Period

August 2008 – Current

Responsibilities

Business Consulting, Process Consulting and Project Management.

Budgets

Usually n/a

Teams

Usually n/a

Environments

Various

Challenges

Working on programmes where there is a need to manage high expectations from owners, managers and end users.  In addition, the variety of work and skills required with the expectation of achieving results quickly and within very limited budgets.

Achievements

Happy clients who keep coming back.

Period

October 2007 to July 2008

Responsibilities

Provide Senior people, project and vendor management expertise in managing existing systems and assisting with the ongoing project.

Budget

$800k

Teams

·         Internal – Two DBA’s, one BA and one Support Desk Analyst

·         External – One vendor company (RHE & Assoc.)

Environment

Mixed environments of old and new technologies.

·         Legacy systems in old languages on locally based servers, used countrywide.

·         New system on centralised servers primarily used by a central team but with access from other hospital sites.

Challenges

Working on unstable systems and involved in a new project present different sets of challenges.

·         Existing systems were highly at risk and prone to failure so required close management to ensure continuity of service

·         Although the role initially did not call for it, there was a need to support the incumbent manager in progressing the system replacement project involving migration from old legacy systems to the new one.

Achievements

For the existing systems:

·         Achieving a level of reliability of the legacy systems that was acceptable to users by taking action to identify and implement preventative measures and ensure recovery was as quick as possible where incidents still occurred.

·         Enhance the support processes to provide better responsiveness.

The challenge of assisting with the replacement project by:

·         Taking on specific work items.

·         Assisting the incumbent manager in hiring new permanent team members.

·         Assisting the newly contracted programme manager to create and implement Risk & Issue registers and bring the project on track for an achievable delivery date.

·         Assisting newly hired team manager and other staff into their roles.

Period

July 2007 to September 2007

Responsibilities

Preparation for upgrade to existing systems to deliver:

·         Integration Point Analysis

·         Assessment and planning for data migration

·         Assessment and planning for required testing

Budget

$50k

Environment

Centralised server based systems

Teams

The project involved both internal and external teams.

·         Internal - Technical, Billing and Business teams

·         External - Overseas Vendor (Comverse, USA)

Challenges

Management of international vendor team made up of members from various countries

Achievements

All deliverables completed one month ahead of schedule

Period

December 2006 to July 2007

Responsibilities

Deliver billing structure for client to meet the agreed contract.

·         Billing Management

·         Management of permanent and contracted staff

·         Budget Management

·         Management of Client Relations and Expectations

Budget

$900k

Environment

·         ICMS Telecom system

·         Telecommunications billing environment for VOIP, Mobile and RAS/RAPS

Teams

·         Internal – Gen-i project team

·         External Client – Telecom Technical, Billing and Business teams (note: Gen-i is owned by Telecom)

·         External Customer – Westpac Bank

·         External vendors: EDS and Verisign, USA

Challenges

The contracted requirements could not be met using the existing billing system.  If this could not be remedied, then significant penalties would come into force from a specific point in time.

·         Alternative methods of providing the required information in the agreed format had to be identified, agreed with the client, tested and implemented.

·         In some instances, internal staff did not have the expertise to come up with solutions so needed to be closely mentored and managed to provide the necessary pre-billing processing.

Achievements

·         Successful planning and transition of the significant billing project.

·         Manipulation of existing systems and processes to achieve result.

·         Delivery of project two months ahead of schedule.

Period

April 2006 to November 2006

Responsibilities

Deliver transition plan covering business readiness, personnel and hardware requirements.

·         Transition Planning and Management

·         Management of permanent and contracted staff

·         Vendor Management

·         Budget Management

Budget:

$400k

Environment

Centralised server based systems

Teams

·         Internal – HIQ project team

·         External Staff – Capital & Coast Health Board Technical, Billing and Business teams (note: HIQ is owned by Capital & Coast Health Board)

·         External Vendors: IBA Health and Orion Health

·         External Client – Capital & Coast Health Board

Challenges

·         Quality and completeness of vendor deliverables

·         Overdue project

·         Lack of complete project plans

·         Availability and skill level of internal resources

·         Management of user and management expectations

Achievements

·         Improvement of quality and timeliness of vendor deliveries.

