April *, ****

Please find attached my resume for your consideration for the position of Program Manager.

As my resume demonstrates, I have extensive, hands-on experience delivering high visibility, enterprise-level IT projects within a broad variety of industries. I have successfully lead COTS and SaaS system implementations, developed custom software products and have delivered business process improvement consulting engagements at companies such as ADP, CVS, Estee Lauder, Tiffany & Co., Gillette’s Jafra Cosmetics Division, Mattel, Arcadia Group (at the time, the UK’s largest retail conglomerate), L.L.Bean and a large number of smaller companies. I have managed budgets from $1M to $28M and teams ranging from 10 to 180 members consisting of internal staff, client staff, vendors, third-party consultants and off-shore assets. I am a natural leader, adept at building positive working relationships at all levels within an organization and am accomplished in delivering projects on time and on budget while exceeding stakeholder expectations. I am proficient in all phases of the PMLC and excel in facilitating communications between technical and business team members, managing risks/opportunities, setting priorities and creatively resolving conflicts.

As an experienced technical management professional, I understand the demands of delivering complex IT, business process improvement and consulting projects and would like to apply those skills and knowledge as a member of your team. I possess broad technical knowledge that includes web and mobile-based distributed technologies on both hosted and cloud-based infrastructures, client-server applications and even mainframe systems. I have a deep understanding of the full SDLC and am accomplished in using both Waterfall and Agile methodologies. In an Agile development environment, I have been both Product Owner, SCRUM Master and Master SM managing Scrum of Scrums. I have extensive experiences successfully working with, and managing expectations at all levels of the organization.

In addition to developing and leading projects as a program/project manager, I am skilled at gathering customer requirements, designing solutions, coding, mapping legacy data and planning the ETL of the data into the new system, planning and executing unit, system integration and user acceptance testing, conducting user training and creating system documentation. I have been an individual contributor, a technical manager and have been a manager of managers. However, the most important experience I bring to this opportunity is my ability to ensure projects are delivered in such a way as to meet all business requirements and exceed expectations.

I welcome the chance to learn more about this opportunity, as I believe there is an excellent fit between this position, my experience, your needs and my professional goals. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Best Regards,

John Jackson

Overview

A SEASONED IT EXECUTIVE with extensive success in application development, product and project management and systems implementation, possessing years of international business experience spanning four continents within the Retail and E-Commerce sectors. A natural leader, with excellent people and communications skills, adept at mentoring and motivating teams to exceed expectations and deliver the highest quality results. An experienced manager, with a track record of successfully delivering custom software development, COTS customization and implementation projects in the enterprise application, e-commerce, and business intelligence space to multi-national corporate and SME companies world-wide. A senior IT manager with a broad base of professional knowledge and technical skills, able to understand the needs of a business, design and implement solutions to solve problems, manage stakeholder expectations and deliver results that meet or exceed business objectives, corporate goals and stakeholder expectations.

Summary of Expertise:

Project/Program Management – I have led the customization and implementation of software systems for Fortune 500 and dozens of smaller companies managing approximately 30 major implementations ($5MM+) over the past 20 years. Managed project budgets that ranged from $1MM to $25MM and project teams numbering from 5 to 80 members that were typically comprised of customer staff, company project team members, external contractors and vendors. I have conducted consulting engagements and/or implementations in 14 counties with many projects requiring the management of off-shore assets. Managed projects through all phases including requirements assessment, business process re-engineering, software customization, data mapping and conversion, unit, system and user acceptance testing, conference room pilot, hardware/network/telecom acquisition and configuration, system load and performance testing, user training, system launch and post implementation support. As projects have required, I hired and trained junior project managers and business analysts, who I then mentored while supervising their efforts as they lead the implementation of smaller projects or projects within a program I was managing.

