Accessibility starts early
Navigation, focus states, contrast and responsive behaviour are planned into the build so the finished interface is usable before it is polished.
Software engineering · Frontend · Digital product
Digital products built to work, last and make sense.
I’m Phil Forster, a software engineering manager, frontend developer and digital product specialist based in Elgin, Scotland. My work ranges from client websites and volunteer systems to museum interactives, local-first tools and the project hubs that connect them.
- Approach
- Clear interfaces, careful data handling and maintainable builds
- Perspective
- Engineering leadership shaped by hands-on delivery
- Location
- Elgin, Scotland · Remote capable
Selected work
Projects that show the work in practice
Project ecosystem
Follow the work beyond the portfolio
The project hubs gather the broader body of work around clear themes: client sites, productivity tools, creative experiments, learning resources and utility projects. Each hub opens in a new browser tab, giving related projects enough space to show their context and development over time.
Working principles
The habits behind the work
Trust is designed in
Contact forms, volunteer systems and browser tools need clear feedback, restrained data handling and choices that make the safer path easy to understand.
Maintenance is part of delivery
Projects are structured so content, images, routes and records can be updated later without unpicking the whole site.
Visual design has a job
Colour, layout and brand details are used to guide attention, separate project families and make the next step obvious.
Leadership feedback
Trusted to steady teams and deliver
“Thrown into the deep end, Phil not only swam but prospered. He managed the team during the challenge of lockdown, helped engineers adjust to new processes, and maintained the legacy frontend.”
Portfolio
Selected work and the wider project archive
This page brings together the work that best shows how I approach digital products: clear interfaces, practical systems, public websites and tools built around real tasks. The archive adds more of the picture, including finished projects, active builds and experiments that show the range of problems I have worked through.
Featured
Six projects that show the range of the work
Project archive
Browse the wider body of work
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Project ecosystem
Explore the wider project ecosystem
The selected case studies show the main highlights. The hubs open up the broader body of work behind them: client websites, productivity systems, creative experiments, learning projects and technical utilities. Each collection has its own focus, giving the work more room to show its range, context and development over time, from finished public projects to smaller ideas that shaped later builds.
Navigation model
A clear path from overview to evidence
- 01Portfolio
Establish professional focus and surface the strongest work.
- 02Project hub
Group related systems by audience, purpose or working discipline.
- 03Individual project
Open the live application, website or detailed project route.
- 04Development record
Follow the deeper context where a project log or archive entry exists.
Directory
Explore the project hubs
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Wider context
A broader view of the work behind the highlights
The hubs show the range that sits beyond the selected case studies: client sites, operational tools, creative experiments, learning resources and technical utilities developed across different needs and levels of polish. Some projects are finished public work, others are prototypes, directories or records that capture how ideas were tested and refined. Seen together, they make the portfolio feel less like a handful of isolated outcomes and more like a connected body of practical, ongoing work. They also show the quieter parts of delivery: iteration, organisation, maintenance and the decisions that let a project keep developing after its first release.
Experience
Leadership, engineering and continued development
My career progressed from safety-critical technical work, through hands-on software delivery, into engineering leadership and end-to-end digital product ownership.
Earlier career · Royal Air Force
Technical responsibility in safety-critical operational service
RAF Survival Equipment was a specialist technical trade built around kit aircrew trusted with their lives: parachutes, liferafts, life jackets, oxygen masks, emergency beacons and survival packs. I inspected, repaired, tested, packed, recorded and managed that equipment, then moved into instruction and specialist trade duties covering briefings, demonstrations, sea-drill training, technical publications, compliance and coordination with aircrew and other RAF trades. It was technical work, teaching work and operational readiness work at the same time, carried into deployed service alongside allied forces where the paperwork, the process and the final check all had to stand up.
The Football Pools · Technical lead and engineering manager
Leading delivery while keeping live systems steady
At The Football Pools I moved from hands-on frontend delivery into technical leadership and engineering management. The role sat between live products, legacy constraints, team support and business change: keeping services moving, helping engineers through process shifts, translating risk for stakeholders and making practical decisions when the ideal technical answer was not available.
- Supported frontend engineers through changing delivery processes, remote work and legacy platform demands.
- Balanced visible product change against maintainability, technical debt and operational stability.
- Turned unclear requirements and constraints into workable frontend delivery plans.
Independent, client and community work · Current portfolio
Practical ownership across sites, tools and community systems
My current portfolio brings together client work, independent tools, project hubs and volunteer or charity systems. I often carry work from early problem definition through to handover: requirements, structure, interface design, copy, frontend implementation, PHP and JavaScript, deployment, documentation and ongoing maintenance. The aim is practical software that makes a real task clearer, easier to manage and robust enough for the people who inherit it.
Qualifications and training
Formal study supported by continual learning
BA (Hons) Interactive Media
Digital design, user-interface theory, animation, interactive storytelling and multimedia production.
BSc Computing
Software engineering, databases, systems analysis, cybersecurity and full-stack development.
Mini MBA
Business leadership across strategy, marketing, finance, people and organisational decision-making.
View additional professional and online training
About
A technical career built on reliability, clarity and useful design
I’m Phil Forster—a former Royal Air Force Survival Equipment Fitter turned software engineering manager, frontend developer and digital product specialist.
My RAF background taught me to treat detail, safety and accountability as operating requirements. That mindset now informs how I build software: understand the task, identify the risks, document the decisions and deliver something people can rely on.
After completing degrees in Interactive Media and Computing, I moved through hands-on development into technical leadership and software engineering management. I have worked across commercial products, education, heritage and community organisations, often bridging the gap between technical implementation and clear visual communication.
Alongside professional work, I support Morayvia, a volunteer-run aviation museum in Scotland. That work has included operational software, interactive displays, digital infrastructure, branding and exhibit design—practical systems built around the needs of volunteers and visitors.
I am usually most useful where a project needs someone to connect several parts of the problem rather than only deliver one narrow task. That might mean turning a loose brief into a working interface, improving an existing workflow, organising content, simplifying maintenance, or making sure a system still makes sense after the first launch.
The common thread is practical ownership. I care about the visible interface, but also the parts around it: the wording, the data, the hosting, the admin route, the update process and the person who has to come back to it later. A good build should feel understandable on day one and still be manageable when content, users or priorities change.
Professional values
Precision without unnecessary complexity
These are the habits I try to carry through the work: keep the system understandable, make the important paths dependable, and avoid adding complexity unless it genuinely earns its place.
Accountable decisions
Practical delivery
Reliable systems
Maintainable builds
Accessible interfaces
Human-centred workflows
Clear communication
Documented choices
Traceable changes
Secure foundations
Private by design
Adaptable thinking
Contact
Start with the problem you need to solve
For websites, internal tools, interface work, branding or technical collaboration, send the essential details below. We can then establish whether the project is a suitable fit.