Ahmad Qasim

Project Manager l 7 yrs. of I.T Project Management exp l 8 years expertise in Tech domain l PMP Certified l Leadership| Continuous Improvement l Consultant l Mentor

Project:                                   ServiceNow and SAN Storage Refresh

• Leading a team of 6 technical engineers supervised, monitored, and collaborated with other team’s staff and management team on all systems-related projects.
• Proficiency in using technology tools such as Microsoft Project, JIRA, confluence, Kanban boards.
• Managed Information Technology datacenter project with a budget of $2M and worked with multiple vendors and technical teams at the datacenter.         
• Responsible for end-to-end Project management of Infrastructure delivery projects reporting into client project governance and program management office.
• Handling project for migration of data from legacy corporate share drives and on-prem sites to SharePoint Online with Budget of $ 500,000 while working with different lines of Business within company. 
• Managed complex projects related to transformation and Strategic planning on Cloud and Security within the company. 
• Delivered projects like transformation of services from one vendor to another, Citrix Migration to MFA, Service Now Integration with Azure, Security Technology, Azure Monitoring, Active Directory in Azure (Entra) etc.
• Created Project Description Document, Statement of Work, Kick-off presentations, Organization Breakdown Structure, project plans, issue/risk register, resource forecast tracker, worked with vendor for procurement of software, hardware, and consulting services. 
• Worked closely with financial, business stakeholders for reporting of project 
  status, budget, and billing.

Project:                                    IT Disaster Recovery project

Responsibilities:

• Led the Exercise program (BCP/DR)- Training and Simulations. testing, review, design solutions for existing discrepancies/risks. 
• Major Incident Mgmt.- Lead & facilitate the cross functional response for natural/intentional/accidental incidents that may impact people, property or operations’-designed & implemented the COVID19 response plan & policies. Other incidents managed - Earthquake, Wildfires, Fire, Flooding, Work strike, Power Outage, Network Outage, Pandemic, Civil Unrest, Supply Chain Disruptions etc. 
• Gathered and Documented Business Requirements (BRD) to identify critical applications, servers, and business unit testing of Department of Defense for Disaster Recovery project.
• Planning and coordination the life cycle of new projects along with client and various internal teams.
• Worked with Disaster Recovery team to setup and implement DR plan using VMware SRM end to end with SunGard DR site.
• Gathered Requirements to create Disaster Recovery Test state to define testing strategy.
• Met with stakeholders to understand their vision of Disaster Recovery for their Business processes.
• Authored policies, standards, guidelines, and procedures for the IT enterprise facilities both the on-premises Data Center, collocated Disaster Recovery (DR) Site, 57 nationwide branches of Network Rooms, and both on-premises and remote tape storage facilities. 
• Implemented various projects such as DR Collocation facility, Oracle redundancy and storage expansion, Hitachi Storage expansion, HPE compute servers and Monitoring System.
• Member of the Change Advisory Board and approver of IT facilities changes and implementation such as Server commissioning and decommissioning and all power-related issues for its day-to-day operation.

Infrastructure Project Manager: General Mills Canada                                                                                                                Feb 2018 to March 2020

Project:                                    Application/Systems Migration and DR Recovery

Description:                            Teams: 10+: Business Analysts, Security Analysts, Operations Teams, Network Team, Vendor, Application Vendors

Responsibilities:

• $3 Million Infrastructure/Application and DR environment migration and Testing
• Responsible for end-to-end Project management of Infrastructure delivery projects reporting into client project governance and program management office.
• Lead the project to migrate over 5K VMs to new infrastructure at offsite Datacenter and development plan with technical team to replicate it to SunGard datacenter. 
• Worked directly with client and vendor cross functional teams to successfully deliver variety of projects: virtual and physical server builds across QA, UAT, PROD environments on various platforms; SAN storage upgrades; LTO tape migrations for Data Centre operations, extensive working relationship with IBM/Microsoft on Exchange migrations; GPO testing and promotions, including migrations from In-house exchange2016 to Office 365.
• Engage with the incident response team and lead the process of documenting event details, creating incident response letters (either when requested or proactively based on severity), obtain proper approvals, and distribute final client facing documents. 
• Managed governance and compliance - IT Service Continuity & Disaster Recovery 
• Bridge Business continuity and IT Disaster recovery -Matured the program from App/DB and server testing to End to End business processes.
• Planning and coordination the life cycle of new projects along with client and various internal teams.
• Managed 5-8 projects simultaneously at any given time, completing a total of 10 projects during term of contract, with minimal project change requests.  
• Lead continuous process/change improvement activities on team's existing framework. Create tools and templates to facilitate repeatable processes and document team knowledge.

Creit Management L.P.

Project Coordinator                                                                                                                                                                      Feb 2016 to Dec 2017

• Coordinated and facilitated project planning, execution, and closure activities.
• Assisted in the development and maintenance of project plans, schedules, and budgets.
• Monitored project timelines and milestones, ensuring adherence to deadlines.
• Collaborated with cross-functional teams to gather requirements and define project scopes.
• Prepared and maintained detailed project documentation, including project plans, risk registers, and status reports.
• Conducted regular project status meetings and communicated updates to stakeholders.
• Resolved project-related issues and escalated as needed to ensure project success.
• Implemented project management best practices to improve overall efficiency.
• Tracked and reported project progress to management, highlighting key achievements and potential risks.
• Contributed to the development of project documentation and training materials.
• Assisted in the identification and resolution of project issues.
• Collaborated with team members to ensure project tasks were completed on time.

