Concepts and Methodologies

Strategic Technology Planning

While working for The Chicago School in 2007, the IT department (at the time 5 people), we contracted with a vendor called Burwood Group to create a 5 year IT strategic plan. The IT director, the network administrator, and myself sat down, analyzed all the current and upcoming projects, talked to other managers and directors in the organization, and finally discussed with our CFO to provide input on an "IT Roadmap". The roadmap was unfortunately only accurate for up to 2 years as the growth of the organization changed the direction and scope of IT's strategic vision.

When it came time to re-evaluate the strategic plan as part of TCS Education system, I provided input and documents to the background and direction the original plan was to take.

IT Policy / Procedure Development

As part of The Chicago School, the network administrator and myself assisted with the contents and editing of the IT policy that would be used by the organization. Policies included the use of wireless networks, computer resources, and account policies in our organization. These policies became part of the organization's overall policies.

As part of Orbitz, The Chicago School and TCS Education System, I have authored, edited, and contributed to many procedural documents for internal IT use as well as for employee use. At Orbitz, I wrote the first IT Guide (98 pages) that employees could reference for documentation. At The Chicago School, I made many procedural documents on account management, system use, and information management. AtTCS Education System, I updated the existing procedures and have coordinated with IT employees to co-author procedures such as employee data life-cycle management and Data Center maintenances.

Staff Management / Mentoring / Training

As part of The Chicago School, I have managed, mentored, and trained multiple internal IT employees, interns, and student workers.

As part of The Chicago School in 2006 and part of 2007, the network administrator and myself managed a group of 4 student workers responsible for helpdesk duties.

In 2007, one of our helpdesk technicians had recently been promoted to the role of helpdesk manager. I
have had prior educational and real-world experience leading small groups so I created a 12 week management training program for the helpdesk manager. The scope of the training centered on collaboration and cooperation tactics, SMART Goals, and ownership and accountability tactics.

In 2008, I successfully convicted the IT director to hire an IT Technical Writer for the department part-time. The technical writer reported to me and provided functions such as: technical documentations, proofreading and editing of IT communication, and coordination of task between the operations team and the helpdesk team. The part-time IT Technical Writer position was removed in late 2009 and a full-time technical employee was hired for the Client Services department.

Resource Planning & Change Managements

As part of TCSES, I am part of the team that is creating a change management policy. The change management process currently involves a consolidated source of all changes in the environment and implementation of times for system maintenance. I am currently and in the past worked on identifying data owners for objects and information.    

For resource planning, I have led many projects that required human resource allocation with Director level managers. This was necessary as with growth companies, it was difficult to obtain time from people due to working on many projects at the same time.

Architecture Design & Development

As part of The Chicago School and TCS Education System, I was responsible for designing and developing various systems. I would use MS Visio and Word to document the design of the systems, discuss requirements, implementation timelines, and backup policies as part of the design.

When possible I use the SDLC concepts when architecting infrastructure. I prefer the SDLC model because it highlights the procedural process for creating a system from its inception to its release. Realistically, the SDLC model has been something that the IT organization in my current company is starting to focus on as of 3 months ago due to the need to develop more robust software and system implementation and upgrade guidelines.

Full Lifecycle Project Management

As listed in the IT Projects section of my website, I have led many projects, as simple as a software or hardware upgrade through complex multi-AD systems from many colleges into one system.

For complex projects, I utilize the PMI project management model which include:

• Identifying the stakeholders
• Assess risk factors
• Develop the WBS (when possible)
• Scope creep management (difficult to do)
• Organize and mediate status meetings
• Develop project phases from identification, testing, pilot, implementation, to review
• Develop timelines using MS Project
• Assess project variances to the baselines

• Analyze and provide after-project review

For projects that are not as complex and don't require as many people, I prefer to use Agile project management. This is because of the fast growing nature of the organization I have worked for, the technology or use changes within a month's timespan.

An example was the implementation of the helpdesk ticketing system. The project needed to be completed as soon as possible and the traditional PMI approach would require too much time to use. I thus used the Agile project management approach and delivered different modules of the software in a short amount of time while the project scope and requirements were changing.

Customer Relationship Management

Having worked in an HR and IT Client Services department before, I learned that a very important part of what I perceive to be IT's responsibility is creating and maintaining positive customer relationships. I believe that marketing and communications with the customers, employees, or students is key to a positive perception of myself and IT in general.

• When working on a project or task, I try to keep the customer in the loop as much as possible via phone call or email so that they don't feel that their issue is being ignored.

• I walk around the floor at least once a day and to other buildings at least 2 times a week to do ad-hoc chat and lunch sessions with other employees to get a "feel" of issues or their current perception of technology in the organization.

• Specifically with The Chicago School and with TCS Education System, I will talk with students and fellow alumni about their concerns and thoughts of IT delivery.

I perform these steps because I have learned that you can get much more information directly from the customers and employees or students through informal means well before issues become escalated and problematic.

Vendor Management / Contract Negotiation

I have managed numerous relationships with various vendors as part of technology acquisition and contract negotiation/renegotiation.

• During 2007-2008, I successfully leveraged competing bids for different SAN vendors, specifically Dell and HP's reseller CDW on a $100K+ SAN project.

• I have worked with our suppliers such as CDW and Sentinel and vendors such as VMware to find ways to reduce cost either through multi-year billing, bulk pricing, or re-evaluation of software compared to competing products.

• During the AD domain migration project, I had to work closely with all our software vendors to insure that as systems were being migrated from one domain to another, we developed testing environments, testing plans, and communication pieces. This specific project required coordination with over 8 specific vendors ranging from outsourced Accounting IT, CampusVue SIS vendors, and other departmental application vendors.