MANAGER – Portfolio.Program.Project.Agile.SDLC

Pat career is focused on leading IT solutions for the business. Pat has a proven track record in private industry (Insurance - health and life; health care; technology; Big 4, and international consulting organizations including management of offshore and distributed resources in the US, Canada, Europe, the Caribbean, Mexico, Australia, India, South America, and Asia Pacific with budget responsibility exceeding $100K (project), $50M (program / engagement) and $100M (portfolio).

Experience includes defining and implementing strategies to enhance the enterprise and enable excellence through planning, risk management, software, process engineering, automation, compliance, quality assurance, and continuity. Pat is able to build and sustain effective relationships, develop innovative enterprise risk management strategies, and implement state of the art solutions. Key achievements include:

Lead multi-dimensional programs and projects including ERP solutions, integrated end-to-end management of solutions with responsibilities for complex solutions across multiple business functions including technology, compliance, users, and vendors with geographically dispersed teams of 5-200+ professionals.

Vendor Management - including vendor contracts - terms and conditions, Statement of Work (SOW), and other contractual documents.

Apply different approaches including traditional waterfall / Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC), Agile – Scrum, Agile – Kanban, and Agile – Kanban.

Lead projects focused on software development – custom, implementation of packaged software solutions with modifications as required to meet the business needs for the solution.

HIPAA compliance for clients including identify proposed approach to respond to findings and recommendations including projected completion date and resources required from the business and technology.

Direct work efforts of resources who are functionally aligned as well as across multiple business and functional areas of the organization.

Reviews focused on NIST 800-33, SOX compliance, and Privacy.

Perform leadership roles including Agile Project Manager and Scrum Master working with Scaled Agile 4.0, JIRA - Web, Rally, Version One, Asana, Microsoft Project - Portfolio, Smartsheet, and .NET.

Responsible for all aspects of assigned technical and compliance projects focused on development of new or upgraded products and services, internal information system specific projects that may include development or enhancement of internal applications, technology integration and / or infrastructure environment build-out, delivery of service teams for outsourced solutions to external clients or delivery of new or enhanced products and / or services to improve customer satisfaction through the use of technology.

Collaborate with Product Owner, Development Team, and other Product Owners managing shared resources. This collaboration was facilitated by using Smartsheet.

Represent various functional areas acting as a senior project stakeholder when required.

Act as the Program Manager and represent other functional areas.

Facilitate response planning sessions including defining the scope and objectives for each session, timing of specific exercises that may be part of the session and addressing all areas of the planning effort including definition of deliverables, meetings, status reports, training team members and executives, interacting with critical vendors and other agencies, to include pre-event planning on thru return-to-work planning activities.

Develop policy and procedures in conjunction with corporate policy management teams. This includes rollout of the policies and procedures with training for critical groups included in the rollout.

Include dashboards, data analytics, reporting, and graphics in status reports, documentation, and client presentations.

Determine metrics to measure planning success and for use during retrospectives following testing and actual activation of the continuity plans.

Develop the project management framework including deliverables and templates, schedule, resources - people, equipment, facilities, etc, and external resource requirements.

Identify, track, and assist in the removal of impediments.

Report status to the Board of Directors, Audit Committees, External Audit, and Federal & State government regulators.

Request funding based on solid set of goals and objectives, risks and rewards, and considering the organizations strategic objectives.

Protects the Scrum Team from distractions both internal and external.

Ensure required meetings that place including scheduling project meetings, producing meeting agendas, briefing materials, and meeting notes.

Manage the client relationship setting appropriate expectations.

Project and manage risk.

Communicate relevant information and project status.

Track action items and records management.

Work with peers and others to define, develop project-related processes leading to improvements and standardization.

Support cross-departmental and cross-divisional activities related to projects

Recognize and escalate issues with the potential of requiring senior management awareness, input, and support.

Serve as the single point of contact between senior leadership, department heads, and technical resources to operationalize cloud offerings, handle inquiries, develop and lead action plans, and assist with the preparation and dissemination of communications.

Perform various support activities to enhance the cloud service practice including generation of action item lists, tracking action items to completion, maintaining program collateral in centralized location, planning and coordinating leadership communication, and completing data analytics by analyzing and synthesizing data to share with executives.

Collaborate with other teams, internal and external to the organization, to ensure practice objectives other teams are responsible for are being accounted for and completed within expected timeframes.

Provide Program Management of strategic business professional services practice ensuring successful execution in alignment with senior leadership expectations.

Review, design, and execute enhancements to practice structure, operational procedures, and communication flows.

Program management of transformational projects.

