Daniel Polanski

**** ********* *****, ******, ** 60502

630-***-**** acvz4u@r.postjobfree.com

Core Competencies

Project/Program Management Extensive Business/Client Interaction Effective Communication Skills

Business Systems Analysis Project Life Cycle Methodology Requirements Gathering

Management/Administration System Development Life Cycle (SDLC) Portfolio Management

Process Dev & Improvement Issue & Risk Management Relationship Management

Contract / Vendor Management Quality Assurance Reporting/Status Skills

Global/Multi-location Initiatives Customer Service Driven Listening Skills

Mentoring/Coaching MS Project / SharePoint Change & Risk Management

Mergers & Acquisitions IT Governance PMO’s

Profile

An experienced Information Systems Project Manager. An effective leader, manager, project organizer, communicator and team builder with extensive experience completing complex, process improvement and technology development projects. Has a working knowledge of business processes, policies, resources, interrelationships, strategies and how they impact the business.

Background includes: working in matrix management environments, leading projects from concept through implementation, experienced working with financial (GL, AP, AR, FA, Forecasting, etc.), sales, marketing, budgeting, order processing, billing, manufacturing, freight/distribution, imaging, human resources applications, knowledge of hardware and software technologies, experienced working with SLA’s (Service Level Agreements) and SOW’s (Statements of Work), a "hands-on” approach for both business and technical requirements/implementations, worked on mergers and acquisitions, teamed with IT and the business to reengineer business processes, experienced working in multi-business, multi-location organizations, global organizations, effective problem solver and has implemented software packages. Worked with external vendors and resources.

Works closely/effectively with business users (all levels) to correctly define/implement requirements into IT solutions. Customer service oriented. Full life-cycle project management expertise. Thrives in both independent and collaborative work environments. Thorough in documentation and consistent with the reporting of Project Status, Change Control, Release Management, Process Improvement and User Relationships. Excellent team player with solid communication skills.

Professional Experience

Sr. Project Manager

PLS Financial – Chicago, IL

06/2015 – 03/2016

PM for project to implement Smart Credit Card Terminals (approx. 2000) in all the PLS Stores (300). Activities included working with the Business Leads, Application team and Technical team to perform: requirements gathering from the business, analysis, application design, system development (identifying & plan changes), testing, implementation and maintenance. Used current state vs. future depictions to successfully relate to all affected by this initiative.

PM for an initiative to centralize the distributed store business applications/servers to a centralized environment. Partnered with the Development team to determine approach, current state vs. future state, application migration schedule, application modifications, testing requirements (levels of testing), development and execution.

Both of the initiatives above included required PM activities: developing/maintaining Project Plans with the respective teams, Governance – with PMO Standards and Procedures, Risk identification and mitigation with the team, maintaining Action Item and Issue Logs, Project Reporting, Teamwork, Communications, acting as the single point of contact, along with the other PM Activities/Phases/Tasks.

Worked with vendors to ensure deliverables are ready as scheduled.

Conducts project meetings, always with an Agenda, and issues minutes so as to ensure project tracking.

Communicates with Stakeholders/Management to ensure accurate project status reporting.

Provides Governance as to procedures, processes and deliverables.

Manage all “Change” activities.

Sr. Project Manager (Contractor)

AbbVie - Vernon Hills

01/2015 – 05/2015

Company Separation - Extensive interaction with business to determine applications requirements/dispositions. Worked with development teams: to perform fact finding (current applications/reports/etc.), identified activities & estimates, determined approach (How) for each location, executed, monitored and reported project status.

Worked on separation projects (HW & Apps.) in support of final separation activities from Abbott. Included Data Center moves.

Worked with vendors, client and development/technical staff to support the separation initiatives/projects. Accomplished via daily communications with all teams to ensure timely delivery of milestones.

Client Data Center Sites were national as well as off shore (JAPAC).

Service Delivery Manager/ Sr. Project Manager

IBM - Chicago, Illinois

1/2010 – 11/2014

Work with business, vendors and technical team resources to manage/lead Projects.

Supported respective organization financial/invoicing/sales/HR application initiatives.

Managed the creation of Executive and Technology scorecards in order that Key Performance Indicators and budget/financial information could be tracked and status reported the organization.

Responsible for reporting and monitoring of SLA’s.

Projects led included: Physical relocation of Data Center, Mergers & Consolidations, Mainframe Decommission – retirement of the VM T26 Mainframe, Continuous Improvement and Applications implementation / support.

