Phill Dawes

Phill Dawes has spent his entire AV career at Pacific Computers, progressing from managing returns and repairs to technical services manager. Along the way, his work has expanded through equipment testing, customer support, system design, programming, configuration and onsite installation support, giving him experience across much of the technical lifecycle of an AV project.

One of the changes he introduced was a full pre-install testing process, designed to identify issues before equipment reached site. He continues to pre-configure and programme systems while managing Pacific’s internal technical team, alongside responsibility for areas including IT and marketing. Dawes has also held AVIXA’s CTS certification since 2018.

More recently, he has applied that technical background to Pacific’s biggest internal technology project: Poseidon, its bespoke CRM platform. Dawes mapped the requirements of different departments and acted as the link between the business and programming team, drawing on years spent working across Pacific to understand how technical, sales and operational processes connect.

His career has required him to keep moving beyond a single specialism, taking on networking, cloud systems and business technology alongside traditional AV disciplines.

For the next generation, Dawes wants the industry to show that AV careers extend beyond purely technical roles, encompassing design, creativity, content and customer-facing work as well as engineering.