Manager Management
Resume:
Sylvia L. Griffith ********@******.**.***
512-***-**** (Home) ******.********@*****.***
512-***-**** (Work) ******.********@**.***
Sylvia Lynn Griffith
Work Experience
Department of Veterans Affairs, AITC
2/2010 – Present
Austin, Texas US
Chief, Project and Release Management Division
• Continue in all duties as Release Manager (detailed below).
• Manage a team of nine experienced Project Management Professionals and five highly
skilled IT professionals.
Project Managers coordinate fini te projects designed to implement new applications
or products into our data center operations or to implement substantial
i mprovements and upgrades to existing products in the data center.
The technical personnel manage multiple internal applications that are critical to
t he staffing, reporting, and billing efforts of the data center and the entire CDCO.
• Ensure that all staff members have the tools and t raining required to perform their
work well, have clear direction and information concerning the expectations for each of
t hem, have access to openly communicate any ideas, ini tiatives, problems, or difficulties
t hey have, have frequent, constructive feedback concerning their performance, and are
recognized for their outstanding work.
• Coordinate our activities with representatives from the other Services in AITC/CDCO,
E IE, OED, and other related organizations to ensure that the t ransition between the
current and the new implementation of any effort is as smooth as possible.
Department of Veterans Affairs, AITC
6/2008 – 2/2010
Austin, Texas US
Release Manager
• Developed, documented, and implemented the Release Management program at AITC.
Technical Publications Professional 1
Sylvia L. Griffith ********@******.**.***
512-***-**** (Home) ******.********@*****.***
512-***-**** (Work) ******.********@**.***
• Collaborated on the selection of Build Managers for each Division in the Applications
M anagement Service.
Organized these technical professionals into the Release Management team and
p resented the basic points and goals of Release Management.
Ensured that all the original Build Managers received t raining in IT I L v3
Foundations and IT I L v3 Release, Control, and Validation.
Chaired a weekly meeting of the Build Managers (the Release Management team), to
collaborate and share best practices in the continuing implementation of Release
M anagement.
• Assisted with the implementation of standard change order workflows in our Service
and with the development of proposed standard change order workflows for Service 31.
• Consulted Senior Managers, Change Management personnel, Business Office
p rofessionals, and others to document the procedure for the creation and
i mplementation of new projects/applications at AITC.
• Documented the standard operating procedure and workf low for the procedure.
• Served on the Change Control Board of the CDCI/AITC to review selected requests for
changes to processes and procedures that impact the organization.
Northrop Grumman Information Technology
5/2006 – 6/2008
Austin, TX
Senior Systems Analyst/Senior Technical Writer
• Planned, managed, and wrote original material for a variety of projects and processes.
Responsible for the analysis, improvement, and documentation of client-server
p roject processes for the Health Data Repository (HDR) operations and maintenance
activities.
Responsible for the mainframe project processes for the Decision Support System.
Researched the Data Center’s policies and directives to ensure that HDR and DSS
Technical Publications Professional 2
Sylvia L. Griffith ********@******.**.***
512-***-**** (Home) ******.********@*****.***
512-***-**** (Work) ******.********@**.***
project policies and processes complied with those of the Department of Veterans
A ffairs.
Attended and documented Problem Resolution meetings that brought together top-
level representatives from all functional areas to evaluate recur ring or urgent
p roblems and to determine plans of action to address these problems.
Wrote executive summaries of findings and plans for the CIO and other leaders in
t he Department of Veterans Affairs.
Designed and wrote executive-level summaries of current and future HDR activities
t hat the Chief of Executive Information Services presented at annual national
p rogram meetings.
• Facilitated process discovery sessions in which representatives from the Data Center’s
Cost Management Office, Contract Management Office, Enterprise Configuration
M anagement Division, and Enterprise Systems Division provided information about “as
is” process steps.
• Created workflow diagrams of current processes and analyzed the steps to determine
methods of streamlining or porting processes to automated workflow-t racking tools.
• Gathered information for the creation of new process and policy handbooks, including
t he Software Configuration Management Handbook, approved and released in mid-
2007.
Assembled oral and wri t ten input from upper management into an organized,
cohesive handbook intended to clarify the software configuration management policy
and process for the entire Data Center.
