Employment History
New York Based Law Firm - New York March 2004 - Present
Executive Director/COO
* 1,500 professional, AM LAW 25 law firm operating in New York, Washington DC and six international branch locations with revenues of $475 million.
* Global responsibility for all non-legal operations including Accounting, Marketing, Human Resources, Associate Development, Information Services and Legal Resources. Oversee operating budget of $350 million and manage staff of 850 administrative professionals.
* Ex officio member of Investment and Retirement Committees. Responsible for administrative oversight of the firms retirement program with approximately $300 million in assets under supervision.
* Established working group to assess current management reporting capabilities of the firm and present findings to the Management Committee. Recommendations will include both process and technology improvements to meet future reporting and analysis needs and enhance decision making capabilities to support global practice management and client development.
* Established an IS steering committee to facilitate approval and prioritization of firm-wide technology initiatives. Directed business rationalization exercise on the current inventory of 100 plus projects and implemented a portfolio management model for resource management and monitoring of the top 20 technology initiatives on an ongoing basis.
* Collaborated with space committee, as well as outside design and construction firms, to coordinate build out of an additional 140,000 USF of space to the New York office location.
* Performed organizational review of all major departments resulting in identification of 7 follow-on initiatives, targeting organizational redesign, process efficiency improvements and/or cost reduction efforts.
Big “4” Consulting Firm - New York March 1997 - January 2004
Partner; June, 1999 - January 2004
Senior Manager; March 1997 - June, 1999
* Regional industry lead for Financial Services responsible for oversight and deployment of over 200 FSI practitioners.
* Member of America's FSI leadership team responsible for practice management including annual partner goal setting, experienced hire recruiting and annual staff performance and compensation reviews.
* Personally sold over $75 million and managed over $45 million worth of consulting services to first tier financial services clients including: Goldman Sachs, JPMorganChase, Transamerica, Bear Stearns, TIAA-CREF, MSDW and Societte Generale.
* Established first global strategic alliance to support the firm’s straight through processing solutions delivered to strategic clients, including: Merrill Lynch, Bank of America, Deutsche Bank and Royal Bank of Canada.
* Led Northeast Enterprise Integration Services (EIS) practice responsible for deployment of 90 practitioners and generating approximately $30 million in revenue within the financial services marketplace.
* Led the development of points of view focusing on CFO agenda and strategic use of technology. Topics included: 2nd wave efficiencies of ERP, Finance Transformation and Extended Enterprise, Changing Role of the CFO and Operations and Technology trends within Investment Management.
* Major projects included program management, IT strategy, Finance transformation, cost reduction/performance management, and middle/back-office integration.
Big “5” Consulting Firm - New York August 1993 - March 1997
Principal Consultant; August 1994 - March 1997
Senior Consultant: August 1993 - August 1994
* Sold and led strategic cost management projects including strategic information systems plan development, process redesign and financial systems implementations at clients including The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Allmerica.
* Established the PeopleSoft financials practice for the Northeast. In 2 years, grew practice to 30 practitioners and $13 million in revenue, servicing world class clients including Reed Elsevier, Warner Lambert and Gruner + Jahr.
* Identified potential business sales opportunities while acting as vendor liaison between the firm and emerging financial application vendors. Prioritized and directed internal investment towards partnering opportunities.
Big “5” Consulting Firm - New York July 1990 - August 1993
Senior Consultant; March 1992 - August 1993
Staff Consultant; July 1990 - August 1992
* Delivered technology solutions to fortune 500 clients including The Equitable, Penguin USA and Big “5” Consulting Firm
* Successfully managed the Beta site for initial installation of the PeopleSoft financials application suite.
* Developed PC-based strategic selling toolkit used by the firm’s Partners and Senior Managers to assist in identifying and pursuing complex sales opportunities.
New York Based Life Insurance Company - New York March 1987 - January 1989
Project Analyst
* Member of special projects area working with lead underwriters and actuaries to develop the latest projection and modeling techniques.
* Developed and implemented an in-the-field underwriting program leveraging the latest knowledge-based programming techniques and lap-top computer technology.
Education
New York University, New York, NY. MBA in Finance and International Business; 1990
Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA. Bachelor's Degree in Economics, Minors in Computer Science and History; 1985.
Representative COO Experience
Organizational Review
* Directed the reorganization of several departments including the decommissioning of the Communications Telephone Operators departments, and the merger of Library Services and Knowledge Management into a combined Legal Resources department.
* Assisted in the review of the current legal recruiting process focused on streamlining the existing full-time and summer associate recruiting efforts and establishing a broader on-campus presence at the firm’s target schools. The effort resulted in the hiring of a new Director of Legal Recruiting and a reorganization of the department.
