
That introduced another dimension to engineering for me.
Sometimes the most valuable tool you can give somebody isn't the answer.
It's helping them understand how to find the answer themselves.
That idea became particularly important when, in September 2019, I was given the opportunity to join Sky's Technical Assurance and Product Safety team on secondment.
Technical Assurance & Product Safety
September 2019 to December 2019
My four months with TAPS took me behind the curtain.
Rather than simply using the technology in the field, I was suddenly involved in helping improve and support it.
A major part of my work centred around the H30 meter, a piece of test equipment used by engineers in the field.
I developed and delivered training materials, including videos, articles and training sessions, to help engineers diagnose and resolve problems onsite.
But my involvement went further.
I supported the development and improvement of firmware within the meter, updated meter channel plans when transponders changed, and liaised with Broadcasting departments to help those transitions happen smoothly.
I also attended field visits as an escalation point when engineers encountered more complex problems and worked with the wider Technical Services Team to provide in-home technical support to engineers and customers.
Monthly meetings with internal departments also gave me exposure to upcoming software changes and the relationship between what happens inside a technical department and what eventually arrives in an engineer's hands.
That experience changed the way I looked at field engineering.
I had spent years using tools and systems.
Now I was getting to ask:
Why does the tool work this way?
What information does the engineer actually need?
How do we teach this effectively?
Could we make this easier?
Those questions stuck.
The People Behind the Tools
Technical problems weren't the only thing I became interested in.
In January 2020, alongside my engineering role, I became an Engineer Wellbeing Champion, a role I continued until leaving Sky in May 2024.
It became one of the most meaningful parts of my time there.
Field engineering can be isolating.
You're part of a huge organisation, but you can spend much of your working day alone, travelling between jobs and dealing with whatever is waiting behind the next front door.
So I wanted engineers to have somewhere they could talk.
I hosted weekly Talk Club drop-in sessions through Microsoft Teams every Monday, Wednesday and Thursday, giving engineers an informal space to connect and talk.
For people who wanted additional support, I also arranged one-to-one meetups.
The goal wasn't complicated.
Give people somewhere safe to speak.
Encourage engineers to look after their mental fitness.
Build morale.
And remind people working individually across a huge geographical area that they were still part of a team.
Supporting Hundreds of Engineers
The wellbeing role grew beyond the regular sessions.
I spearheaded multiple wellbeing events supporting hundreds of engineers, creating opportunities for people to step away from the everyday pressures of field work, connect with colleagues and access resources supporting their mental and emotional wellbeing.
I also regularly met with senior leadership to discuss what engineers needed and collaborate on ways the organisation could better support its field workforce.
That mattered to me.
Because wellbeing shouldn't simply be a poster on the wall of an office that field engineers rarely visit.
It has to exist where the people are.
And sometimes somebody needs to carry their voices back into the room where decisions are being made.
For a period of my career, that became part of my job too.
Then I Learned to Code
By 2023, another curiosity had become difficult to ignore.
Software.
I'd spent years surrounded by technology and using software created for engineers, but I wanted to understand what was happening on the other side of the screen.
So from June to October 2023, I joined Sky's Get into Tech Development Programme on secondment as a junior software developer.
And suddenly my toolkit looked very different.
Instead of meters, cable and hand tools, I was working with:
Python HTML CSS JavaScript Git Flask Agile Scrum
I achieved a 90% pass result on Codility, but the most valuable part wasn't the score.
It was discovering that software development and fault diagnosis aren't actually worlds apart.
An engineer looks at a system that isn't behaving as expected and asks why.
A developer does much the same thing.
Understand the system.
Break the problem down.
Test an assumption.
Find the failure.
Change something.
Test again.
The tools had changed.
The way my brain approached the problem hadn't.
Engineer + Technology + People
Looking back now, there's a thread running through my decade at Sky that wasn't obvious while I was living it.
Field Engineering
I learned how to diagnose problems, work independently, manage stock and deliver excellent service in customers' homes.
Coaching
I learned how to help other engineers develop and solve problems for themselves.
Technical Assurance
I learned what happens behind field technology, from training and escalation to firmware, broadcasting and product support.
Wellbeing
I learned that supporting engineers means looking after the person carrying the toolkit as well as what's inside it.
Software Development
I learned that if a tool or process isn't good enough, you can potentially build a better one.
And those five things have gradually collided.
The Decade That Still Influences Me
I left Sky in May 2024 after 10 years and 4 months.
But I didn't leave those lessons there.
Today, when I look at field service, I don't just see an engineer repairing a machine.
I see the entire ecosystem surrounding them.
The customer.
The equipment.
The stock in the van.
The diagnostic information.
The training.
The software.
The office teams.
The technical support.
The management decisions.
And, crucially, the engineer themselves.
That's probably why I find it difficult to encounter a clunky process without wondering how it could be redesigned.
It's why I'm interested in engineering and software.
It's why I care about customer experience and engineer experience.
It's why I'll happily spend the day diagnosing a piece of equipment and then spend the evening thinking about an application that could make diagnosing the next one easier.
Sky gave me the opportunity to see field service from several completely different angles.
Frontline engineer. Coach. Technical support. Wellbeing advocate. Junior developer.
They might look like separate chapters on a CV.
To me, they're one story.
Ten years learning how things work.
And, increasingly, asking how they could work better.