Led the process discovery meetings for three diverse software change activities: one
open systems process and one mainframe process under the Enterprise Systems
D ivision, and a Windows patching process under the Wintel Support Unit of the
Technical Infrastructure Division.
• Following Capability Matu ri ty Model Integrated (CMM I) guidance, created process
f lows for HDR operations and maintenance processes, for the customer requirements
definition process, and for the cost estimation process.
Technical Publications Professional 3
Sylvia L. Griffith ********@******.**.***
512-***-**** (Home) ******.********@*****.***
512-***-**** (Work) ******.********@**.***
• Served as Configuration Librarian for HDR project documentation for the HDR project.
O rganized our project documentation library and maintained administrative oversight
of this library. (Contact Supervisor: Yes, Supervisor's Name: Pamela Gutierrez,
Supervisor's Phone: 512-***-****)
Newisys, Inc.
11/2004 - 5/2006
Austin, TX
Team Lead, Technical Publications
• Responsible for scoping, planning, designing, and ensuring delivery of all product
technical documentation and most process documentation for high-end enterprise
servers for major, tier-1 computer companies.
• Conducted process discovery meetings with personnel from the software, hardware,
manufacturing, and marketing divisions to define the process steps in the Engineering
Change Process.
Created process f low diagrams and process f low narratives for the "as is" process.
Conducted "to be" process discovery meetings with personnel from the same
d ivisions to determine how we could streamline the process and ensure that i t was a
repeatable and predictable.
• Conducted process discovery meetings with software and hardware engineers to obtain
i nformation about the process steps in the Product Change In tention Notification
p rocess.
Created process f low diagrams and the process f low document that was published to
t he company Web site.
• Conducted research and interviews with software developers and manufacturing
personnel who created the Product L ine Management process for our company's
manufacturing plants.
Created the process f low diagrams and the process f low document that was
p ublished to our company's Web site.
Technical Publications Professional 4
Sylvia L. Griffith ********@******.**.***
512-***-**** (Home) ******.********@*****.***
512-***-**** (Work) ******.********@**.***
• Interviewed personnel from the hardware, software, manufacturing, marketing, and
quality control divisions to gather input for the document change process I created.
Ini tiated the process through our version control software tools, StarTeam and
Subversion.
• Documented product hardware design and software functionality.
Conducted interviews with software and hardware engineers to determine product
features and changes for the following products:
2100-E Enterprise Server
4300-E Enterprise Server
2110-F Enterprise Server
NA-1400 Storage Area Network Appliance
Organized information and created product documentation sets for these four unique
p roducts. Each illustrated documentation set contained the following:
o Installation guide designed for system administrators
o Hardware parts replacement guide
o Systems management guide
o Systems management commands reference guide
o Bios script guide
o Troubleshooting guide
o Basic users guide
o Release notes
• Researched the functionality of the customer support center and created the Customer
Support Users Guide that was published to the company's Web site.
• Based on input from hardware and software engineers, I created matr ices of compatible
memory, hard disk drives, options, and part numbers.
Technical Publications Professional 5
Sylvia L. Griffith ********@******.**.***
512-***-**** (Home) ******.********@*****.***
512-***-**** (Work) ******.********@**.***
Northrop Grumman Information Technology
5/2003 - 11/2004
Austin, TX
Senior Systems Analyst/Senior Technical Writer
• Conducted interviews about system development processes for all types of mainframe
software changes.
Created process f low diagrams for each type of software change.
Created the Fiscal Services Section's Financial Management System (FMS) System
Development Life-cycle Methodology document, a comprehensive summary of the
p rocesses and artifacts for each type of change, which i tself is a collection of artifacts
t hat provide evidence of compliance with CMM I guidelines.
• Created the Financial Management System Continuation of Operations Plan.
• Created Continuation of Operations plans for many other applications under the
E nterprise Systems Division, including the top-level Continuation of Operations plan
for the Division.
• Created documentation for the Corporate Data Center Continuation of Operations Plan
I ni tiative (CDCI) project. I created an Access database of Division personnel, by Section.
