Hi, I’m Nick.
I’m the founder of Depth First. Software engineer by training, software trainer for the better part of a decade, and a transformational coach.
The work sits at an unusual intersection: technical competence and relational depth. Depth First exists because the wise use of AI lives right at that intersection. Most of the training currently on offer doesn’t.
I started as a software engineer. For most of the last decade I’ve been training other people to do that work, teaching them to write code well, design systems, and think rigorously under uncertainty. Most of that work was through General Assembly, including their flagship Software Engineering Bootcamp and a series of accelerator programmes for engineering teams at major UK enterprises across financial services and beyond.
Alongside that, for years, I’ve had a parallel practice. Coaching, group facilitation, and deeper relational work.
For a long time these felt like two different rooms. Software training in one, deep relational work in the other. They drew on different parts of me and served different people.
Then I started teaching AI.
What I noticed quickly: this material doesn’t separate cleanly. The technical questions are real and worth taking seriously. How these models actually work. Where they fail. How to build with them.
The human questions are at least as real, and often more urgent. How these tools shape our thinking. What they quietly remove alongside what they add. What should stay human even when it could be automated.
Most AI training does one or the other. The technical version teaches you to prompt and ships you off. The philosophical version warns you of the risks and leaves you with nothing to actually do. Both are partial. Both leave the practitioner stranded.
The only way to teach this work that respects both sides is to actually hold both. So that’s what Depth First is: technical training that doesn’t pretend the human questions don’t exist, and human-centred training that doesn’t hand-wave the technical reality.
These tools are limited and empowered by the paradigm and context of their user. Learning to use them well is learning how to think well.
The conviction that runs through everything I do.
- Technical
Software engineer by background. Years across financial services and health-tech startups, mostly front-end with some full-stack.
- Pedagogical
Hundreds of hours running technical workshops and accelerators for teams at all skill levels, from first-time learners to experienced engineers.
- Relational
Years of coaching practice and group facilitation in deeper relational traditions. Deep work with people on what they’re creating and what’s in the way.
- Synthetic
The unusual willingness to hold both at once. A track record of designing learning that draws on both without flattening either.
Want to talk?
Book a 30-minute call. No pitch.