Charles Fordham

aczvv3@r.postjobfree.com

804-***-****

SUMMARY

Experienced IT Professional specializing in Quality Assurance software management and testing, Enterprise wide process improvements, and testing methodologies and team leadership. Proven track record in the efficient testing of client server and web applications throughout the entire software development life cycle. Strong communication and interpersonal skills and reputation as a committed team player with a talent for developing positive relationships with customers, vendors and other departments. Embraces change and opportunities to develop and exercise leadership ability.

Core Competencies

Creating Test plans, strategies and approaches

Test team management and leadership

Microsoft SQL Server Enterprise Manager and Query Analyzer

Quick Test Professional

Microsoft Office Suite & Microsoft Project

Rational Unified Process Fundamentals

Introduction to Object Oriented Design

Software Testing Workshop for Medical supply Chain Applications – Rice Consulting Services

Metrics for Managing and Improving software Testing – QAI Global Institute

Quality Center 9.2 Project Planning and Customization – HP software education services

EXPERIENCE

Cognizant Technical Solutions

QA Manager

August 2013 – Present

Cognizant is a leading provider of information technology, consulting, and business process outsourcing services, dedicated to helping the world's leading companies build stronger businesses. Essential job functions include the following:

Create and review test plans, staffing plans, estimates and resource allocation to ensure project success in terms of both quality and budget

Integrates QA activities and mind-set throughout the software development lifecycle and

Setting QA vision and growing existing QA capabilities to encompass best practices

Working with senior management team and cross-functional project teams to ensure implementation of the overall QA strategy

Developing internal and external training plans for the QA team

Create and maintain comprehensive testing metrics and reporting to reflect progress against the overall strategy as well as the success of individual projects

Helping to coach a team of agile testers, developers and business users toward collaborative, cohesive testing that result in measurable quality improvements across projects.

Reviewing test plans, staffing, estimates and resource allocation to ensure project success in terms of both quality and budget

Develops and maintains excellent working relationships with development, project management, and business analysts in order to foster quality environments within all teams

Conducts postmortems and lessons learned meetings with the goal being to identify and practice processes that work well and to amend processes that need improvement – continuous process improvement.

Xerox, Inc.

June 2012 – August 2013

QA Manager

Xerox Corporation is a $22 billion leading global enterprise for business process and document management. Through its broad portfolio of technology and services, Xerox provides the essential back-office support that clears the way for clients to focus on what they do best: their real business. As QA manager, I was responsible for the QA support of the prescription delivery team (RxD). Some of the roles of this team include providing prescription management and Medicaid claims processing for state governments. My team supports more than 14 applications across more than 10 states. Specific duties include:

oManages the operation of the organization's total quality management (TQM) program.

oOversees the development of systematic approaches for assuring high quality services that meet customer needs.

oCoordinates program communications to employees.

oDevelops training and related reward systems.

oDevelops, implements, and leads key process improvement efforts and influences cross-functional efforts.

oDevelops systematic approaches for assuring high quality services.

oIdentifies the interface of key activities within and between the functions of the organization.

Key initiatives include creating and documenting a Quality assurance approach, a defect management approach and a regression testing approach.

Virginia Retirement System

June 2011 – May 2012

QA Manager

The VRS is in underway with a major Modernization project. The purpose of this project is to move all business functions from an older Mainframe system to an updated .net system. The development work was performed by a 3rd party vendor. As the QA manager for the VRS; I am responsible for leadership and oversight of UAT testing. At a high level, my job is to define and champion initiatives that support the ongoing quality improvement of all elements of the agency’s business solutions. Specific duties include the following:

oOversight of testing performed by vendors (includes unit, systems, regression and performance testing)

create testing methodologies and standards, and ensure compliance

identify appropriate places for automated scripts

Evaluate quality and appropriateness of testing performed by vendors to give recommendation that vendor testing was complete and accurate and software is ready to move to UAT

oPlan and manage the execution of User Acceptance Test

Ensure user acceptance testing of developed systems and processes is completed in accordance with contractual agreements/requirements, industry standards, and under the guidelines of the Modernization Program test methodology