Experience organizing and directing multiple teams and departments.

Plan and lead strategic initiatives.

Familiarity with emerging technologies, cloud technologies, network security, cyber security, and other technical subjects.

Establish, implement, and monitor information security and business continuity standards and policies globally.

Works closely with all technology and business leadership - domestic and global.

Responsible for building an accountable, information security-conscious culture and system security infrastructure built on high quality standards backed up by effective operational procedures, status monitoring, and reporting.

Ensure compliance re: information security policies and practice globally.

Lead Big Data Migration Project moving from legacy to Big Data Platform including identification of four distinct data sources, determination of differences in the data available from each of the sources, decisions on how to populate the “gaps” in data, and business process improvements and procedures for the migrations as well identification of new data sources.

Work with minimal direction supporting multiple initiatives across functional areas, define strategy appropriate to the situation, manage P&L, work across divisions, with remote teams and vendors, project managers, managers and executives to prioritize requirements as well as software project management, and program and portfolio management.

Implement all aspects of program / project management including project scheduling, status reporting, gate reviews, executive presentations, and application of the client’s life cycle methodologies.

Define and implement creative solutions to address organization’s requirements leading to improved budget control, on time delivery, and exceeding expectations.

Incorporate Rational Unified Processes, Agile, Scrum, Kanban, SAFe, iOS, and collaboration techniques to facilitate solution development and remove barriers that impact a team’s ability to meet goals and objectives and ensure cooperation across organizational boundaries.

Responsible for drafting and / or reviewing contract terms to ensure compliance with policies, includes statement of work focused on deliverables and other non-standard terms and conditions, maintenance of accurate contract records as well as drafting, analyzing and negotiating contract terms with clients and vendors.

Ensure teams include business and technical resources formulating product, infrastructure and compliance solutions delivering results that are consistent with the needs of the organization and that meet the planned schedule 90% of the time.

Define and implement PMO functions including identification of skills, tools & methodologies, training requirements, performance improvements, use of Earned Value Management as a control system – baseline planned state as target, measure using controls systems and status reporting, compare current state as baseline and variances, and correct any variances outside allowable limits taking corrective action.

Manage Software Solutions including content management, mobile with handheld devices and tablets including organizational change management (OCM) – eLearning solutions, corporate communications, POS, mobile devices, customer web portals, Oracle – Financial & Manufacturing and SAP – Financial & HR, and others.

Manage infrastructure solutions including high availability, server consolidations, internet data center solutions, implementation of production monitoring tools, firewall implementation, disaster recovery, security, network solutions, database upgrades, and others.

Lead deployment of solutions including Oracle - Financial and Manufacturing; SAP - HR and Financial

Provide Program Management of strategic business initiatives for the professional services practice ensuring successful execution in the alignment of senior leadership expectations.

Serve as single point of contact between department heads, senior leadership, and technical staff to operationalize the cloud offering, handle inquiries, develop and lead action plans, and assist with the preparation and dissemination of communications.

Oversee various practice programs and operations by performing an array of tasks including administrative, generating action item lists, tracking action items to completion, maintaining program collateral in centralized location (usually electronic), planning and coordinating leadership communication, and analyzing and synthesizing data to share with senior executives.

Collaborate with other teams, internal and external to the organization, to ensure practice objectives other teams are responsible for are accounted for and completed within expected timeframes.

Ensure that critical information was available to the organization on the cloud.

Experience includes 8+ years in program management of transformational projects, experience planning and leading strategic initiatives, experience with data analysis, experience organizing and directing multiple teams and business functions, and experience planning and leading strategic initiatives.

Experience leading initiatives such as emerging technologies, network security, cloud technologies and platforms, etc.

Areas of Expertise

Engagement / Portfolio / Program Management / PMO / Scrum Master / Vendor and Contracts Management

Agile / Scrum / Kanban / SAFe / Earned Value Management / Agile Coach

Change Management - Scope; Organizational; Schedule; Resources

Data Analytics

Enterprise solutions

Cloud Solutions focused on Transformations including .NET

NIST; High Trust Compliance; ISO/IEC 27001 and 27002; PCI; SOX; SOC2 Type2 Audits

Risk Management / Compliance / Life Cycle Engagements / Complex Solutions / Encryption / CCPA / GDPR

Roles - Senior IT Manager; Senior Business Analyst; Senior Scrum Master

Administrative / Microsoft Office Professional - Word, Excel, PowerPoint / Microsoft Visio / Smartsheet / JIRA / Asana / MS Project (Professional)