* Established an Operations department to coordinate all facilities and office management functions and hired the firm’s first Director of Operations.
Strategic Planning/Executive Oversight
* Sat on steering committees offering executive direction on several key firm-wide initiatives including the roll out of the firm’s internal knowledge management portal, the transition to an automated transit check system, the design and launch of the firm’s new website and the implementation of a foreign currency capable billing system in Europe.
* Re-established annual branch office manager’s conference to facilitate communication among office managers and establish greater integration between branch offices and the New York home office.
* Established domestic business continuity strategy incorporating a global disaster recovery plan.
Process Efficiency/Cost Management
* Reviewed travel department outsourcing agreement resulting in an annual recurring savings of 10% in travel related costs.
* Initiated project to review the Records department focusing on improving document management efficiency through scanning and electronic storage with the goal of reducing the overall in-house footprint of Records by 50%.
* Successfully converted the firm’s three defined contribution plans to a self-directed, online platform. The project included the selection of a new trustee and investment manager as well as developing a marketing and training program to be roll-out during the conversion.
* Initiated the effort to implement a firm-wide program for establishing standard relocation benefits and assistance for ex-patriots.
* Established program to extend health benefits for retirees with twenty years or more of service to the firm.
* Drove decision to switch the firms healthcare benefits brokers and actuaries which will result in an estimated ongoing annual savings of $300,000.
Investment/Financial Oversight
* Assisted in the development of a hedging program to protect foreign partners’ income against significant currency fluctuations.
* Initiated review of the performance of the firm’s staff pension plan resulting in a shift to a new investment management strategy targeting an additional 200 basis points in excess return with a reduced tracking error.
* Structured and negotiated global long term disability program for all partners of the firm to meet requirements defined in the partnership agreement.
* Led effort to assess the firm’s current life insurance program for partners as required by the partners’ agreement. Developed strategy to implement and convert to a new program offering improved administrative services and capturing an annual savings to the partners of approximately $500,000.
Representative Consulting Experience
Universal Bank - SME engaged to advise executive leadership and assist in program management development on a global finance transformation effort targeted to capture a 30% reduction in costs within 3 years.
Global Investment Bank - Lead partner engaged to redesign global consolidation process. Effort established single global consolidation process and reduced close time by 50%.
Universal Bank - Lead partner in development of methodology to link infrastructure total cost of ownership to line of business (LOB) specific business processes targeting identification of cost saving opportunities averaging 20% per LOB.
Universal Bank - Lead partner in merger integration effort to implement a global single source time tracking system for the entire enterprise, reducing systems from over 50 to 1.
French-based Investment Bank - Lead partner engaged in developing overall financial systems and accounting strategy to provide a universal accounting process through the deployment of an integrated financial system and standardized policies and procedures.
US Brokerage Firm - Lead partner working with client to define decommissioning strategy to migrate legacy heterogeneous systems to a single integrated settlement, product accounting and general ledger environment.
US Asset Manager - Lead partner engaged to incorporate process improvements, better leveraging their recently implemented ERP package. Effort improved data accuracy significantly and reduced monthly close and reporting cycle to an industry best practice of 5 days.
US-based Investment Bank - Lead partner engaged to implement new e-Procurement solution resulting in increasing spend through procurement area from 15% to over 50% with target of 90% within a year.
US-based Investment Bank - Lead partner engaged to assess current financial architecture and develop a financial application strategy leveraging new GL, product accounting and rules engine application.
Global Asset Manager - Lead partner assisting client in redesigning their end-to-end billing and statement creation process which resulted in reducing their billing cycle from 150 days to less than 50 days.
US-based Pension Fund - Led team engaged to redesign the finance functions, leveraging newly purchased financial applications and recommend a strategic systems implementation plan.
US-based Insurance Company - Led team implementing new ledger and management reporting system focused on consolidating finance operations and improving quality and timing of management reports.
Global Consumer Products Firm - redesigned global process to consolidate financial data from all 57 affiliates world-wide to a single corporate ledger.
New York-based Not-for-Profit - Led Team responsible for effort to transform the financial and budgeting organization leading to improved operating efficiencies, enhanced reporting capabilities and capturing associated savings of approximately 15%..
US-based Insurance Company - Led team responsible for implementing a fully integrated management reporting and financial analysis workstation. The effort reduced the number of consolidation systems from 3 to 1 and the monthly reporting cycle by 30%
US-based Publishing Firm - Engaged to re-engineer clients monthly accounting and management reporting processes resulting in a reduction of the monthly close cycle from 21 days to 10 days. |
