2007 - Present
CLIFFSIDE CONSULTING, LLC
Stewartsville, New Jersey
PRESIDENT
Client: Heller Erhman, LLP (2007 - 2008)
Recruited by a former manager and business colleague to join a group of five independent consultants, supporting a prominent IP law firm in a patent litigation case involving dozens of defendant companies. My role was to provide analysis of defendant’s telecommunications systems such as PBX, Computer Telephony Integration, Interactive Voice Response applications and call center operations; to assess alleged claims of patent infringement against a portfolio of granted patents; and to provide technical support to the attorneys during defendant depositions. My work product included both oral and written reports provided to the Intellectual Property attorneys and the expert witnesses.
1982 - 2007
AT&T
Bedminster, New Jersey
DIRECTOR PRODUCT MARKETING, BUSINESS SERVICES (2002 - 2007)
Promoted to manage the $38.5 Million, multi-year, development, deployment and market launch program for VoiceTone(R), AT&T's Natural Language Understanding Speech Recognition service for large-volume contact center operations. The creation of this service represents the final stage of technology transfer for the speech technology developed during my two previous positions.
Upon successful market launch of the service followed by a 50% reduction in the product team staff, I was assigned additional Product Management responsibilities including P&L for a $40 Million portfolio of legacy services and a team of 5 product managers, along with Business Planning for a larger portfolio of services totaling $115 Million in annual revenue.
- Grew new product revenue by 56.4% CAGR over three years
- Improved EBIT for the portfolio by $51.2 Million in two years by
aggressive cost management, targeted investments and retirement of
underperforming services
- Reduced vendor costs 27.1% on a base of $19.2 Million by contract
negotiations, and eliminating underutilized vendors
- Developed and managed portfolio roadmaps and product requirements
- Lead seven product release projects through an SDLC-based process,
including initial product launch
- Developed and tracked business cases and benefit realization valuations
- Implemented Long Range Incremental Cost modeling to achieve competitive
pricing and ensure long-term profitability of the product portfolio
2000 - 2002
PROGRAM MANAGER, CUSTOMER CARE - VOICE TECHNOLOGY
Recruited by former manager to consult with the leadership team to develop and manage the business strategies for the prioritization and implementation of advanced customer service technology in support of the customer care transformation initiative. Lead the project team in the data mining and analysis of a base of 54.0 Million consumer accounts, 88.1 Million annual service calls, customer segmentation data, contact resolution data and an analysis of more than 50,000 transcribed speech samples from customer service calls. The primary objective was to increase the customer utilization of, and customer satisfaction with, self service options within the Interactive Voice Response applications.
- Project managed the development and successful implementation of Speech
Recognition and Natural Language Understanding applications
capitalizing on the technology advances developed during the research
programs managed in my previous assignment
- Improved net earnings by $20 Million annually, through cost savings and
increased customer retention
- Increased customer retention by 18%, reduced same-day repeat calls by
25% and reduced customer service complaints by 75%
1996 - 2000
PRODUCT MANAGER, PRODUCT STRATEGY & DEVELOPMENT
Proposed the creation of a position focused on the business and technical development of next generation Speech Recognition capabilities to build upon the success from my previous position. The new position became the Consumer Services liaison to AT&T Labs research teams for the business development of technologies such as Spoken Language Understanding, Dialog Automation, Automatic Speech Recognition, and Speaker Verification. In 1998 I was assigned responsibility for directing all aspects of product development for new consumer oriented communications services utilizing speech recognition, VoiceXML and IP telephony technologies.
- Developed service concepts and managed the development, implementation
and post-trial performance analysis of five new services, leading to
commercial implementation as part of the Watson speech recognition and
Natural Voices text-to-speech software; CallVantage(R)and VoiceTone(R)
services
- Managed $2 Million annual development budget
- Planned and executed market research to evaluate product positioning,
market acceptance and potential market sizing
- Created business cases and position papers supporting R&D priorities
for Consumer Services
1992 - 1996
PRODUCT MANAGER, CONSUMER SERVICES
Assigned responsibility for reducing the cost of operator handled calling card, collect, third-number and person-person calling, by expanding the use of speech recognition within network call processing applications.
- Project managed the design, development and implementation of automatic
speech recognition (ASR) and automated network call processing
applications
- Managed customer research and application design studies
- Successfully protected revenues in excess of $300 Million annually, by
conceiving strategies to defend against potential Federal and State
Utility Commissions rulings enacted in response to the implementation
of automated operator services
- Achieved cost savings of $60 Million annually
1990 - 1992
Lead Analyst, Consumer Services Revenue Analysis & Forecasting
Managed a team of two analysts in the development of usage and stimulation analyses for Calling Card and Operator Services used to develop revenue and volume forecasts for the newly created product management organization. Managed market share analysis and reporting process.
1988 - 1990
MANAGER, CORPORATE FINANCIAL PLANNING
Promoted by former supervisor to manage a team of three analysts responsible for the development and consolidation of annual operational budgets for the corporate finance organizations. Coordinated the organizational and budgeting transition from a single corporate finance support organization into business unit specific support teams.
1987 - 1988
ASSISTANT PRODUCT MANAGER, UNIT COST & PRICING
Promoted to aid the development of the internal accounting methodologies to track and analyze the unit cost of providing telecommunications services to AT&T business units. Developed pricing schedules to ensure each service line fully recovered internal costs. Coordinated benchmarking of the unit costs.
1986 - 1987
FINANCIAL ANALYST, CONSUMER MARKETS
Promoted and relocated to corporate headquarters. Coordinated the monthly tracking, results analysis and reporting for the Vice President of Consumer Marketing along with sales forecasts and budget requirements for the annual business plan.
1984 - 1986
FINANCIAL ANALYST, DATA SYSTEMS & CORPORATE OPERATIONS
Promoted to assume Systems Administration role for a newly developed financial reporting system which integrated the General Ledger and Accounts Receivable databases. Responsibilities expanded to include coordination of the monthly inter-departmental billing process for computer resource usage and development of “own versus lease” cost studies on the construction and operation of corporate data centers. Also, designed and programmed the desktop financial models used to standardize the financial analysis of corporate real estate lease projects, eliminating the need for submission to centralized analysts and a 24 hour turn-around for approval.
1982 - 1984
COMMUNICATIONS CONSULTANT, AT&T INFORMATION SYSTEMS
Position was originally with Southwestern Bell Telephone and transferred to AT&T Information systems in 1984 in accordance with the Modified Final Judgment requiring AT&T to divest local telephone service assets.
Provided technical sales support for data transport services and telecommunications systems to national accounts in the chemical processing and data processing industries in Houston, TX.
EDUCATION: Postgraduate studies at the University of Houston, Houston,
TX, 1984; University of Central Florida, Orlando, FL, 1985
BS, Business Administration & Economics, cum laude, Olivet
Nazarene University, Bourbonnais, IL - 1981
AWARDS & PATENTS
- 2004 AT&T Strategic Patent award for creating business value in excess
of $100 Million from the Automated Call Router System and Method patent
# 5675707
- 2002 AT&T Software Excellence award for innovation
- 2001 AT&T Circle of Excellence award for achieving outstanding business
results
- 1997 Automated Call Router System and Method, US Patent #5675707 (Also
granted in Canada, France, Germany and Great Britain)
- 1994 AT&T Spirit of Communication award for achieving outstanding
business results.
- 1992 Chosen to interview Business Unit executives and write the
Leadership section of the 1992 Malcolm Baldrige National Quality award
application for the Consumer Services division. |
