Bryan McNamara / Strategic thinker / systems builder / people developer
A working notebook
I’ve had a few careers.
Accounting, media, games, entrepreneurship, public service, and software. They look unrelated on paper. In practice, they have taught me how to make complicated things clearer, help people do their best work, and turn an idea into something useful.
The through-line is simple: I turn complexity into progress.
01 / why this exists
To make the pattern visible.
02 / current work
Public service and useful software.
03 / current study
Leadership and strategy.
02 / the arc
The job titles changed. The work underneath them did not.
I have moved through finance, media, games, business, public service, and software. The common thread is learning how to read a system, work with people, and make an idea useful in the real world.
I started with the wrong answer
I never really wanted to be an accountant. I was good with numbers, so I tried it as a career and learned the difference between being capable of something and wanting to build a life around it.
Then I followed the interesting things
A love of gaming led to events and Riot Games, travel, international work, and a breadth of projects. Geek Ireland ran alongside it. RAID Studios then taught me about business, delivery, and what it actually means to help people grow.
Now I’m putting it together
Now the focus is strategic thinking, long-term planning, leadership growth, and development: a public-service career, continued study, and software built because sometimes the best way to understand a problem is to make a thing.
The evidence behind the arc
A short version of the work that shaped the longer version of me.
Senior Staff Officer, Policy and Practice
The Housing Agency
Complex cross-organisational projects, senior management and CEO engagement, conference delivery, and practical AI-assisted workflows.
Co-founder and CEO
RAID Studios
A seven-year run growing an international business from three founders to 22 people, while leading client work, operations, finance, and the development of the people around me. I learned that performance conversations can be structured as opportunities to grow, not only as consequences.
Senior Community Manager / Project Lead
Riot Games
Esports and competitive play across English-speaking Europe, connecting community, product, and delivery.
Founder
Geek Ireland
An online media and events platform built from a genuine love of the weird and wonderful, grown with volunteers and contributors before its sale in 2019.
Senior Financial Analyst
AOL Ireland
Financial analysis, forecasting, and commercial evaluation in a fast-moving technology and media environment.
03 / how I think
I make complicated things feel possible.
The interesting problems are rarely only technical or only human. I make the shape of a problem clearer, build a practical way forward, and help the people involved carry it on.
See what is actually going on
I tend to start with the question that makes the room go quiet for a second. What are we really trying to change? What is getting in the way? What would make the next step obvious?
Make the next thing possible
The answer might be a strategy, a better process, a website, a product, or simply a decision people can finally act on. I like useful things more than impressive-looking plans.
Leave people stronger
Good work should give people more agency, not make them dependent on the person who started it. That means clear conversations, honest feedback, and room to make a mistake without being written off.
04 / making room
Making room is part of the work.
Who feels at home in a room, who is quietly translating themselves, and what a system assumes about the person using it.
I’ve learned to pay attention to the edges.
The human bit in between
Who feels at home in a room, who is quietly translating themselves, and what a system assumes about the person using it. I’m a nerd, so I notice the rules; I care about people, so I notice who gets left out by them.
That attention shapes how I lead, build, and collaborate. I want the work to make room for a fuller range of people and ways of thinking — not as a performance, but because better systems usually start by noticing who they were quietly designed around.
05 / proof in practice
The through-line holds up in the real world.
Public service and business leadership ask different questions, but the instinct is the same: offer a different view, make the problem workable, and leave people with more agency than they started with.
2025—2026 / Public service / delivery
Housing Agency website redevelopment
The project got moving when the team identified my experience with WordPress development and the wider technology stack around it. With the support of a section head and the team, I was able to take ownership of the problem, lead the business case, budget, procurement, requirements, governance, stakeholder coordination, content migration, accessibility work, and launch planning. The work brought 15 internal teams and external suppliers into one delivery rhythm and landed on time and under budget.
2017—2024 / Build / lead / grow
RAID Studios
I helped grow RAID Studios from three founders into a 22-person international business with more than €2m in annual revenue. One part of that work was supporting an employee through a performance improvement plan as a development opportunity rather than a punishment: connecting day-to-day work to impact, satisfaction, and growth, while making sure they had support from me and the wider team. They made marked improvement and had space to make honest mistakes and learn.
06 / things I build
Software is where I make the thinking tangible.
I build software because it is a good way to test an idea against reality. Sheet of Holding, Check-In, and Clear Scales all ask the same question in different ways: how do we make the signal clearer without taking control away from the person using it?
The design principle
Complexity should be available when you need it, not imposed before you understand why it matters.
Check-In: Physique
A private, local-first progress photo app for seeing change through repeatable poses and comparisons.
Build insight
Consistency is the feature: repeatable poses make progress easier to see.
Front, side, back, and custom poses
Same-pose comparison with a slider
Photos and progress stay on device by default
Clear Scales
A private, local-first weight tracker for seeing the trend behind each entry.
Build insight
Direction matters more than a single noisy daily reading.
Latest entry plus trend weight
Weekly recaps, averages, lows, and reports
Goals, cadence, and optional HealthKit
Sheet of Holding
A deep but intuitive online D&D character sheet that gives newer players what they need and lets experienced players discover more.
