Robert Chatley

Imperial College London, Department of Computing

Professor Robert Chatley

Professor of Teaching in Software Engineering

Director, Software Engineering Practice  ·  Director, DoC EdTech Lab

Huxley 358  ·  rbc@imperial.ac.uk

I lead software engineering education and practice at Imperial. After a PhD at Imperial I spent many years in industry as a senior engineer and consultant, before returning to academic life to build a programme that bridges the two worlds. My research centres on software engineering education, developer tooling, and how engineers learn.

Research & Scholarship

My work centres on software engineering education, alongside a continuing thread of research in industrial software engineering practice. Full details on Google Scholar.

Software Engineering Education

My Lean Learning framework applies agile and lean principles to the design of iterative, feedback-rich learning experiences, and underpins curriculum innovations now cited and adopted internationally. I co-founded the Workshop on Modern Software Engineering Education (WMSEE) and served as Programme Chair for CSEE&T 2025.

Recent work: Designing for Real People (ICSE 2023) · Global Software Engineering in a Global Classroom (ICSE 2022) · Beyond Coding: Lean Learning for Real-World Software Engineering (EERN 2025)

Educational Technology

I founded and direct the DoC EdTech Lab, building software infrastructure used daily across the department, from our VLE to our digital exam platform. The team operates an internal open-source model, letting students learn by contributing directly to production systems. Recent work explores automated, LLM-assisted feedback on software design exercises at scale.

Recent work: Creating an Open-Source Ecosystem for Contextualized Learning in Software Engineering (HEAd 2025) · Creating a Student-Friendly PaaS Platform (FSE 2025)

Software Engineering Practice

Earlier and ongoing work looks at industrial software engineering practice: serverless computing, developer experience tooling, and performance testing. My FSE paper (with Gojko Adzic), Serverless Computing: Economic and Architectural Impact, was featured by The Morning Paper.

Also: Nimbus, a framework for serverless developer experience (see also the project site) (ICSE 2020) · Supporting the Developer Experience with Production Metrics (RCoSE 2019) · Continuous Performance Testing in Virtual Time (ICSA 2019)

Teaching

I lead the Software Engineering Practice group at Imperial, a team of engineers and industry-expert adjunct faculty working to give students relevant skills for industrial software engineering careers.