Steven Merzon

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acqqod@r.postjobfree.com ● 347-***-**** ● 1625 East 13th Street, Apt 1E Brooklyn, NY 11229 https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevenmerzon

Information Technology Executive

Leader of highly efficient and collaborative IT departments. Facilitating business growth & development through the effective use of technology. Key Member of Senior Management Team

Chief Information Officer (CIO) function reporting directly to Executive Director / CEO.

Provided clear technical vision and global IT strategy, obtaining consensus and approval across multiple business units, ensuring operational success in service driven environments.

Chairperson of IT Steering Committee providing collaborative technical leadership to organizations.

Delivered well-received technical presentations to the Board of Directors.

Led IT Project Management Office, completing initiatives on time, within budget and within scope.

Assembled motivated and successful teams encompassing the complete portfolio of IT disciplines, promoting growth of the individual as well as the organization.

Aligned IT with Strategic Plans and created practical policies and procedures, resulting in efficiently running departments, working as a strategic partner in a business driven culture.

Profit and Loss responsibility including budget preparation and forecasting for all technology expenditures. Reduced expenses and negotiated cost-saving contracts with vendors / contractors. Infrastructure, Disaster Recovery, Business Continuity, Security

Established state-of-the-art cloud based infrastructure, monitored and staffed 24/7, capable of supporting offices around the globe, ensuring the continuity and successful operation of the organization. Provided positive, interpersonal customer service to internal and external personnel. Business Intelligence and Reporting

Implemented BI solutions featuring Data Warehouses, KPI’s, Scorecards, Dashboards and Data Visualizations increasing the organization’s ability to make sound business decisions based upon actual data.

Application Development, Architecture Design, E-Commerce and System Integration

Led complex development & data processing initiatives through the complete Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC) including the development of enhancements to the Aptify AMS, the St Paul Re Global Reinsurance System and the Matthew Bender Editorial System.

Led an Agile team to create several industry-recognized resources named “one of the ten best online trademark tools” by World Trademark Review.

Automated inefficient manual processes, increasing staff efficiency, simplifying the prior process and increasing revenue.

Created an E-Commerce / POS system used by over 10,000 international customers, generating over $20 million in annual revenue.

Websites, Intranets and Portals, Enterprise CMS

Designed and led the development and redesign of multiple websites, intranets and web based products, implementing responsive design and an improved user experience, resulting in increased traffic and first page search result ranking.

Document Management

Implemented organization wide document and content management systems enabling staff to quickly locate relevant documents on a given topic, increased efficiency over the previous method of manually searching a variety of locations on file servers and in file cabinets. Steven Merzon

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DIRECTOR OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

MERZON IT SOLUTIONS 2015 - PRESENT

Creator of innovative ideas, providing strategic guidance on technical initiatives to SMB’s & non-profits.

Website Design and Development

Information Systems Analysis, Selection

and Implementation

Business Intelligence

E-Commerce

Technical Roadmaps / Project Management

Enterprise CMS / SharePoint

Data Management

DIRECTOR OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

INTERNATIONAL TRADEMARK ASSOCIATION (INTA) 2006 – 2015 CIO Function

Strategic Planning

Network & Database Administration

Web & Application Development (DevOps)

Business Analysis / Quality Assurance

Help Desk / Customer Service

Project Management

Security

Data Management / Governance

Infrastructure, Disaster Recovery, Business Continuity

Ensured the successful operation of an infrastructure serving six locations across four continents. Managed the relationship with a co-location provider for all external facing systems and disaster recovery providers to ensure business continuity.

Supported international and domestic remote INTA offices in Washington D.C., Brussels, Belgium, Mumbai, India and Shanghai China.

Directly responsible for Customer Service in support of the needs of a global membership base, ensuring customer satisfaction and member retention.

VMWare Windows and Web servers

Windows PCs / Mac Workstations

Mobile / Tablets (iOS / Android)

Active Directory Administration

MS Exchange

Citrix / Remote Access

Sonicwall Firewalls / E-Mail Security

Microsoft Office / Office 365

SQLServer / MySQL

SharePoint Enterprise / PHP (MVC)

Microsoft Dynamics Great Plains

Aptify

Mitel Phone System

Acronis Backup

Business Intelligence and Reporting

Provided data warehousing and business intelligence services using Microsoft technologies which allowed the association to make strategic decisions based upon historical trends and data driven predictions, resulting in an increase in generated revenue. Websites, Intranets and Portals

Designed and led the development of INTA websites, micro sites and intranets, providing association members and staff with access to key information. Application Development, E-Commerce and System Integration (Full Stack)

Integrated SalesForce with Aptify AMS and custom developed marketing automation systems, enabling Membership Engagement to increase recruitment and retention.

