Actually Delivered Discuss your project

Complex projects, actually delivered.

For ecommerce and software companies with a complex project that's stalled, slipping or too big to run alongside the day job. I take it from plan to live, keep everyone around it pulling in the same direction, and if anything is at risk, you hear it from me first.

Discuss your project See selected results
Engineering, operations, business and partners drawn as four overlapping circles, with the touchpoints where they cross marked in yellow and Stuart Lipinski at the centre, where all four meet. Engineering Operations Business Partners
I work at the touchpoints: where your teams meet, and where projects usually go wrong.

What I bring

Senior, hands-on delivery, focused on the places projects usually go wrong.

Projects rarely fail on the technology alone. They fail at the touchpoints: where engineering meets operations, where the business meets its partners, where teams in different countries hand work to each other. I make those touchpoints part of the plan, so problems surface while they're still small.

  • Platform migrations and consolidations

    Moving brands, websites or older systems onto one shared platform while the business keeps trading.

  • Recovering projects that have drifted

    Getting a stalled or slipping project back on course.

  • Ready for your busiest days

    Making sure your website, systems and team can handle your busiest trading periods and major launches.

  • Teams spread across countries

    Years of leading internationally distributed and remote teams, so work keeps moving across locations and time zones.

I work with the tools and processes you already have, rather than introducing new ones.

Selected results

Multi-brand ecommerce group · Europe · distributed teams

Seven brands consolidated onto one ecommerce platform

A €350m group serving 7 million customers a year needed to move seven European brands, each with its own website and ways of working, onto a single shared platform.

Seven brand websites, each with its own connection, merging into one shared platform. One platform

I led delivery across teams in several countries, with reporting that surfaced risks early and a common way of tracking work, so every team could see the others' progress.

Leadership had a clear, reliable view of progress, and decisions were made before issues became critical.

Approach
Hybrid Scrum and Kanban
Tools
Jira, with Structure for cross-team reporting; Miro for planning sessions and retrospectives
Teams
Engineering, finance, operations, production, marketing, legal and brand, plus fully outsourced remote teams
Locations
Amsterdam, London, Germany and Paris

Ecommerce business · Europe · brought in mid-project

A slipping product launch, back on track

An online business was moving older systems onto a new platform while launching a new product line, ahead of its busiest trading period. The work was already under way, and the launch was starting to slip.

I was brought in to get it back in line. I coordinated the engineering, design and production teams, brought business priorities and technical reality back into the same conversation, and tracked risks and milestones closely through to launch.

The new product line launched on schedule.

Approach
Hybrid Agile
Tools
Jira and Asana
Teams
Engineering, design and production
Locations
London and Paris

Seasonal online retailer · Europe

Ready for a 500% peak in demand

For a retailer whose demand rises by up to 500% at peak, performance testing was outsourced, which limited how often it could run and how quickly the team could respond.

Demand through the year rising to a peak of six times normal, 500% up, with the site status still OK. Normal +500% Status: OK
Shape is illustrative. The 500% is real.

I brought performance testing in-house, working hands-on with JMeter alongside a small squad of engineers to find the bottlenecks and roll out fixes before each peak, and negotiating priorities with the other engineering teams. I also commissioned independent security testing, turned the findings into a prioritised list of fixes, and led readiness reviews with senior leadership.

The team could test and prove its own readiness, peak after peak.

Approach
Kanban, run in Jira
Tools
JMeter (hands-on) and BlazeMeter for performance testing; an external security testing partner
Teams
A small squad of engineers, plus the other engineering teams and senior leadership
Locations
London

Have a project like these?

Discuss your project

How we'd work together

  1. A first conversation

    We talk through the project, its constraints and what success looks like.

  2. An honest assessment and plan

    Where the project really stands and what's achievable by when, then a plan with clear owners and milestones, agreed before work starts.

  3. Delivery, with regular reporting

    Hands-on delivery with your existing tools. Regular status reports cover progress, risks and the decisions you need to make.

  4. A documented handover

    So your team can run what's been delivered without me.

Ways to work together

Interim or full-time
For the length of a project or programme.
Part-time
A set number of days a week, alongside your team.
Fixed-scope review
A short health check of a project that's struggling, with clear recommendations.

Working across borders

I've led teams spread across several countries and time zones, so distributed working is second nature: clear written updates, well-run calls and nobody left out of the loop. I'm based in France and travel to you whenever the project needs it, whether for a kick-off, a key milestone or a critical launch.

About me

Stuart Lipinski

I'm Stuart Lipinski, a senior project manager with more than 15 years in ecommerce and software. I'm a native English speaker, and I also speak conversational French.

My career started in customer support and moved through database management into technical project and programme delivery. That's why I'm at home on both the engineering and the operational side of a business, and why I can translate between them.

I'm certified in agile project management (AgilePM), and I adapt my approach to the way your organisation already works.

References are available on request, and you can read recommendations from people I've worked with on LinkedIn.

Discuss your project

Tell me about the project, where it stands and the timescales involved.

What happens next

  1. I read your enquiry and reply to you personally, within two working days.
  2. If it looks like a fit, we arrange a short call to talk it through.
  3. You decide whether to go ahead. Nothing is agreed until you do.

Prefer email? hello@actuallydelivered.com