Industry Verticals

Aerospace; Automotive; Education (K-12, Higher Ed); Financial Services; Food & Beverage; Health Care - Billing, Hospitals, Practice Admin; Government (Local, State, Federal); Hospitality - Hotel, Casino; Insurance - Health, Liability; Legal; Manufacturing; Medicare / Medicaid; Oil and Gas; Publishing; Retail Banking; Technology – Software; Technology – Service Provider; Telecommunications (US; Europe; Australia); Transportation (Air; Rail); Utility

EDUCATION, CERTIFICATION, SKILLS, AND PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS

DEGREES -

Masters – Project Management (MPM), Keller Graduate School of Management, Atlanta, GA

BA – Math & English, Mercyhurst University, Erie, PA

CERTIFICATIONS -

Certified Scrum Master (CSM - #64128)

PMP (#40940)

Six Sigma – Green Belt

DRII, Certified Business Continuity Professional (CBCP - #13867)

Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA - # 6129044)

Certified Records Manager (CRM)

One Trust (Privacy - CCPA / GDPR) – currently completing courses to take the exam

PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS -

PMI

PMI – Mentor

PMI – Scholarship Recipient

ISACA

Women in Agile

SCRUM Users Group

Dev Ops Users Group

Association of Contingency Planners (ACP) – Board of Directors

Southeast Continuity Planners Association (SCPA) – Board of Directors

SCPA - FEMA Liaison

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE -

Blue Cat Enterprises, January 2023 – Current

Role(s): Senior Scrum Master; Senior Project Manager; Senior Analyst

Lead for projects focused on software development following traditional software development life cycle as well as Agile – Scrum, Kanban, and / or Kanban, customization of packaged software solutions, compliance with federal, state, and local regulations, change initiatives moving from traditional SDLC to Agile Scrum / Kanban and product development projects incorporating the use of JIRA as the repository for User Stories, the Product Backlog, and the Sprint backlog.

Representative engagements include:

-Lead for transition from traditional SDLC (Software Development Life Cycle) to Agile – Scrum.

-Lead responsible for identifying opportunities to enhance enterprise systems thru integration of data and key metrics.

-Lead for knowledge transfer to the technology and business teams regarding the use of JIRA including user stories, product and sprint backlogs, JIRA Boards.

-Ensure the product backlog in JIRA included user stories with projected completion date no later than mid-November 2023.

-Lead evaluations of tools for project team collaboration across functional areas and with external resources. Tools included in the evaluations – MS Project (Portfolio), Smartsheet, Asana, and JIRA – Web.

-Ensure privacy compliance is integrated into all new automation and updates to current production automation based on the Privacy Act of 1974 (Most Current Edition)

-Address Data and Information Governance while working with leads from various business units to ensure that privacy is addressed in automated tools and associated processes and procedures.

-Participate in daily meetings as needed for addressing issues and to ensure both the business and technical teams are aligned regarding milestones, schedule, and any issues to be addressed.

-Partner with the client to determine pilot project(s) where the project or phase 1 of the project had a projected completion date of EOY 2023.

-Lead representing the PMO to provide support for both the technical and business teams as needed.

-Participate and lead initiatives to enhance the team’s knowledge and use of Agile, JIRA, MS Project, and other tools and techniques.

-Enhance knowledge of current tools and techniques related to hybrid approaches to the development life cycle.

-Partner with business users to identify milestones and critical resources.

-Provide list of milestones; project schedule with tasks, resources, dependencies, durations; deliverable descriptions.

Elevance Health, Atlanta, GA, August 2022 – January 2023

Role(s): Senior Scrum Master; Senior Project Manager; Senior Program Manager; Product Manager; Senior Analyst

Lead transformation, privacy, and the compliance efforts for the technology group focused on change initiatives for technology and methodology. The predominant focus of the compliance projects was Privacy and SOX. This included providing input for the Vision Statement, establishing the framework for the approach to be used for traditional SDLC and Agile/Scrum projects including the work breakdown structure, deliverables for each milestone, approach for tracking each deliverable using Gantt charts and other graphic representations, using tools (e.g., Tableau, Power BI) and accessing the options, transformations to .NET. Key components included transformation from AWS to Azure Cloud, data transformations, data visualization and analytics and data reporting. MS Project, JIRA, and Confluence were used in concert for tracking milestones (MS Project), documenting user stories (JIRA), and reporting on hours entered for each team member by projects assigned to (Confluence).