Train team members and ‘guest testers’ from the operational areas in the methodologies and standards

Manage and help create test coverage matrix and test cases/plans

Research, implement and educate on best practices for software life cycle management with focus on quality assurance

Coordinate with other VRS entities (business owners, solution architects, development lead, etc.) in order to successfully prepare for the test

Create test acceptance criteria for the Modernization Program

Manage test environment including test data

Coordinate and promote the use of the automated test tools to enable repeatable, high-quality testing

Develop the testing task plan and staffing plan for User Acceptance Test

Coordinate and provide senior level testing guidance to analysts, developers, business users and project managers

oWork with vendor to classify and prioritize defects

Provide overall defect resolution management across the project

Created and implemented a defect resolution management process

oEnsure compliance of testing methodologies and standards

Establish quality metrics for software development, and report out on them

Found ways to improve and promote quality

Generates suggestions for improving work

Develops innovative approaches and ideas

Owens & Minor (Dell Services), Richmond, Virginia

August 2006-June 2011

QA Team Lead/ Release Coordinator/Defects Manager

While serving as a QA Team Lead, I was responsible for not only ensuring enterprise wide quality software and software development processes, but also coordinating the software releases for the QA group; consisting of home office, offsite and offshore teammates. While operating in this capacity, some of my major accomplishments include analyzing and streamlining the defects resolution management process, conducting effective WAR-ROOM sessions to flush out and resolve difficult issues and working directly with the customer to identify opportunities to strengthen the teams testing efforts. Responsibilities include the following:

Team Leader/Release Coordinator

oVerification of requirements documentation

Working with development and other teams to get good requirements

Working with development and other teams to get requirements in a timely fashion

oWorking with the environment team to ensure a stable and loaded test environment

Lead shake out testing of the environment for each release.

oAdministration of Quality Center testing tool

Conduct Quality Center training sessions across the enterprise

oCreate test plans

oCreate and implement test strategies for enterprise wide software releases, as well as large scale projects (ex: Mainframe Migration project that saved the company 6 million/year)

oCreate test cases and scripts

oMaking testing assignments (on and off-shore)

Coordinating with offshore resources on test schedules, progress and reporting

oCreate and present reports to senior management

Metrics definition and reporting.

Test planned vs. test executed

Open issues

Missed milestones

Requirements quality

Test forecasting

oConduct shut down and lessons learned meetings at the end of software releases

Use learned lessons towards future releases

oCoordinate which functionalities are good candidates for automation

oCoordinate various regression test phases; i.e. full regression, smoke test or shake out

oSupport UAT testing efforts

oConduct regular status meetings (on and offshore)

oFacilitate release kick-off meetings

oDocument enterprise best practices for agile/iterative development type projects

oInterviewing and mentoring/training new team members.

Defects manager

oFacilitate daily defects review meetings

oEnsure high quality defects creation by establishing and enforcing guidelines

oManaging the defect resolution process.

oEnsuring that key persons are involved in the defect resolution process

oFacilitating war room sessions for defects that cross multiple groups

oPromote root cause analysis among all teams

oTrack defects status and ensure timely defect resolution

oManage and report metrics

Defect discovery rate

Invalid defect rate

Defect aging

Defect status

Other duties/accomplishments include creating checkpoints that ensure the quality of my team’s work which in turn promotes a quality software product. These checkpoints include the creation and monitoring of metrics that allow upper management to assess testing progress as it relates to software development as a whole. I have successfully managed the testing of multi-million dollar projects.

EDUCATION

M.S. Mathematics with interdisciplinary study in Management Systems Engineering

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech), Blacksburg, VA

B.S. Mathematics / Computer Science

Virginia Union University, Richmond, VA

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