Jon is an IT director with 14 years’ experience in delivering strategic IT management with a clear business focus. He is an excellent communicator who can deliver effective Board level presentations on all interactions between IT and the business.
He understands the realities faced by SMEs in delivering effective IT services with limited resources having had broad hands-on experience as a ‘one-man IT department’. He has also run helpdesk teams in the advertising/media sector and for an international Business Information corporation delivering online services.
Working within the EMEA IT Manager’s team of a global pharmaceutical and chemicals manufacturing company, Jon was responsible for implementing measurable process improvements which were recognised by International Standards Organisation certifications for Quality Management (ISO 9000), Service Delivery (ISO 20000) and Information Security (ISO 27001).
As UK IT Director for a global music publishing company, Jon streamlined Enterprise Resource Planning and Warehouse Management Systems to deliver products through both traditional mail order and digital download.
His focus is on ensuring that IT provision is driven by and aligned with business need rather than being an end in itself – or, as he puts it, “IT without the geek factor”.
Specialist areas:
- IT Director
- Information security
- Disaster Recovery Planning (Service Continuity) and data backup
- Business risk assessment and mitigation
- Cost control of IT budgets
- E-commerce websites with card payment processing (PCI Data Security Standard)
- Major software systems implementation and upgrade (especially CRM, ERP, WMS)
- IT infrastructure and phone systems overhaul
- Vendor selection and 3rd party supplier and contract management
- Data extraction and management information reporting
- Designing and documenting robust business processes
- Project management
- Data mining for direct mail
Industry sectors:
- Mail order processing
- Warehousing
- E-commerce
- Credit card processing
- Call centres
- Direct mail
- Music publishing
Recent projects have included:
- Replacing a legacy Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system with a new ‘best-in-class’ mail order solution (€750k). The whole project management life cycle included business requirements analysis, vendor selection, budget approval and system implementation using documented and structured project management methodologies. Working effectively with stakeholders to identify real business requirements, and with IT developers to focus on business needs ensured the project delivered its business benefits.
- Introducing structured business processes around a new £500k ERP and warehouse management system (WMS). This enabled business users, many of them ‘creatives’, to get the most from the IT investment and ensure its alignment with the business need.
- Replacing the full IT infrastructure for a €20m business, including server room rebuild, to reduce business risk and improve disaster recovery. Implementing a full business risk assessment and proven disaster recovery plan.
- Upgrading the phone system for a 24-seat, seven day a week call centre. This enabled customers to route more effectively to staff with the correct skills. Thus call times were reduced and order processing efficiency went up.
- Working with third party vendors to deliver new e-commerce websites with credit card processing and integration to back office warehouse systems. The e commerce sales channel grew from nothing to 30% in six years with various sites, upgrades and cosmetic overhauls. Guided the business to achieve Visa and Mastercard’s mandatory PCI DSS data security standard.
- Implementing Customer Relationship Management (CRM) with a management information reporting portal (Crystal Reports and SQL). This gave field sales staff easy and reliable sales history information to manage their customers, and their managers accurate metrics to monitor team performance.
- Defining business training needs and implementing appropriate training structures and interventions either personally or through the commissioning of third party providers.
- Rolling out best IT practice processes (ITIL) for incident, problem, change and release management to improve end-user IT support and reduce business risk. Creating mandatory version-controlled documentation for all material IT systems/processes.
- Introducing Orion solar winds network monitoring system for availability and capacity management to facilitate a measurable alignment of IT provision and spend to the business need.
A former Christian Minister with a degree in theology from the University of Wales, Jon is an excellent communicator with strong interpersonal skills who can deliver effective Board level presentations on all interactions between IT and the business. He was awarded an ITIL foundation certificate in service management in 2010 with a pass mark of 95%.