Build insight
Complexity should be available when you need it, not imposed before you understand why it matters.
Intuitive flow for new players
Depth for experienced players
Quick reference while the table is moving
07 / the working notebook
I build with AI. I still do the thinking.
I am not trying to pretend I came up through a traditional software-engineering route. I learned by being curious, making things, breaking things, and getting much better at checking the result. AI has made that loop dramatically faster.
Daily practice
Codex / Cursor / Claude
AI helps me move faster. It does not get to make the important decisions. I still define the problem, verify the behaviour, and keep the user in control.
Research
Use AI to move from a question to useful context without losing the original problem.
Build
Turn a rough idea into a working product, then keep shaping it until the experience feels right.
Verify
Test the output, challenge the assumptions, and refine the parts that do not hold up.
08 / learning
Still becoming more useful.
The formal qualifications matter, but so does the habit underneath them: keep learning, then put the learning to work.
MA Leadership & Strategy
Institute of Public Administration — study commenced.
Professional Diploma in Housing Studies
NFQ Level 8 — 2:1.
Professional Diploma in Project Management
University College Dublin — distinction.
QQI Level 5 Exercise & Fitness
CMIT — distinction; qualified personal trainer.
Accounting Technician
Accounting & Taxation NFQ Level 6 — distinction.
Professional Scrum Master II
Scrum.org qualification.
09 / beyond work
The nerdy bits are not a footnote.
The stuff I do when nobody is paying me is not separate from the work. The gym gives me discipline. Climbing gives me connection. D&D gives me a way to be expressive with friends. Warhammer and science fiction give me worlds to disappear into. Games give me systems to pick apart.
Gym
Six days a week. I became a qualified personal trainer to understand the craft of building the body I want.
Climbing
A shared activity with Conor, and a good reminder that progress is usually a sequence of small decisions.
D&D
A way to stay connected to friends, be expressive, and make things up together.
Warhammer
Deep, ridiculous, endlessly interesting fantasy — currently mostly consumed through audiobooks.
Science fiction
Star Trek, Stargate, and the kind of worlds that make ordinary problems feel usefully small.
Games
I play a lot of video games. The systems, stories, and tiny decisions are hard to resist.
10 / evidence index
Look closer when you want the detail.
The story is the front door. This index keeps the supporting evidence available for anyone who wants to explore the work, the decisions, and the outcomes underneath it.
7 everything evidence entries shown.
Check-In guides recurring check-ins through front, side, back, and custom poses, then makes same-pose comparisons easy to revisit. Photos, measurements, conditions, and notes stay together in a calm, private tool for noticing meaningful change.
Evidence
- Front, side, back, and custom poses
- Same-pose comparison with a slider
- Photos and progress stay on device by default
Clear Scales brings logging, trend weight, weekly recaps, averages, lows, reports, goals, and flexible cadence into one focused experience. It is local-first by design, with optional HealthKit connections, widgets, backups, and exports kept under the user's control.
Evidence
- Latest entry plus trend weight
- Weekly recaps, averages, lows, and reports
- Goals, cadence, and optional HealthKit
Sheet of Holding turns the familiar character sheet into an online workspace for core stats, HP, AC, abilities, spells, inventory, features, effects, and notes. The flow is designed to be self-delivering: newer players are not burdened by depth they do not need, while seasoned players can discover more when they go looking. It is a product born from wanting the table experience to feel less like admin.
Evidence
- Intuitive flow for new players
- Depth for experienced players
- Quick reference while the table is moving
The project got moving when the team identified my experience with WordPress development and the wider technology stack around it. With the support of a section head and the team, I was able to take ownership of the problem, lead the business case, budget, procurement, requirements, governance, stakeholder coordination, content migration, accessibility work, and launch planning. The work brought 15 internal teams and external suppliers into one delivery rhythm and landed on time and under budget.
Evidence
- 15 internal teams and external suppliers
- Delivered on time
- Delivered under budget
I am shaping a digital learning platform for training and upskilling across local authorities, approved housing bodies, state agencies, and the wider housing sector. It is an exercise in making a complicated ecosystem feel navigable, useful, and ready to grow.
Evidence
- Cross-sector audience
- Focused on practical upskilling
- Designed for a public-service context
I helped grow RAID Studios from three founders into a 22-person international business with more than €2m in annual revenue. One part of that work was supporting an employee through a performance improvement plan as a development opportunity rather than a punishment: connecting day-to-day work to impact, satisfaction, and growth, while making sure they had support from me and the wider team. They made marked improvement and had space to make honest mistakes and learn.
Evidence
- 3 founders → 22 employees
- >€2m annual revenue
- Up to 10 direct reports
I founded Geek Ireland as an online media and events platform, growing it to roughly 200,000 unique users per month with a community of volunteers and contributors. It was sold to DMG Media Ireland in 2019.
Evidence
- ~200k unique users per month
- 12 volunteers and contributors
- Sold in 2019
11 / contact
If the problem is interesting, say hello.
You do not need to know the solution yet. If you can describe the problem — especially where people, strategy, AI, or software might help — I am open to exploring collaboration, advising, mentoring, or building something together.