HR - Worked with HR: to define onboarding requirements for new employees, developed training plan & tracking of course completions, aided with creation of HR support calendars, provided support/training for employees to utilize in-house HR tools.

DASD Consolidation – the objective of this Program was to save 1 terabyte of DASD from the MVS and VM LPARS. This effort achieved a DASD savings of 1.2 terabytes resulting in a savings of approximately $70,000. To accomplish the objective required a through inventory of applications, files, reports, user interviews, etc., to ensure a complete analysis of the I.T. environment. Metric reporting was critical to monitor progress and with reporting to senior management.

Worked on the development of PMO project processes/procedures/SDLC/etc. in support of a new Global Distribution Center in Dubuque. A primary objective was to develop repeatable processes for projects.

Supported Acquisition activities for acquired organizations. Included determining best of breed of applications, immediately planning for getting the new organization on the Chart of Accounts and application feeds, reporting, training, etc.

Project Manager /Program Manager - PMO

Classified Ventures, Chicago Illinois

8/2007 – 11/2009

Work with internal, business, vendor and technical team resources to define, create SLA’s and SOW’s, estimate, prioritize and schedule project activities in support of Sales and Financial systems.

Accountable for continual tracking and analysis of project performance through oral and/or written reports.

Team member who revised the SDLC methodology used in-house, and for use by contractors.

Acted as Program Manager for Security and Financial programs. Worked with external contractors to implement

G/L and Budgeting applications.

Assures the creation, existence, quality and accuracy of project related documentation for the PMO.

While performing formal project management activities, the PM role also requires providing leadership,

flexibility, prioritization, encourage initiative, challenge team members, communication and analytic skills in addition to providing guidance and mentoring to the project team.

Project Manager - PMO

DeVry Inc., Oakbrook Terrace, Il

6/2005 – 8/2007

Managed all initiatives for adding new school locations. This averaged 4 – 10 new locations yearly.

Worked with business managers to manage organization wide projects. Assumed responsibility ensuring expectations to scope, schedule and budget processes.

Teamed with business and IT stakeholders to document business critical processes, managing the IT project life cycle which included requirements, design, development, training, deployment, testing, maintenance and documentation.

Member of PMO team which supported PMO initiatives such as Portfolio Management and SDLC Improvements.

Responsible for managing all Project items which included Issues, Risks and Status Reporting.

Accountable for the design, build, test, deployment and ongoing maintenance of applications to support the business.

Responsible for requirements gathering and to-be process definition. Act as a liaison between the business community and the Information Services department to support the business processes.

Responsible for analyzing the business needs of our clients and stakeholders to help identify business problems and propose solutions.

Understand business problems and opportunities in the context of the requirements and recommends solutions that enable the organization to achieve its goals.

Governance for ensuring the success of all projects that involve IT according to methodologies.

Investigate the requests and communicate with the functional area(s) to determine the exact scope of the project and the extent of each area’s involvement.

Sr. Project Manager (Contractor)

Hospira, Lake Forest, Il

9/2003 – 7/2005

Responsibilities include defining, planning, organizing and managing multiple software developmental initiatives/requirements supporting merger/split efforts for the business. Prioritize project workload and provide day-to-day direction to development resources.

Develop customer relationships by facilitating communication, managing expectations and negotiating timelines to meet project deliverable due dates.

Gathered and documented applications functionality, application synergies, processes and best practices.

Worked as member of Team to develop new processes for the business as well as IT.

Supported implementation of an ERP solution (SAP) while ensuring the current business applications continue to effectively support the business.

Responsible for the Testing of Non-SAP applications for the Commercial Businesses (Domestic & International). Helped develop an IT Support Model for International Service Support Center.

Sr. Project Manager

SAIC, Naperville, Il

8/2001 – 7/2003

Project Manager for Business/IT requests and studies. Specific duties involved working closely with respective functional area user management to identify/define requirements, justification and tracking through implementation.

Member of Team which established a Project Management Office (PMO), at the Naperville SAIC location. The initial thrust was to define “Common” processes, aid/support with project planning, establish standard Procedures (ex. PLC) etc. to attain CMM level 2.

Leader for the Transition of a “Worldwide Incident Reporting” application. Objective was to transition support/new development from an external consulting organization to SAIC. Worked with Sr. Business Managers (Worldwide) to ensure all enhancements, requirements and problems were documented, defined and prioritized, tracked and completed per schedule.

BP – Program One. Manager of the Core Financial legacy applications as part of the overall BP Program One Project to merge the applications of BP, Amoco, and ARCO under one common footprint. Scope planning with application teams to develop work scopes and level of efforts, budget tracking and implemented MS Project to meet Program One schedule.

