Home is in Lucan, where I live with Penny my wife (she is a psychotherapist and runs Therapy Haven in Leixlip), and Danny and April, so the house is always busy!  When I'm not on the school run, taxiing them to hockey or refereeing the littles, I currently wear a number of professional hats, having consciously opted into a portfolio career soon after completing my MBA.

• Managing Director of Houghton Consulting.  My main area is now AI - heIping organisations of all sizes from The Defence Forces & Govt Departments down to small charities engage with AI, implement it into their processes and train their people. I also have a few clients who I have worked with for years who I consult with on various areas of management and risk.  I'm always interested in new opportunities, so do reach out if I might be able to help you or someone you know!

• CPD - I’m a lifelong learner!. To stay fully up to date, alongside my other teaching and consulting, I’m completing the Digital4Business Joint Professional Masters in Advanced Digital Technologies for Business across 2026. Four academic partners - National College of Ireland (NCI), Alma Mater Studiorum - Universita di Bologna (UNIBO), Linkoping University (LIU), and Universidade Nova de Lisboa (UNL) - have developed  the  programme's  core  modules.  These  modules  address  in-demand  digital competencies such as Artificial Intelligence, Cybersecurity, Cloud Computing, Data Science, and Digital Transformation. Elective modules include emerging technologies such as Blockchain, the Internet of Things, Generative Al, and Quantum Computing, as well as essential topics including Programming for Productivity, Data Governance and Ethics, Innovation, and Risk and Change Management in Digital Environments.

• Assistant Professor and Programme Director at UCD Smurfit Graduate School of Business, one of the world's top 100 business schools.  I co-created and direct/teach on the MSc in Project Management, as well as on a number of other post-grad programmes up to PhD level.  My profile there is at https://people.ucd.ie/joe.houghton and the MSc in PM website is at https://www.smurfitschool.ie/programmes/masters/mscinprojectmanagement/ 

• Author - in recent years I’ve found that writing books is something I really enjoy, and I now have 16 published books on AI, Accessibility & UDL, Risk Management, Project Management and photography. Many of my photography books have reached #1 in the Amazon best-seller lists - an unexpected bonus! All my books can be found at my Amazon author page - most are available in hardback, paperback, e-book and audio formats.

• Senior Trainer with Trigraph Intelligent Learning - I do some project management and business communication training through Trigraph, and have also created an AI series that we have run several times, both as an open enrolment course and also as one that has been tweaked for specific company needs.

• Chair of the Board at Shine. I’ve been involved in mental health since joining the Samaritans as a volunteer when I was 19 (scary that this is more than 40 years ago now!). Shine is one of Ireland’s leading voices in the movement to destigmatise and advocate for better mental health supports, and I’m proud to help Shine enact its vision as Chair of the current Board.

• Owner - Houghton Photography.  My creative outlet is photography, and as with all my other pursuits, teaching this wonderful and accessible craft is something I just end up doing naturally.  I offer personal 1-1 tuition, longer-term mentoring/development, workshops to businesses wanting to up their own photography game, and talks to camera clubs.  I've also dipped my toe into creating some online video classes around developing photos using Lightroom, and I continue to explore and develop my own skills in this endlessly challenging craft.  My training website is at www.houghtonphoto.com and my Instagram feed is at www.instagram/com/totpics, where I post mainly black-and-white street photos shot with my beautiful little Fuji X series cameras.

The year 2000 and moving to Ireland from the UK was a major change in my life, moving from a career working my way into more senior roles in various multi-national corporations after training as a computer programmer and analyst with the Co-op and Littlewoods in the UK.  I followed that with 4 years working as a self-employed systems developer, before joining Dearborn Chemicals in 1992, who was snapped up by WR Grace, who was in turn bought by BetzDearborn and eventually they were bought by General Electric, where I finished my corporate career as one of their Global Tech Managers. 

But after 15 years of flying somewhere different in the world almost every week, when I moved to Ireland, I did the International Executive MBA in Smurfit to "plug in" to the Irish network, loved it there, and following Charles Handy's lead in his wonderful book "The Empty Raincoat".  I decided to chunk my life and go for a portfolio career where I could have time at home with Penny & the children, as well as work with interesting and challenging people, and with charities such as Pieta House & Shine which are important to me.

I now focus almost exclusively on online education, as this enables me to reach wider audiences and provide a high-level of service to widely distributed audiences