Resume (CV)
James P. MacLennan
Summary
Seasoned IT leader with a broad background in strategic
visioning, tactical & operational planning and management, and
effective & relevant system/process design. Focused on delivering
timely, measurable, and sustainable results that support business
objectives. Recognized for creative, high impact performance with
consistent delivery of strong results through formal and advisory
leadership.
Education
MBA, Marketing
Concentration, DePaul University,
Chicago, IL, 1992
BS, Electrical Engineering, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame,
IN, 1985
Experience
($BB manufacturing company) Chicago, IL area
2005-Present
Executive Director, Information Technology
Divisional CIO role, with direct responsibility for these
functional areas within IT:
- Supply Chain Systems: SAP, JDA/Manugistics, and other
custom systems in support of R&D, Procurement, Product
Engineering and Commercialization, Planning and Inventory Control,
Manufacturing, and Logistics (Warehouse & Transportation).
- Information Management: Providing data warehousing
& analytics solutions on the SAP BW platform, along with
supporting tools and custom development for SQL Server and Oracle
database environments, using multiple reporting & analytics
platforms.
- SAP Application Support: Operational and break-fix
support of all SAP modules; this role manages the ABAP developer
pool, plus all external resourcing relationships. This role also owns
the company's vendor relationship with SAP and JDA/Manugistics.
- International IT: The company has a presence in
Europe and Mexico; the IT organizations for these wholly-owned
subsidiaries report up through me.
Within IT, I manage seven direct reports, and a total team size
of over 40. Total operating budget of these groups is in excess of $21M.
In addition to these organizational groups, I also have
responsibility in these areas:
- Business Unit IT Director: The company has two major
business units; I oversee IT for the larger of these ($2B annual
revenue), and own the relationship between IT and this organization.
- Project Management Office: Corporate IT is grappling
with the traditional challenges of balancing IT resources against
ongoing "run-the-business" support and projects that drive the
business forward. I am leveraging my experience at Searle and
Culligan to implement process & procedure, metrics, and knowledge
capture tools, in support of our Resource Portfolio Management
initiatives.
Strategic IT
- IT Project Lead for integration of major ($750M)
acquisition; co-directed team of 300+ business and technical
resources, implementing major business process change, SAP and other
enterprise systems. Project successfully completed, rolling out to
nine sites in 12 months, and defining process standards and project
management framework for future integrations.
- Created a comprehensive, evergreen Enterprise Architecture
review of the company's strategic application portfolio, in
preparation for our next major SAP upgrade.
- Drove renegotiation of SAP software agreements to deliver an
upgrade path while reducing total cost of ownership for this
platform.
- Developed a complete set of performance metrics and TCO
calculations to accurately illustrate the cost of customizing our
enterprise software.
- Developed innovative ways to drive IT alignment with
strategic business plans, and provide clear line-of-sight for
balancing resources against critical change management issues and new
business opportunities.
- Completed strategic analysis of the RFID technology and
business environment; the company has a large investment in process
and technology supporting customer requirements for RFID tagging of
products, but could not clearly define the cost / benefit challenges.
This effort allowed the company to respond effectively to key
customers requests; we continue to monitor our investment in this
area.
Tactical IT
- Driving IT tactical planning and integration for recent
acquisitions.
- Rationalizing technology platforms and toolsets in our
Information Management group; eliminating redundant technologies to
simplify the portfolio and drive down support costs.
- Took over project management responsibilities for a
high-visibility, time-sensitive project in the Logistics area;
project was significantly behind schedule and dysfunctional. Drove
alignment between key IT teams and business units that owned the
processes; rejuvenated project team and delivered on original
schedule.
- Providing real opportunities for staff growth and
advancement through structural reorganization and introduction of
cross functional project and requirements reviews.
- Introduced Technology Roadmaps methodology across multiple
areas of IT, providing 6-12 months visibility to strategic and
tactical projects, for prioritization and schedule dependencies
- Facilitating resolution of international design and
implementation issues as the company reworks our entire global
network infrastructure.
Project Management
- Automated and streamlined the IT Project Forecast process,
which provides an integrated, forward-looking summary of resource
requirements and constraints for all IT projects.
- Leading the technical and user-interface design for project
portfolio management toolset; we are providing opportunities for
internal developers to learn new development skills while upgrading
the quality and timeliness of our project tracking data.
- Pioneering the use of collaborative knowledge management and
social networking tools; implemented and introduced a wiki platform;
driving the use of blogs and discussion forums.
Culligan is a $700M global provider of water treatment
products and services.
2000-2005 Director,
Information Technology
- Assumed lead IT role in October, 2004, after departure of
CIO; managed annual North American IT budget of $5M; responsible for
30+ member global IT team, including internal / external resources.