Software Product Development - Lead the development and deployment of numerous enterprise level and mobile applications (both mWeb and native app) from concept to deployment through all phases of the SDLC. Lead the design, development, testing and commercial launch of two enterprise level software products supporting the automation needs of companies selling direct-to-consumer. I have also developed and launched numerous E-Commerce systems. I have managed projects using both Waterfall and Agile methodologies and have extensive experience as a SCRUM master and product owner. I have years of hands-on development experience and have managed diverse teams of developers all of which has provided me with a very thorough and broad technical knowledge of web and native app (iOS and Android) technologies.

Systems Integration and Deployment -. I have significant experience in the development of cloud-based infra-structure and the migration of enterprise level systems to cloud and the development and integrated of micro services architecture. Experience includes integration to the back-end fulfillment (WMS and SCM), front end order entry and customer service systems, Accounting and cash management system and interfaces to electronic payment systems. I have led needs analysis and feasibility studies and business process re-engineering studies in support of e-commerce and e-marketing platforms whose development and deployment I managed. Examples include implementations of tag management systems, ad servers, demand-side media buying platforms, and targeted remarketing platforms. Lead focus group meetings to better understand UX pain points and document suggestions for improving the system’s functionality,

Professional Experience

Contract Program Manager ADP, Inc Oct 2019 to Feb 2020

Managed the development and delivery of Digital Transformation Projects for ADPs Retirement Services Division. The projects involved initiatives in the areas of compliance optimization (year-end testing and 5500), integration of 401K plan set up with payroll and digitization of the enrollment experience. Responsibilities included the coordination of efforts of four product teams (both on and off-shore) while serving as SCRUM master for one of them. Lead all agile ceremonies to include SCRUM of SCRUM meetings and provided weekly program status reporting to executive sponsors. Reviewed all team Rally entries for quality and completeness and maintained project plans to track and coordinate dependencies between team deliverables, interim releases and activities leading to a coordinated initiative roll out. Completed all assigned projects on time and on budget while exceeding business value targets.

Contract Project Manager CVS Health Sept 2018 to May 2019

I was rehired at CVS to manage projects on its front-store E-Commerce Platform as the company moved to an Agile development model using an integrated development team structure. I was the SCRUM master for two development teams (Android and iOS products) and for the Dev Ops team. During this time, I facilitated all Agile ceremonies such as backlog grooming, task scoring, leading scrum creation meetings, daily scrums, and retrospectives. Led SCRUM of SCRUM meetings and contributed to SCRUM process standardization meetings. Was the principal owner of all JIRA activities, creating dashboards and reports as needed while performing JIRA administration in support of backlog and scrum management. Lead the Dev Ops team as we moved a number of e-com sub-systems to AWS cloud to provide unlimited scalability and improve the customer user experience by proving faster performance.

Contract Program Manager Hertz, Inc Mar 2018 to Sept 2018

Responsible for the management of Hertz’ digital transformation of its main e-commerce property which involved the re-write of its main on-line reservation application, migration of the platform to AWS cloud and deployment of the application as part of its Digital Transformation Initiative. The new infrastructure included the creation of a micro-services layer (using MuleSoft) to integrate to all existing backend systems and the build and deployment of all development, test and operational environments to AWS Cloud using Docker as the containerization software. Major accomplishments included 1) creation, testing and deployment of six AWS Cloud environments (Dev, QA UAT, Prod1 Prod2 and Disaster Recovery), 2) the creation of all Jenkins jobs required to create a completely automated and operational CI/CD pipeline, 3) the movement of all code to and operationalization of the pipeline and 4) the documentation and testing of the systems Go-Live plan prior to the successful launch of the deployment.

Contract Project Manager CVS Health Feb 2017 to Mar 2018

Managed multiple parallel projects enhancing CVS’s main E-Commence platform in the Integrated Customer Experience (Omni-Channel) area using structured Waterfall methodology. Projects included numerous UX/UI updates and refreshes on the Mobile native app versions of the platform, the addition of Accessibility standards to the UI (both mobile and web) and responsive design to the UX (mobile only).