Rogers Communications Inc.                                                                                                                                      Nov 2014 to Dec 2015

ITSM Analyst

• Implemented and managed ITIL-based IT service management processes, including Incident Management, and Service Request Management in ServiceNow.
• Conducted regular reviews of ITSM processes to identify areas for improvement and optimization.
• Collaborated with cross-functional teams including Business Analysts to design and implement ITSM workflows and procedures.
• Monitored and reported on key performance indicators (KPIs) to assess the effectiveness of ITSM processes.
• Worked closely with stakeholders to gather requirements and ensure alignment with business objectives.
• Provided training and support to end-users on ITSM tools and processes.
• Worked with Project Manager as a Project Resource for implementing SLAs for Service Request Management module in ServiceNow.
• Responsible for setting user accounts in Active Directory and mailboxes in Exchange 2010/2013 and provisioning group mailboxes as per ITIL/ITSM guidance and compliance.
• Responsible for imaging laptops using WSUS and then SCCM.
• Managing AD user accounts, distribution lists, security groups and user permissions.
• Performed weekly/monthly ServiceNow reporting for incident management and performance analytics.
• Responsible for troubleshooting remote printers for sales reps.
• Worked with Active Directory user accounts and OU management on Server 2012 servers.
• Worked on the project of SharePoint migration and migrated end-users’ files and folders into SharePoint sites and resolved any issues involved during migration.
• Worked as on-site walk-up desk support personnel whenever required to resolve end-user issues.
• Responsible for Skype for Business support for end users and escalations.
• Responsible for creating and working with incident tickets and resolving those within SLAs provided using Service Now and Remedy ticketing systems management and user profile administration.
• Performed level 2 support including Exchange support, Active Directory management, file servers and share management and permissions support.

Lindt & Sprungli                                                                                                                                                          April 2012 to Dec 2015

Technical Support

• Responsible for IT inventory and Asset management for the organization client computers 

using ServiceNow, iPhones and iPads using Mobile Iron and SOTI MobiControl, Vendor management, RMAs etc.

• Responsible for working on MAC requests from Department Managers for new hire/terminations or any changes to be made.
• Responsible for creating communication templates for service desk improvements and upgrades.
• Responsible for creating and managing desktop and laptops computer images and deploying them when required.
• Responsible for working on MAC requests from Department Managers for new hire/terminations or any changes to be made.
• Involved as part of the team successfully migrated 300 users from Windows 7 to Windows 8.1
• Involved as team member successfully upgraded 300 users from MS Office 2010 to MS Office 2013.
• Responsible for MS Office applications troubleshooting.
• Responsible for managing video conferencing equipment in executive offices and board rooms.
• Provide Intermediate support of VoIP system on Avaya Phone System.
• Responsible for managing the SAP Based ticketing system.
• Involved in Active Directory setup, maintenance, backup, replication, and migration.
• Troubleshooting Anti-Virus issues using Symantec Anti-Virus Corporate software. Managing licenses and updating client machines.
• Involved in troubleshooting of AD and files servers and decommissioning servers when required. 
• Responsible for creating technical and end-user documentation.
• Responsible for upgrading server and client hardware as required. 
• Involved with higher management for creating managing Group Policies and access management. 
• Responsible for setting up and troubleshooting VPN and certificate services. 
• Responsible for creating and managing user accounts in AD and mailboxes in Exchange Server 2010, 2013.
• Responsible for installing production applications for end users and providing access. Get in touch with application vendors for advance troubleshooting and upgrades. 
• Responsible for granting Lync access to end users and troubleshooting access issues.

EDUCATION & TRAINING

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University of Greenwich, Masters in Information Technology, London, UK – 2006

Oracle SQL Certified - 2011

Oracle Database 11g Certified - 2011

VMware Certified Professional 6.5 – Datacentre Virtualization (VCP5-DCV), 2021

Project Management Certification PMP – 2023

Security Plus Certification – 2023

ITIL v4 Professional Training in SRM, Incident Management and Change Management, 2020

Splunk and Cyberark Training - 2022

SKILLS

__________________________________________________________________________________________

• Excellent communication (written and verbal) and team leadership skills for managing and motivating employees in a fast paced and multi-cultural unionized environment.
• Self-motivated, Adaptive to change, Exceptional communication skills, Advanced analytical, problem solving and decision-making skills.
• Ability to manage multiple projects simultaneously while delivering quality outputs in all projects.
• Hands on experience working with Waterfall and Agile Frameworks.
• Extensive experience in project design phase, collaborating with various teams.
• Software Packages: Proficiency in Microsoft Office 365 Tools, SharePoint, MS Project, Visio, Microsoft Teams. Slack, Jira, Confluence
• Scrum
• SDLC
• Kanban
• Project management
• Project planning
• Business Requirements

References Available Upon Request

University of Greenwich, master’s in information technology, London, UK – 2006

VMware Certified Professional 6.5 – Datacentre Virtualization (VCP5-DCV), 2021

Security Plus Certification – 2023

ITIL v4 Professional Training in SRM, Incident Management and Change Management, 2020

Splunk and Cyberark Training – 2022

MS Azure AZ-900 Certification – In Progress