·         Mentoring and training of internal IT staff.

·         Management of customer expectations from lethargy to excitement

·         Instrumental in significant re-planning of major programme to align with an achievable delivery date.

·         Hand-over to incoming permanent manager.

Period

October 2005 to March 2006

Responsibilities

·         Manage development and delivery of multiple (8) projects in BizTalk environment

·         Working with external client (NZ Post and Kiwibank) resources

·         Working with internal teams providing architecture, procurement and technical resources.

·         Managing management and business expectations.

Budget:

$600k

Environment

Intranet based systems

Teams

·         Internal:  Three Java developers and Test Manager with three testers.

Achievements

·         Manage development and delivery of multiple (8) project streams in BizTalk environment.

·         Involved in significant replanning of major development/replacement programme.

Period

June 2005 to October 2005

Responsibilities

·         Deliver education packages to inmates over a centralised LAN based on Citrix farm technology.

·         Manage vendor companies: Sytec, Gen-i, Telecom, Dell, Citrix and others.

·         Work with internal architecture, procurement and technical teams.

·         Manage management and business expectations.

Budget

$200k (I worked very closely with other teams to specify and provide over $2m of budgeted work, however the individual budgets for other work streams were owned by other managers)

Environment

Centralised Citrix Farm

Teams

·         Multiple vendors

·         Internal DoC teams, locally and distributed

Achievements

·         Successful delivery of the project under a very tight timeline in very difficult technical conditions.

·         The expectations of delivery by a Citrix farm exceeded those specified by the vendor and close working with them, combined with a lot of hard work on the demands of the packages being delivered, resolved a number of seemingly insurmountable issues.

·         Managing a diverse range vendor companies

·         Delivering a project that had to have a high level of security and integrity, given the end user base.

Period

October 1999 to May 2005

Responsibilities

·         Management of support team for over 60 systems in a variety of languages, databases, architectures, on a variety of platforms.  Increasing number of supported systems

·         Management of multiple project streams, ranging from one-man developments through to a team of 24.

Budgets

$300k to $2.2m, as allocated per project

Environment

Centralised server and intranet based systems, distributed server, desktop systems, Novell networks, MS desktop platforms

Teams

·         Permanent:  Six development and support.

·         Contracted:  Up to 24 developers and testers on projects.

Achievements

·         Management of support team for over 60 systems in a variety of languages, databases, architectures, on a variety of platforms.  Increasing number of supported systems, whilst headcount was reducing

·         Instrumental in creating a new Programme Office

·         Involvement in upgrading MS NT4 servers to Win 2003, Oracle servers from v8 to v10 and desktop O/S from NT4 to XP and the purchase and installation of several Windows and Unix servers.  Roles ranged from technical support, project manager through to project manager’s manager

·         Successful introduction of, then development and migration to, new architectures (spec.,  Java, WebLogic and other web/browser technologies)

·         Successful delivery (to time and under budget) of over six systems in the past year (over twenty in the past four), as well as a number of minor enhancements, data fixes and maintenance releases to the supported applications.  Projects delivered in 2004 and into 2005, many concurrently, with budgets totalling $5.5M, include:

-          Ensuring compliance of all MoJ applications, moving from NT4 desktop O/S to XP.  A dual role, responsible for the project to ensure compliance of all MoJ systems as well as delivering compliance for the 60+ systems my own team supports.