Designed and led the development of the INTA E-Commerce system (PHP based) which includes an Annual Meeting Registration system, a PAC fundraising system and a Membership Renewal system. SharePoint Enterprise Development and Administration

Designed, implemented and served as administrator for intranet, document management, collaboration and public facing websites using SharePoint Enterprise. Designed and implemented custom site branding using SharePoint Designer.

Steven Merzon

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FREELANCE PROJECT MANAGER

FIRST CAPITAL EQUITIES 2005 – 2006

Provided project management and business intelligence reporting services for mission critical projects. Examined and streamlined key business processes. Designed and implemented training courses for end users. Created formal documentation for high profile business systems. Advised Vice President on all corporate technology matters.

SENIOR DIRECTOR, INFORMATION SYSTEMS

ST. PAUL REINSURANCE 1999 – 2005

CIO function reporting directly to the CEO.

Established and managed the execution of strategic and operational technology plans and directions of the organization, providing the company with a highly efficient Information Technology department. Examined and streamlined key business processes, increasing the effectiveness of the organization.

Responsible for all mission critical business systems, including Financial (Oracle Financials, accounts receivable and payable, budgeting, reserve processing), Content Management (imaging and workflow), Claims Processing, CRM, Underwriting, Data Warehouse / Reporting.

Led the management of the St Paul Re Project Management Office (PMO).

Reorganized the IT Department to run efficiently with a smaller budget and reduced headcount. Reduced department expenses by 50% over three years.

Successfully led the initiative to relocate a 2600 square foot data center and related infrastructure to the company’s new location.

Maintained contact with a variety of technical, sales and support representatives. Negotiated cost- saving contracts with external vendors.

APPLICATIONS MANAGER AND DEVELOPER

MATTHEW BENDER AND COMPANY 1986 –1999

Responsible for the successful completion of programming projects used by Matthew Bender's Editorial, Editorial Operations, Manufacturing and Digital Publishing Departments in three locations

(NY, San Francisco, Albany).

Responsible for overseeing and participating in the complete project life cycle, from initial specification gathering, through impact and cost analysis, application development, basic quality control and roll out.

Designed, implemented and rolled out the Matthew Bender Content Management Repository using Powerbuilder, Documentum and Sybase. This mission critical project was the centralized tool used by Editorial, Operations and Digital Publishing to ensure total quality control and version management for key components of the Matthew Bender Forms products. Steven Merzon

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Technical Skills and Core Competencies

E-Commerce (multi-currency)

Business Intelligence

Websites and Portals

Application Development & Architecture

Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) –

Agile SCRUM / Waterfall

Enterprise Content and Document Management

Departmental Leadership, Team Mentoring /

Coaching

Strategic & Tactical Planning

Budgeting & Forecasting

Expense Reduction

Regulatory Compliance (SOX)

Database Design

Project Management (PMO)

Process Analysis & Improvement

Digital Publishing

Vendor Management & Negotiation

Technical Writing, Documentation & Training

IT Metrics Reporting

Enterprise CMS / SharePoint / Drupal

Object Oriented Programming

PHP (MVC Frameworks)

.Net, C#, VB, Vbscript

JQuery / Javascript / Angular JS

HTML / HTML5 / CSS / AJAX

Python

Twitter Bootstrap

SQL

SQLServer

Oracle

Sybase

MySQL

Business Objects / COGNOS

Adobe

SalesForce / CRM

Documentum

Dynamics Great Plains

Education and Professional Training

B.S. with honors Computer and Information Science, June 1986 Brooklyn College, Brooklyn NY

Academic Honors

Dean's list freshman, sophomore, junior and senior years.

Jack Wolfe award for outstanding achievement in

computer science.

Member of Upsilon Pi Epsilon computer science honor society.

Honors internship in computer science

Professional Training

AMA IT Department Management

AMA Responding To Conflict

AMA Critical Thinking

AMA IT Cost Management

Project Management Methodology

Situational Leadership II

Times Mirror Leadership Institute

PMI Project Management Series

Agile Software Development Practices

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