Focus on engagement, portfolio, program and project management, based on specific needs, for mission critical enterprise product and application development - healthcare industry representing the PMO for Technology

including:

• Project Management Office (PMO) – Oversight for Technology

• Enterprise Solutions for healthcare industry to minimize risk of inconsistencies between sources of redundant data

• Organization Change Management (OCM)

• Business Intelligence (BI)

• Vision Statement

• Privacy compliance based on regulations in place for each state within scope

• Agile and Kanban Team (Scrum Master)

• HIPAA Compliance solutions for the PMO

• Align milestones with the status for tasks in the project schedule for the SOX and / or SOC2 audits.

• All compliance-related projects working with leads from technology, the business functional area, internal and external audit and compliance teams with primary focus on Privacy.

• Required and necessary documentation provided and accepted by the users and audit.

• Ensure all Project Meetings (for SDLC and / or Agile projects) were conducted and that the required participants were available.

• Produce the project deliverables focused on project management reporting including status reports, Ganntt Charts, and others.

• Lead evaluations of team collaboration and planning tools – MS Project (Portfolio), JIRA (Web), Asana, and Smartsheet.

• Lead presentations to Executives, Audit and Steering Committees.

• Ensure Vision Statement reflected the business groups current needs

• Lead Agile Teams (Scrum Master)

• Ensure teams were self-managed with minimal oversight

• Maintain the Product Backlog of all User Stories for the specific initiative

• Maintain the Scrum Backlog for the current work in progress

. Provide training to ensure all team members comfortable with the approach, deliverables, schedule, Milestones, and their roles and responsibilities.

• Maintain the Scrum Backlog for the current Sprint

• Lead projects focused on enhancements to the overall processes, procedures, and federally mandated compliance requirements to ensure compliance.

• Project Documentation

• SAP - Financials

• Milestones with associated identification of owner, organization, timeline and dependencies

•Best Practices, Policy Statements, Standards, Procedures

•Risk Management

•Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)

•Data Migration and Data Cleansing

•Data Analytics and Data Reporting

•Data Visualization using PowerBI

•CyberSecurity

• Business Intelligence (BI)

• Budget responsibilities included tracking the projected costs vs the actual costs monthly, quarterly, biannually, and the overall annual actual vs budget.

•Records Management

•Data Strategy – visualization; identification of redundant sources to ensure accuracy of data; conversion of data from unstructured to structured format; PII data; governance of data restricting who has full access vs. limited access (read-only), and use of data reporting tools.

• Integration of ITIL practices

• Operational Assessments of current strategies and plans

• Comprehensive change management

• Testing programs including Unit, Stress, Integration, Validation Acceptance, User Acceptance, and Regression

•Training and Awareness Programs

•Work with teams accessing options for use of Clarity, Rally, JIRA, Confluence, and MS Project Web Access with Enterprise for portfolio management (tracking and reporting status; issues management; team assignments and roadmap; and scorecard reporting for executive management budget management; financial management.

•Represent technology in the evaluation of team collaboration tools including Project – Portfolio, Smartsheet, Asana, and JIRA (Web).

• Lead transformation projects focused on change initiatives for technology and methodology. These included establishing the framework for the approach to be used for traditional SDLC and Agile/Scrum projects including the work breakdown structure, deliverables for each milestone, approach for tracking each deliverable using Gantt charts and other graphic representations, transformations to .NET. Smartsheet was used to provide business team leads with information regarding status, team members (Internal; External - vendors and audit) providing Gantt Charts showing the plan vs actual for key milestones.

Blue Cat Enterprises, June 2019 – August 2022

Roles: Senior Scrum Master; Senior Project Manager; Engagement Manager; Independent Contractor / Consultant

Lead transformation projects focused on change initiatives for technology and IT compliance (e.g., CCPA; Computer Security; Privacy; AICIPA SOC2 Type2; SOX; One Trust; others). Representative engagements include:

-Lead for healthcare client for service provider in the healthcare industry working for their Legal department preparing their responses to AICPA’s Soc2Type2 Audit. This effort started with the high level review of all production systems and drilled down to the most critical production systems. Each business unit and the corresponding group in technology were responsible for providing their responses and their plans for any required remediation.

-Provide list of milestones; project schedule with tasks, resources, dependencies, durations; deliverable descriptions. These are critical components.

-Work with clients to ensure compliance responses include the necessary information – proposed approach, resources, vendors, and projected completion dates for HIPAA..

-Document the plan with milestones, resources, and deliverables using Smartsheet for workflow management.

-Focus on data analytics to examine the data sources to determine how to effectively utilize the raw data in order to provide the executive team with critical information regarding key areas of the business to address to mitigate risks associated with their products and processes.