Project Manager

UNICOM Energy INC, Westchester, Il

6/2000 – 7/2001

Responsible for development, implementation, maintenance and coordination of all system-related projects. Included creating, tracking and maintaining schedules to ensure all milestones are met. Performing risk analysis, contingency planning, training users, ensuring that appropriate documentation exists and managing customer relationships.

Act as the liaison between user groups, technical programmers and Data Center operations to insure coordination and delivery of the specific requirement/project.

Managed the efforts/direction of all of IT: Vendors, Consultants, Developers, Help Desk and Data Center.

A key objective was to add structure to the IT organization. Insure development of project plans, deliverables, status reporting, establishing of priorities, follow-up and staff development/cross training.

Project Manager

Comdisco, Rosemont Il.

6/1998 – 6/2000

Implemented a web-based Travel & Expense reporting package for the entire enterprise.

Member of Team, which implemented Oracle Financials. Responsible for all Reporting (Information Delivery). Worked very closely with users to identify/define requirements. Teamed with business partners to document existing business processes (G/L, AP, and AR) and revise as required to facilitate implementation of Oracle Financials. Part of effort was dedicated to developing reconciliation processes to allow for new Chart of Accounts.

Member of Team that established a Project Management Office. Purpose of PMO is to insure project success from initialization (Charters), monitoring via dates/milestones and completion. Capture a project's synergies across businesses. Insure that standards are followed, documentation and training materials are created, risk/contingency issues are addressed and appropriate quality assurance is attained. Efforts were also dedicated to attaining CMM level 1 & 2 certification, focusing on repeatable processes, reusable plans, etc.

Senior Project Manager

EDS, Lombard, Il.

10/1998 – 6/1998

Proposals - Worked on various teams to develop proposals for potential EDS clients. Efforts included: defining future staffing requirements, identifying short/long term I/T projects, documented current/proposed I/T environment, developed skills inventory of current staffs, helped develop Service Level Agreements (SLA’s) and Statements of Work (SOW’s).

Chicago Parking Ticket - Manager for the I/T Development/Support and Operations Departments. Staff included 12 I/T Developers and 4 Operators. Applications included mainframe and client/server systems.

Banking – Project Manager for team that provided support for reengineering of customer statements. Other efforts included requirements gathering, definition and working closely with both clients and developers to support existing and new requirements.

IT Manager / Sr. Project Manager

Lipton (Formerly Van Den Bergh Foods), Lisle, Il.

10/1989 – 10/1998

Responsible for the development and support of all Marketing, Financial, HR, Freight/Distribution, Order Entry, Budgeting, Reporting and Sales systems, while ensuring development and implementation is in compliance with company development methodologies, security policies, best practices. Represented IT on the Steering and Long Range Planning Committees.

SAP – Member of Team to identify business requirements/processes to implement SAP Order Administration and Financial modules. Required the development of processes (interfaces) to keep the legacy billing/sales/financial/inventory applications running. Worked on developing/implement ting a new chart of accounts and processes for SAP financial implementation.

Accountable for all system development activities, including project planning, system analysis, requirements gathering, design and development. Projects were of both short and long (Enterprise wide) duration with various levels of complexity.

Designed, developed and implemented a consolidated Reporting system, eliminating the use and processing of three legacy systems. Reduced paper usage by 90% and delivered more timely and accurate information to the respective field sales users 3 weeks earlier.

Managed business consolidations – to support mergers and consolidations (financial, sales, and other applications/hardware).

Worked with team of senior managers reengineering the business planning process.

Successfully directed annual disaster recovery test of all system applications. Worked closely with the Business to identify and ensure all mission critical applications tested successfully. IT Security Officer for the Company.

Technical Skills Summary

SharePoint, Oracle, DB2, IDMS, Cobol, PowerBuilder, Visual Basic, CICS, MVS, JCL, TSO/ISPF, Windows, Project Life Cycle Methodologies, MS Project, Project Workbench, WEB, VSAM, Visio, RPG, Security (ACF2), EDI, Desktop Tools, UNIX, JAVA, WEB, Lotus Notes, Microsoft Suite of Tools (Word, PowerPoint, Excel). Mainframe, Mid-Range and Client-Server Platforms. Portfolio Tools: 3 Olives and MS Project 2007

Academic Background

EDUCATION: 6/82, Bachelor of Science, Management – Summa Cum Laude, Meyers College, Cleveland, Ohio

CSP – Certified Systems Professional Designation

Contact this candidate