Catharine Riley

IT Executive

Streamwood, IL 847-***-**** ad0tfa@r.postjobfree.com www.linkedin.com/in/catharine-riley/

EXECUTIVE PROFILE

IT professional with a proven track record of leading and integrating infrastructure, applications, operations, engineering, architecture, and enterprise portfolios and programs. Exceptional leadership skills in team development and business process transformations that drive growth, efficiency, and shareholder value. Strong track record of moving new business concepts and strategies into effective operational systems, driven by teamwork, technology, automation, and process optimization.

Areas of Expertise

Compassionate Human Leader: keep teams motivated and focused through changes and challenging times.

Cross-Functional Team Lead: strategy, implementation, troubleshooting, continuous improvement, and change.

Technical Delivery: proven success of the development, leadership, quality, and timely delivery of projects

Technologies: Microsoft, Citrix, Cisco, VMWare, end point management solutions, Cloud, audio/visual, Active Directory/GPO, Performance Management tools.

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS

Consistently delivered new technology, software, and infrastructure capabilities on time and within budget to support business and operational strategy.

Effectively collaborated with internal business units to translate business needs into technical solutions.

Managed and maintained vendor relationships including contract negotiations, initiating formal vendor requests, SLA accountability, and contract renewals.

Led engineering staff of diverse backgrounds and experience levels through informal and formal training. Feedback mechanisms included regular performance reviews and career development.

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

USCELLULAR, Chicago IL 6/2017 – 6/2023

Provides a comprehensive range of wireless products and services and a high-quality network to customers with 4.8 million retail connections and over 4,000 employees.

Senior Manager – Network Performance Management Engineering (1/2019 – 6/2023)

Managed wireless network performance management infrastructure, cloud services, and managed service agreements with multiple performance tool vendors aligning with industry trends.

Provided direction to a team of 75+ data and network engineers, product managers, application developers, contractors, and vendors responsible for defining, implementing, and supporting infrastructure and data ingestion and aggregation for reporting on wireless network performance metrics and KPIs which reduced new network KPI implementation by 50%.

Implemented new processes for distributed hardware implementation exceeding project timelines and increasing visibility of the network.

Senior Manager – Infrastructure Systems (6/2017 – 1/2019)

Accountable for strategy, planning, design, project execution, and overall health of the IT infrastructure systems.

Led automation, virtualization, storage, and Unix/Linux and Windows platform engineering and operations teams responsible for defining, implementing, and supporting IS infrastructure strategy.

Implemented a $11M hardware refresh for the billing system which improved performance and operational stability.

Created and staffed automation team with focus on standardization and governance across IS teams.

UNITED AIRLINES, Chicago IL 1/2001 – 1/2017

A major American airline operating a large domestic and international route network with over 90,000 employees.

Director – IT - End User Services Engineering (2015 – 2017)

Built and led top-performing engineering teams responsible for defining enterprise engineering strategy, standards, user support, integrating systems across merged companies, and understanding the environment end-to-end to continual improvement to the user experience.

Responsible for a budget of over $25M which included infrastructure and managed service agreements with multiple vendors aligning with industry trends.

Proven leadership in defining scope and implementation plans for large enterprise infrastructure programs including automating processes, management tools, and standardizing hardware for over 100K devices: workstations, servers, mobile devices, and network switches across more than 500 locations worldwide.

Implemented workstation, mobile device, and software license management tools to improve stability and security, reduce support costs, and reduce hardware and software maintenance costs.

Designed long term procurement strategies with suppliers to secure on-demand end use device delivery.

Director - IT– Platform Automation and Engineering (2014 – 2015)

Managed Implementation, Automation, and Continuous Improvement for Call Center, Infrastructure, and Virtual Platforms.

Automated on demand virtual machines and storage requests resulting in a $6M savings.

Inherited a troubled $15M Cisco call center integration project and completed implementation within budget and ahead of expectations.

Implemented Enterprise Citrix environment and migrated all virtual machines, improving operational stability by reducing priority support incidents from many per month to almost zero.

Senior Manager – IT – Engineering Portfolio Management (2013 – 2014)

Led automation, virtualization, integration, and standardization of processes, domains, technologies, and management tools across the enterprise providing a seamless environment for all applications and infrastructure projects.