• Researched and security information for the Financial Management System and
recorded i t in the Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA) online
survey, a national database. Survey questions were based on N IST Special Publication
800-26, Security Self-Assessment Guide for Information Technology Systems, Appendix
A, System Questionnaire, which is based on the Capability Matu ri ty Model In tegrated
(CMM I) standards for an organization's continuous process improvement.
• Created a documentation control process for the Health Data Repository (HDR) and had
t he process ini tiated i t in the Change Management software tool in use at the AITC.
• Collected daily report information for the Fiscal Services Section's staff meetings,
i ncluding information about all software changes ready for implementation.
• Interviewed software developers for the Financial Management System's Annual Close
Technical Publications Professional 6
Sylvia L. Griffith ********@******.**.***
512-***-**** (Home) ******.********@*****.***
512-***-**** (Work) ******.********@**.***
to create a handbook of the process steps for Mock Close and Annual Close.
Net Perceptions, Inc.
1/2000 - 1/2003
Austin, TX
Manager, Technical Publications Team
• Responsible for scoping, planning, assigning, and ensuring delivery of all product
documentation for the company’s high-scale data mining, analytic, and recommendation
technology software.
Managed a team of ten technical writers across two locations: M inneapolis,
M innesota and Austin, Texas.
Created a team t raining plan and individual roles for team members, based on each
team member's individual career goals and complemented the team's requirements
for fulfilling our role in the company.
• During company down-sizing in 2002, when nine team members were eliminated,
became responsible for all product documentation for our Web-based and locally
i nstalled products.
Used the software products in order to wri te the end-user guides.
In terviewed engineers who designed the databases, the graphic user interfaces, and
t he administrative tools that comprised the software, in order to wri te the technical
administrators' guides and design guides.
Document sets for each of our products included:
o Release Notes
o • Installation Guide
o Metadata Designers Guide
o Analytics Guide
o Administrators Guide
o Users Guide
• Updated the company's Web site to reflect new releases.
Technical Publications Professional 7
Sylvia L. Griffith ********@******.**.***
512-***-**** (Home) ******.********@*****.***
512-***-**** (Work) ******.********@**.***
• Created marketing collateral and data sheets for the sales team.
First American Real Estate Tax Information Service
11/1998 - 1/2000
St. Petersburg, FL
Senior Information Developer, Field Services Manager
• Researched, designed, and created the Y2K Disaster Recovery Plan for the St.
Petersburg office.
Included data backup and recovery plans and the notification process for First
A merican personnel and customers.
Documented the software application that was created to facilitate the system and
data recovery.
Created the user guide to accompany the software's implementation. The plan
i ncluded:
• Researched, designed, and created the Hu r r icane Evacuation Plan for the St.
Petersburg office.
Steps for preparation of the facilities and equipment.
A detailed process for communication with First American personnel, their families,
and customers.
Specific process steps for an orderly evacuation.
The duties of each section.
A t ime line for accomplishing the tasks.
The specific criteria that would t r igger the implementation of the plan.
Criteria necessary for the return to work.
Specific process steps for an orderly resumption of business following any necessary
clean-up activities by other entities.
Technical Publications Professional 8
Sylvia L. Griffith ********@******.**.***
512-***-**** (Home) ******.********@*****.***
512-***-**** (Work) ******.********@**.***
Ini tial preparations of the office after the clean-up activities.
The order in which those who held specific roles would return to the office.
Details of the communication plan to be implemented during the evacuation and
resumption of business.
• Documented all user procedures for mainframe software modules produced at the St.
Petersburg office.
• Led business process discovery sessions for the implementation of the new tax
i nformation software.
• Created process diagrams and process f low narratives and worked with software users
and developers to validate the f lows.
• Created the tax information software implementation guide that the company used to
i mplement the new software in an efficient manner.
Computer Task Group (CTG)
5/1996 - 11/1998
Senior Information Developer/Field Services Manage
• Wrote user guides for the largest (to that date) Oracle HRMS and Oracle Financials
i mplementation accomplished to date. These services include payroll administration,
r isk management, benefits administration, unemployment services, and human
resources consulting services.
• Interviewed developers and users to gather information about the customized HRMS
and Financials system software.
• Created t raining lessons for call center personnel who used the application's various
f unctions.
• Conducted discovery sessions with Staff Leasing personnel from various departments,
i n order to document their "as is" payroll data entry, insurance calculation, and benefits
p rocesses.