Strategic IT
- Drove IT strategic planning for 2004 divestiture from Veolia
/ USFilter, including work plan and master budget ($2M) for all IT
projects.
- Developed a Business Architecture that captured a vision of
an IT-enabled business model, and created the Technical Architecture
that directly supports that model.
- Developed strategic approaches for Sales Life Cycle
Management and integration of Commercial Services Networks.
Tactical IT
- Coordinated operational support of multiple ERP systems,
including detailed issue / resolution management, and implementation
/ management of business-driven prioritization process.
- Implemented the eBusiness Integration Hub; a "Center of
Excellence" approach for facilitating electronic transactions between
external trading partners and internal business systems. Supported 20
trading partner relationships, estimated monthly cost savings $25K.
- Created concept and high-level architecture for the Channel
Partner Locator, a web service that leveraged our existing investment
in geographical software. Processed 35,000 requests per month,
estimated monthly cost savings $150K.
- Consolidated web application development under IT;
introduced project management, asset control, development
methodologies.
Business Change
- IT Project Lead for major (>$10M) ERP implementation,
coordinating internal & external IT resources; managed
integration partners and hardware & software vendors.
- Managed multiple projects in support of the corporate
divestitures, including the consolidation of call centers, transfer
of customer service and support for select product lines.
- Initiated and mentored Hyperion Financial Management
implementation for corporate consolidated financials;
second-generation effort includes groundwork for Sarbanes-Oxley
compliance.
Project Management
- Standardized project proposals, approvals, tracking, and
prioritization; these efforts have evolved into the IT Project
Management Office (PMO), featuring process and metrics that help
Culligan maximize the value of our IT investments.
- Implemented an issue tracking system, with comprehensive
management reporting, that proved invaluable in managing complex
projects with limited resources.
- Created the corporate intranet site, with supporting process
and documentation that enables site creation, document sharing, and
content management without IT involvement.
- Created a comprehensive "boilerplate" Master Services
Agreement for technology projects, which affords excellent
protections while streamlining the vendor approval process.
Vendor Management
- Multiple (>$5M) software / hardware contract / purchase
negotiations for technology projects; often called in by legal group
for input on technology discussions in different business units.
- Drove professional services contracting in support of
multiple projects, including creation of proposal, specifications;
budget / arrangement negotiations, and ongoing monitoring.
Pharmacia was created in 2000 through the merger of
Pharmacia & Upjohn with Monsanto Company and its G.D. Searle
pharmaceutical unit ($3.9B in sales).
1999-2000 Associate
Director, Strategy Development
- Completed impact analysis of eBusiness concepts &
technology on the pharmaceutical industry, with focus on driving
R&D productivity, and developing relationships with prescribers,
key influencers, and the distribution chain.
- Introduced improvements to the Long-Range Planning process,
tightening the connection with corporate IT. Improved visibility of
total IT spend; highlighted opportunities for productivity
improvements & alignment with corporate strategic direction.
- At the end of 1999, the Pharmacia & Upjohn merger
converted my role to support integration of two complex IT
organizations; developed IT architectural requirements in support of
eBusiness initiatives in the merged organization.
1996-1999 Associate Director, IT Relationship Management
- Primary liaison between multiple business units and IT,
including Global Medical Marketing and Managed Care organizations,
Strategic Communications, Marketing, and Field Sales, and the
corporate (Monsanto) Human Resources / Staffing group.
- Took over troubled projects in Managed Care, supporting the
validation of contract purchasing claims. Adjusted goals &
tactical plans, managed multiple teams to common objectives, and
delivered effective short-term results while supporting a strategic
data warehousing vision.
- Defined overall architecture for a Call Center / Document
Management system; worked with IT and business project managers to
make sure projects came in on time / under budget. Involved in
technical specifications, vendor evaluation, and contract
negotiations.
- IT support for Monsanto's corporate Knowledge Management
initiatives; designed and implemented localized projects applying
these concepts to pharmaceutical marketing processes, including
cross-corporate work with a strategic partner.
Adams is a $28M manufacturing & distribution company serving the elevator industry.
1993-1996 Director,
MIS
- Responsible for 10+ member IT team, including internal /
external resources.
- Led a large business re-engineering project, introducing a
significant business process change while downsizing technology
platforms. This effort included multiple technology projects,
upgrading the front-end business processes for an important SBU.
Duties included all user interface design, data modeling, technical
specifications, evaluation, selection and management of external
consulting resources, plus coordination of the testing and rollout
phases.
- Other development projects included an EIS implementation
consisting of custom applications for the unique data constraints at
Adams. The first module, an "animated P&L", allowed drill-down
analysis that identified over $100,000 of problem spending within
minutes of it's introduction.