Added over 30K application and infrastructure monitors and automated recovery processes on the top applications which reduced MTTR from days and hours to minutes.

Implemented HP Service Management tools, creating a single pane of glass for operations support center.

Manager – IT – End User Engineering (2008-2012)

Insourced IT services and created strategy, roadmap, and solution for upgrade and management of end user environment.

Hired over 25 engineering resources in less than a month and transitioned engineering activities from vendor to new team.

Implementation of enterprise active directory and HP (Hewlett Packer) server and client automation tools creating an automated process for OS upgrades and applications distributions. Reduced the time to upgrade over 35K devices worldwide to Windows 7 and completed over 150K application end point distributions in 25% of the time with automation vs manual processes.

Manager – Architecture and Vendor Management (2007 – 2008)

Managed SLAs for architecture, engineering, deployment, and support of end user environment.

Partnered with users on requirements, managed vendor activities, SLAs, and a gaps budget for requirements missed in the contract. Kept the project on schedule and users productive.

Completed workstation upgrade from Windows NT to Windows XP for over 35K devices worldwide.

Enterprise Architect (2004 – 2006) & Senior Enterprise Architect (2006 – 2007)

Delivered end user engineering architecture standards, strategy, and outsourced end user engineering and managed third party vendors.

Created architecture strategy, participated in creating statement of work (SOW) and contract for technology, financials, and resources for business outsource initiative, oversaw proof of concept with vendors, and participated in vendor selection process.

Led and coordinated multiple rounds of vendor due diligence including domestic and international joint discovery and design meetings and engineering and support transition to vendor.

Senior Technical Project Manager (2001 – 2004)

Hired to lead migration from Novell 3 (IPX) to Novell 4 (IP) and workstation upgrade from Windows 3.1 to NT.

Led enterprise Novell Directory Services implementation and workstation OS and Novell management tools upgrade for servers and workstations worldwide.

Led troubleshooting and Novell client fixes of scaling Novell IP client with Novell utilizing Sniffer network traces to keep upgrade project on schedule.

SPX CORPORATION, Portage, MI 1/1999 – 1/2001

A supplier of highly engineered products and technologies, holding leadership positions in the HVAC and detection and measurement markets.

Manager – Technical Services

Drove vision and strategy for development and deployment of new technologies across the enterprise, providing measurable operational efficiency and cost benefits.

Responsible for architecting, engineering, implementing, managing, and supporting Microsoft, Novell, and Unix server and storage environments, workstations, AS/400, phone systems, network, and firewalls

Led the standardization, upgrade, and migration of desktop environment and e-mail systems

Designed and implemented a Citrix solution in the DMZ to support remote user access to Novell, ERP, and mainframe systems.

SECANT TECHNOLOGIES, KALAMAZOO, MI 12/1993 – 1/1999

A Leader in IT Services and IT Consulting.

Systems Integrator and Sales Consultant

Managed solutions, sales, and delivery of IT services to Michigan-based clients.

Technology Consultant (1997-1999)

oDedicated on-site at SPX Corporation; architected, engineered, and implemented full server and workstation hardware and OS refresh for 5k+ devices

Outside Sales Associate (1996-1997)

oTop sales numbers for 6 consecutive months; planned, proposed, sold, and managed the implementation of Novell and Microsoft infrastructure and network solutions to multiple schools and business clients

Inside Sales Associate (1993-1996)

oLed sales and provided advanced hardware and software troubleshooting, repair, and upgrades

EDUCATION, PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT, AND LEADERSHIP

Master of Business Administration, KELLER GRADUATE SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT, Schaumburg, IL

Bachelor of Science, Computer Science, WESTERN MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY, Kalamazoo, MI

Project Management Professional (PMP) – PROJECT MANAGEMENT INSTITUTE

Information Technology Information Library v3 (ITIL) – Fundamentals, Service Delivery, Service Support

Information Technology Information Library v4 (ITIL) – Introduction to Service Management with ITIL 4

Certified SAFe 4 Agilist (SA) – Safe Agile Framework (SAFe)

Microsoft Certified – Azure Fundamentals

Scrum Master Certified (SMC)

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