-Ensure that the people-side of change is addressed as part of the overall scope and objectives to ensure successful adoption of the new processes and procedures aligning with the new technology. This is part of organization change management and includes: training; formalizing processes and procedures; conducting orientation programs for new team employees and those new to the project; and executive programs.

-Lead projects where JIRA was used for backlog repository as part of agile initiatives following transformation from Microsoft Office - Excel which served as the “backlog” prior to JIRA being available.

-Work with vendors and clients to ensure contract terms and conditions accurately represent agreed to deliverables and scope.

-Lead solutions including .NET.

-Lead for enterprise solutions including infrastructure, automation of critical processes and procedures, and risk management.

-Implement ITIL best practices including stakeholder requirements gathering with focus on - Security, Request, Change, and Incident Management including processes and procedures and conduct of a pilot to identify enhancements. Align with NIST, High Trust Compliance, CCPA/GDPR and other standards and guidelines focused on privacy, availability, and security.

-Lead transformation projects for subsidiary of large automotive company for financing loans with a large retail banks. This transformation included providing access to key members of management and the Board of Directors so that they had access and the ability to perform ad hoc reporting.

-Provide training as part of the transformation to ensure that the business understands their roles and responsibilities in the compliance, transformation, Agile Scrum and Kanban initiatives.

-Lead medium to large innovative new product development engagements including multiple technologies, stakeholders, and business processes leading to technology adding value to the business including enhanced profitability, user experiences, and customer satisfaction.

-Lead data transformation solutions focused on migrating critical data to the cloud to enhance availability, security, and change management. This included review of the various solutions available, the projected cost of each solution, and the associated timeline(s) from requirements to the initial prototype.

-Manages, forecasts, and reports on project schedule - planned and actual, project financials, and resource utilization with an understanding of revenue models and cost to completion projections providing management with information so that they can make educated decisions on next steps, risk management, and changes.

-Manages the capital budget for project expenditures both actual and forecast.

-Manages issues, risks, and changes based on the agreed upon processes and tools established by the PMO.

-Define approach for conduct of compliance reviews for CCPA and other compliance initiatives. This is for use on client engagements to document status of compliance initiatives, planned remediation including target dates, identification of acceptance of risk if decision is to “not remediate”, and other pertinent information.

-As Senior BA, worked with client (internal and external), audit and compliance teams, and others to define gaps and areas for improvement, provide recommendations on approach including ROI for each, and presented to all levels of management within the organization including Board of Directors and C-Level management team.

-Work with clients to establish computer security functional teams including roles and responsibilities, processes and procedures, training, and ongoing education.

-Interact with Executive and Compliance committees, senior leadership, vendors, and business executives to ensure approach understood and complied with as part of management responsibilities.

-Provided leadership for compliance and software projects.

-Lead implementation and customization of solutions including Oracle - Financials and SAP - Financials. This included working with clients to evaluate the solutions and features leading to decision on how applicable the solution was to their needs. Worked with client and vendors on crafting the terms and conditions as well as the SOW and timeline.

-Provide leadership over critical initiatives related to Computer Security including password processes and procedures, ensuring standards and procedures are relevant to current security environment, and educate C-Level as well as their managers and team members from technology and business.

-Work with other consulting firms, audit teams, and vendors to identify options for remediation specific to CCPA using One Trust and other tools.

-Work with organizations related to enhancements to their business and technology recovery plans based on changes in their production portfolio.

-Conduct pre-assessments for clients so that they can identify gaps, document a plan for remediation including schedule and proposed approach, and ensure that executive management is apprised of the situation and aware of their obligations.

-Lead transformations to .NET.

-Work with clients on privacy compliance remediation programs including pre-assessments, review of reports from internal and external auditors, and document project plan including schedule for completion.

-Clients included automotive; transportation, financial services, retail lenders, and others.

CapGemini, May 2018 - June 2019

Roles: Engagement Manager / Senior Scrum Master / Agile Coach / Senior Business Analyst

Manage and deliver engagements working at all levels of client and vendor management. Focus on software development – SDLC (Software Development Life Cycle) and / or Agile / Scrum / Kanban / SAFe with JIRA (Confluence; GreenHopper); data transformations; compliance; computer security, and infrastructure. Representative projects include:

-Product development for transformation of contracts management system to ensure aligned with current requirements from the business units and the clients, to provide broader functionality, to enhance the data available to internal and external users of the system, to provide clients with access to their information using a web portal, to allow users to make reservations online, and other user-friendly features. Client anticipated that the requirements had remained stagnant for several years. After working with the user community, there were 500+ additional requirements. Significant areas such as roll-out plan and funding were critical to moving forward with the initiative.

-Focus on data analytics to

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