Contract Program Manager Estee Lauder Mar 2016 to Jan 2017

Lead the Retail Division’s Mobile Device Task Force chartered to understand and fix challenges faced by the Estee’s Brands in deploying, using and maintaining mobile devices in support of in-store retail initiatives. I managed numerous simultaneous mobile projects in support of multiple Brands. Projects included a standardization of the UX/UI of one application running on various mobile platforms (iOS, Android and mWeb), numerous customer-interactive display-only digital advertising applications, a customer facing app that activated and sent a text alert when a customer was within a few blocks of a store that displayed information about active promotions and provided downloadable digital coupons and a project that allowed a client to take a selfie and then have the artist digitally apply a make-up template so the client could see an approximation of what the final make-over would look like.

Contract Program Manager Tiffany & Company June 2015 to Jan 2016

Lead and managed Tiffany’s Retail Foundations Program which consisted of three simultaneous enterprise–level projects: 1) The consolidation of all US order channels (e-commerce, direct marketing and retail POS) into IBM’s Sterling Order Management System, 2) The implementation of Oracle’s Retail Management System (RMS) and Retail Sales Audit Systems (ReSA) and the integration (ESB and ETL) of these systems with all legacy applications and the company’s Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW). Responsible for supervising the efforts of four work stream project managers and coordinating the activates of five (5) services vendors (IBM, Oracle, NCR, Infosys and Slalom) along with Tiffany internal resources to plan and execute program work through the business requirements gathering, functional and non-functional analysis and technical design phase gates.

Contract Project Manager State of Wisconsin – DATCAP May 2014 to Jan 2015

Created and managed the master project schedule and multiple sub-project schedules, work assignments and priorities for the Bureau of Agri-chemical Management IT (BAMIT) alignment project while also serving as a BA and QA planning manager. Mentored bureau staff in creating a departmental WIKI using MS SharePoint. Started by educating the user community as to what a WIKI is and how it could be used as a web enabled knowledge base for departmental P&Ps and as a document management system. Supervised its creation and distribution to the department. Created technical specifications for the modifications needed to the Division's MS Dynamics CRM implementation to support the bureau’s Pesticide and Lime licensing programs.

IT Product/Project Manager Commonwealth Financial Services Oct 2013 to Apr 2014

Responsible for setting the strategic vision for, and managing all projects related to, the systems that automate the internal operations (CRM, workflow, compensation, etc.) of the nation’s largest independent financial services broker-dealer.

Managed multiple simultaneous projects to augment the functionality of the various systems and methodically consolidated customer, operational and compliance data to better populate departmental BI reporting systems.

Work with stakeholders to identify functional deficiencies and feature enhancements, maintain and prioritize the product backlogs, and manage a fledgling SCRUM team while serving as Product Owner and SCRUM Master.

Managed the RFP and vendor selection process for a replacement for the company’s 15-year-old client/server workflow platform.

Contract Project Manager L. L Bean Aug 2013 to Oct 2013

Managed multiple simultaneous projects and a team consisting of a BA, Delivery Architect, Tech Leads, Developers and QA staff in the implementation a tag management system (Tealium), an Ad server (Google DFA), a Demand Side Platform (TellApart) and a Digital Remarketing Platform (MediaMath). The SaaS products where integrated with the company’s main and mobile e-commerce portals and all projects where delivered on time to meet peak season demand.

Consultant Impactiva Mar 2011 to May 2013

VP – Client Services Nimbit Inc. Jan 2008 to Dec 2010

Contract Program Manager Nimbit Inc. Feb 2007 to Dec 2007

Contract Program Manager Cross Country Group Jan 2006 to Jan 2007

VP Product Development Stumpworld Systems Jun 2004 to Dec 2005

Principle and COO Renaissance Software Inc. Oct 1997 to Nov 2003

VP and General Manager Calidus Systems, Inc Feb 1992 to Oct 1997

Implementation Manager Springer-Miller Systems Sept 1990 to Jan 1992

Product Manager/Sales Manager Retail Systems Co. Jun 1985 to Aug 1990

Principle Jackson Enterprises, Inc. Oct 1983 to Jun 1985

Captain US Army Jun 1979 to Aug 1983

Education: Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, NC Marketing

Project Manager Training Program - Digital Equipment Corporation

PMP-PMI obtained March 2020

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