Seven-person team (including project manager, systems architect and BA) developing a new Java/WebLogic/Oracle application

-          Three-person team (including project manager) developing a new system Java/WebLogic/Oracle application

-          One-person project to deliver enhancements to an existing system for Jury management (to cater for a legislation change) – PowerBuilder/Oracle DB

-          One-person project delivering enhancements for a Change Authorisation System – MS Access/Oracle and ASP, VB Script Browser/Oracle DB

-          One-person project delivering Oracle Reports for a Java/WebLogic/Oracle DB system

-          One-person project managing vendor moving HR Payroll system from vendor server to in-house, in parallel with an enhancement release.  Same team member providing a small (MS Access-based) system for managing performance appraisals

-          Several other small maintenance projects

·         Aside from purpose specific systems to manage court proceedings and internal systems, consulting and advising on the installation of an Electronic Document Management and Business Intelligence Systems

My teams achieved outstanding results while the organisation was undergoing significant change including, the merger between DfC and MoJ, new senior management, new project delivery teams

Period

May 1994 to Sept 1999

Responsibilities

Management of IT network, telecommunications, Call Centre and security systems, and:

·         Tender and managing the implementation of a replacement for all countrywide telecommunications systems and PBX's

·         Successful tendering and managing the implementation of a building security system

·         Development/delivery of several IT systems

·         Training and mentoring of staff in various areas of IT, covering project management through to development languages

Budgets

• Staffing $400
• Tender $800k & $2.2m

Teams

• Internal development team
• Internal network support team
• External telecommunications vendors, providing services, cabling, PBX, plus call centre products and services.
• External vendors providing building security products and services

Achievements

·         Successful tendering and managing the implementation of all countrywide telecommunications systems and PBX's

·         Successful tendering and managing the implementation of a building security system

·         Development/delivery of several IT systems

·         Training and mentoring of staff in various areas of IT, covering project management through to development languages

Period

1980 to 1991

Titles

Various, including:

• IT and Business Consultant (often ‘trouble-shooting’ internally and for IBM clients)
• Importation Manager
• Senior Project Manager
• Trainer (in Project Management, Time Management and Process Improvement practices)
• Sales Representative
• Vendor Manager

• Systems and Business Analyst
• Application Developer in several languages

Responsibilities

·         Projects Delivered as Project Manager included:

-          Seconded to New York for a very successful four-month project to deliver an international ordering application.  The project required visits to Singapore, Tokyo and Toronto

-          Warehouse system

-          Finance systems

-          Business continuity (Disaster Recovery) project manager.

·         Sales Representative

·         Deliverables Manager for the ICMS Telecom project

·         Tutor in various subjects, including database design and project management

·         Systems and Business Analyst

·         Application developer in several mainframe languages

Budget:

Various from $600k to $1.2m

Achievements

Whilst at IBM I received numerous awards for outstanding achievement.  These included awards for innovation and for successful deliveries of projects, including, amongst others:

·         International project specification for an internal system to be used for cable ordering.  This involved a four month project, based in the USA, with visits to Singapore, Japan & Canada and input from other countries.

·         Implementation of a major Warehouse system, developed in Canada.

·         A significant upgrade to the Warehouse system.

·         Implementation of an internal Finance System.

·         Business continuity planning and test for success (Continuity provided by servers based in Sydney).

·         Significant improvements to deliverables processes on the ICMS Telecom project.

·         Warehouse stock management project

·         ASP

·         HTML

·         Java

·         MS Access

·         PowerBuilder

·         VB Script

·         WebLogic

·         XML

·         .Net Forms

·         BizTalk

·         Data Warehouse

·         Microsoft NT Networks

·         Novell Networks

·         Citrix Farm

·         Oracle

·         SQL Server

·         Dbase IV

·         Paradox

·         MS Access

·         Windows to 2003 and XP

·         IBM O/S2

·         Linux and Unix

·         MS Project

·         MS Project Server

·         SAS

·         Crystal Reports

·         Oracle Reports

·         GIS

·         Rational Unified Product

·         Microsoft Suite

·         Other MS tools

·         ICMS

·         SAP