Created f low charts of these processes, and validated them with users.
Technical Publications Professional 9
Sylvia L. Griffith ********@******.**.***
512-***-**** (Home) ******.********@*****.***
512-***-**** (Work) ******.********@**.***
Assisted with the analysis of the "as is" processes that yielded improvements on the
old f lows, and recorded the results of these process re-engineering meetings for the
developers who later customized the software to accommodate the users' needs.
Documented the "to be" process f lows that would be implemented with the help of
t he new Oracle HRMS and Financials system software.
• Served as Field Services Manager for CTG.
Served as CTG's on-site management representative at the client site and as liaison
between the client supervisors and our CTG-employed software developers.
Responsible for interviewing client supervisors and employees for input into
performance appraisals and for wri ting employee performance appraisals based on
t hose interviews.
Texas Society of Professional Engineers
9/1991 - 9/1995
Assistant Education Program Manager
• Assisted the Education Program Manager with processes and procedures for the state
administration of the MATHCOUNTS program.
Created news releases, fund-raising letters, program bulletins, newsletters, and
annual reports for program donors.
Recruited 7th- and 8th-grade math teachers to sign up to sponsor MATHCOUNTS
teams at their schools.
Met with program donors to report our progress in increasing the number of Texas
m iddle schools that participated in the MATHCOUNTS program.
Helped conduct regional MATHCOUNTS contests in Texas.
• Managed the high-school-level programs which included the JETS program and two
competitions sponsored by the National JETS organization: the TEAMS test (Tests of
E ngineering Aptitude, Mathematics, and Science) and the NEDC (National Engineering
Design Competition).
Technical Publications Professional 10
Sylvia L. Griffith ********@******.**.***
512-***-**** (Home) ******.********@*****.***
512-***-**** (Work) ******.********@**.***
Conducted the TEAMS test at regional competitions.
Assisted sponsoring engineers with regional competitions.
Planned and made all arrangements for the State NEDC Competition, held at the
Balcones Research Center (now the J.J. Pickle Research Center).
• For the Texas Professional Engineer, TSPE's professional journal, planned and wrote all
o riginal material and I edited contributed columns from TEF's Board Chairman, TSPE's
P resident, TSPE's Executive Director, and other TSPE officers.
E ducation
Austin Peay State University
Clarksville, Tennessee US
Master of Ar ts in English Li terature
5/1999
GPA: 4.0 out of 4.0
University of Houston
Houston, Texas US
Bachelor of Ar ts in English Li terature
12/1970
Columbus H igh School
Columbus, Texas US
H igh School or equivalent - 5/1966
Training
IT I L V3 Foundation Certification
New Horizons
Austin, Texas
IT I L V3 Release, Control, and Validation Certification
New Horizons
Austin, Texas
Process Management Certification
Technical Publications Professional 11
Sylvia L. Griffith ********@******.**.***
512-***-**** (Home) ******.********@*****.***
512-***-**** (Work) ******.********@**.***
University of Texas Professional Development Center
A ustin, Texas
M icrosoft Project Training
ExecuTrain
Tampa, Florida
Field Services Management Training
C TG Corporate Offices
B uffalo, New York
Honors and Affiliations
Phi Kappa Phi National Honor Society
Inducted 1989; Member #10556987
National Merit Scholarship Corporation
Full-tuition, four-year scholarship, 1966 - 1970
American Mensa
Member #1047401
Professional Publications
Texas Professional Engineer
July/August 1995
References
Joe Bulger
Vice President
L ifesize Communications, Inc.
Phone: 512-***-****
E-mail: j ******@********.***
Madhavi Nookala
Associate Director
Department of Veterans Affairs
Corporate Data Center Operations/Austin Information Technology Center
Technical Publications Professional 12
Sylvia L. Griffith ********@******.**.***
512-***-**** (Home) ******.********@*****.***
512-***-**** (Work) ******.********@**.***
Phone: 512-***-****
E-mail: M ******.*******@**.***
Stephen L. Smith
Former Vice President
First Advantage Corporation
Phone: 305-***-****
E-mail: S *************@*****.***
Technical Publications Professional 13
Contact this candidate