- Developed an automated link between Adams' AS/400-based job
tracking system and a number of finite shop scheduling packages. The
system incorporated work center modeling & capacity planning,
daily work schedules, and automated customer follow up & status
reporting.
TenMan Systems, Inc. Des Plaines, IL
TenMan was an $8M software & services provider,
focused on Real Estate/Property Management.
1985-1993 Manager of Product Development
- Responsible for design & development of AS/400 and
PC-based products.
- Managed 10+ member development, implementation and customer
support teams.
- Specific projects included one of the first PC-to-midrange
data communication products, a number of separate finance,
accounting, and management modules for the System/36 and AS/400, and
the conversion of a suite of System/36 products to native code on the
AS/400. In addition, designed and programmed three PC-based Property
Management systems.
Publications
www.cazh1.com - Professional
web site / selected essays, plus blog; on
Business, Information, and Technology, 2004-Present
Front End
of Innovation blog - Contributing author, 2008-Present
Smart Data
Collective web site - Featured blogger, 2009-Present
Resistance is Futile (ThinkWrap column), Datamation Magazine, Cahners
Publishing, Feb 1995
SQLWindows 5.0 (Product Review), Software Development Magazine, Miller
Freeman Publishing, Jan/Feb 1995
Contributing author, Financial Applications in Windows,
Windows Connectivity Secrets, IDG Books Worldwide, 1994
Skill Sets
Vertical Markets
Consumer Package Goods, Consumer Durable Goods, Consumer
Products, Financial, Foodservice, Franchise, Manufacturing,
Pharmaceuticals, Professional Services, Property Management, Real Estate
Global Markets
North America (Canada, Mexico)
Europe (France, Germany)
Business Training / Practices
Balanced Scorecard, Business Process Re-engineering (BPR),
Knowledge Management (KM), Lean Manufacturing, Mergers Acquisitions
& Divestitures, Organizational Change Management, Portfolio
Management, Project Management Office (PMO), Scenario Planning,
Strategic Planning, Total Quality Management (TQM)
Technical Methodologies
Client/Server Design/Architecture (n-tier), Configuration
Management (SCM), Data Modeling, Information Engineering (IE),
Internet/Web Design/Architecture, Information Technology Infrastructure
Library (ITIL), Object Oriented Analysis & Design (OOP),
Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA), Software as a Service (Saas),
Software Metrics, Software Quality Assurance (SQA), Unified Modeling
Language (UML)
Functional / Operational Areas
Audit, CAD/CAM/CIM, Customer Call Center, Channel Management,
Communications, Customer Service, Distribution, Electronic Commerce,
Engineering, Finance, Help Desk, Human Resources, Legal, Logistics,
Manufacturing, Marketing, Payroll, Procurement, Production and Inventory
Control, Property Management, Research & Development (R&D),
Recruiting / Staffing, Sales Management, Sarbanes-Oxley, Supply Chain
Planning, Transportation, Warehousing
Application / System Disciplines
Collaboration Platforms, Customer Relationship Management (CRM),
Data Warehouse, Decision Support Systems (DSS), Distributed Databases,
Document Management, Electronic Data Interchange (EDI), Enterprise
Application Integration (EAI), Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP),
Executive Information Systems (EIS), Groupware, Material Resource
Planning (MRP), RFID, Sales Force Automation (SFA), Workflow, Web 2.0,
Web Hosting Services, Web Standards
Computer Languages / Standards
C, CSS, Gupta SQLWindows, HTML, Java, JavaScript, jQuery, Lotus
Notes, MS Access, MS Visual Basic / VBA, Pascal, Perl, PHP,
Powerbuilder, Progess/4GL, Python, RPG/CL, VBScript, XHTML
Relational Databases
DB/400, MS Access, MS SQL Server, Oracle, Progress, SQLBase,
Sybase SQL Server, Watcom SQL
Development Tools / Environments
Adobe Acrobat, Apache, AutoCAD, Blackberry, Cold Fusion,
Documentum, Eclipse, Front Page, mod_perl, MS Index Server, MS Office,
MS Project, MS Visio, MS Web Server (IIS), S-Designor, Visual Interdev,
Visual Studio, WebTrends, Windows Help System
Operating Systems
HP/UX 11i (Unix), Linux, Novell Netware, OS/2, OS/400, Palm OS,
Windows CE, Windows NT Workstation/Server, Windows 2000
Workstation/Server, Windows 2003 Server, Windows XP/Server, Ubuntu
Application Suites
Baan (light), Hyperion Enterprise, Hyperion Financial Management
(HFM), JDA/Manugistics, JD Edwards (light), MAPICS, Peoplesoft (light),
PRMS, QAD MFG/PRO, SAP