Overall Accomplishments:
Throughout my employment at Artisoft, on a regular basis I interact with other departments within the company to create, monitor, and modify policies and procedures with regard to customer support. Working with the team of supervisors I was involved in the creation and implementation of a service improvement plan which increased service levels to our customers in excess of 50% while reducing the technical support staff by 40%. I have been responsible for the management of the Artisoft Express Technical Consulting, a pay-per-call service offered to our customers. I designed and implemented a system which reduced the occurrences of a caller wishing to use the pay service receiving a busy signal (no technicians available) by 50% without any increase in headcount. I am directly involved in the hiring process for new analysts. I am a board member and have chaired "Customer Focus First", a weekly meeting of approximately 1/3 of the company where we hold focus groups with our customers via telephone conference calls. I have been twice nominated for the Customer Focus Champion Award for my dedication to customer satisfaction. I have developed and implemented several customer satisfaction surveys, and am responsible for analyzing and acting upon data collected from those surveys. I have worked directly with the CEO in resolving complex customer service and support issues involving crucial major customers, and on several occasions have saved those accounts from migrating to our competitors' products. I have been responsible for the coordination of all our electronic support services, including the ArtiFacts BBS, the Artisoft CompuServe forum, and the Artisoft Home Page on the World Wide Web. I have assisted in the management of the Aspect telephone system, reviewing, revising, and implementing menu and messaging structures. In April of 1992 I was assigned a three month tour in Australia to assist in starting up our Pacific Rim office. I was responsible for establishing and training the Technical Support Department in Sidney, as well as attending trade shows and conducting seminars throughout Australia and New Zealand. In July through August of 1992, I accompanied the Director of International Sales and Support on several tours of Latin America to train our international distributors on the technical aspects of our products, as well as attending trade shows and conducting seminars. As a direct result of those tours, sales of Artisoft products in Latin America increased by over 1,000%.
Senior Technical Support Analyst
October 1996 to present
As a result of a re-organization of the structure of the Customer Support department, I was chosen to assume the position of Senior Technical Support Analyst. This was due to my retention of technical knowledge during the period I was a supervisor, a role which removes one from the technical portion of the support organization, and my high level of customer focus. I field telephone calls for technical assistance from our top-level resellers and customers using fee-based technical support. I lead a group of 10 level II support analysts in providing technical assistance with Artisoft's newest products, including Internet applications and telephony software and hardware. I am responsible for coaching my associates and preparing and delivering monthly skill reviews and quarterly performance reviews.
Technical Support Supervisor
February 1994 to October 1996
I directly supervised a group of ten Support Analysts IIs and two Senior Support Analysts in Artisoft's award winning technical support department. My main responsibility was to mentor, coach, and review my analysts' performance to ensure the highest possible level of service was delivered to Artisoft customers. I also assisted in the supervision of the entire Technical Support Department, which consisted of 58 Analysts of varying levels.
Lead Technical Support Specialist, Remote Communications and Third-Party Hardware
February 1992 to February 1994
I lead a group of approximately 7 analysts who fielded calls for technical assistance on Artisoft's "specialty" products, including all modem related and third party network interface card products. While leading this group of specialists, my group consistently maintained the highest level of performance of the entire technical support organization. This was especially challenging and rewarding, as my group was the first to learn and support the new Artisoft products coming to market at the time. I authored numerous technical bulletins regarding installation and problem solving of Artisoft products.
Technical Support Representative
January 1991 to February 1992
I fielded customer calls for assistance on the entire line of Artisoft products. While in this position, I demonstrated the ability to learn new and existing technologies very quickly, and rapidly became one of the highest performers in the technical support department.
May 1989 - November 1991: Flagstaff Engineering Flagstaff, AZ
Technical Support Manager
I coordinated all activities of the technical support and repair staff in providing assistance to customers installing and using Flagstaff Engineering's PC based data conversion sub-systems, fielding approximately 150 calls per day. I was responsible for the design, implementation, and modification of procedures for tracking products returned for repair or replacement. I also provided technical pre-sales information for sales staff in answering customers' configuration and specification questions.
Local Area Network Administrator
I controlled all phases of a 50 node Novell network using Netware v2.12. I was responsible for the setup and maintenance of the individual workstations, and installed network and stand-alone software packages. I controlled and coordinated the upgrade from Netware v2.12 to Netware 386 v3.1.
Electronic Bulletin Board System Operator (SysOp)
I established and maintained the BBS, coordinating files and bulletins available for download for entitled users of Flagstaff Engineering's Software and hardware products.
May 1987 - April 1989: Golightly Tire & Associates Flagstaff, AZ
Front Counter Manager
I fielded calls for sales and service both over the telephone and in person for northern Arizona's largest distributor of tires, batteries, and accessories. I coordinated all activities of service personnel and dispatched on site trucks and personnel. I controlled the generation and reconciliation of work orders and invoices for consumers and resellers of our products. I also performed first level diagnostics of the in-house mainframe computer system.
April 1986 - May 1987: Copperstate Computers Flagstaff, AZ
Store Manager
I managed all aspects of operations of a retail computer outlet, including opening, closing, employee scheduling, and cash register balancing. I assisted customers with the post-purchase setup and support of their computer systems.
December 1984 - December 1986: Applied Software Techniques Phoenix, AZ
Systems Support Specialist
I assisted in the design, implementation, and maintenance of hardware and software accounting applications designed specifically for the medical and legal professions. I was directly responsible for translating application programs from one mainframe running the MIIS operating system to a larger mainframe using MUMPS. Working directly with our customers, I evaluated their specialized needs and designed custom software programs to fit those needs. I maintained both time-share mainframes serving over 100 clients in the metro-Phoenix area via 9600 baud modem connections, and coordinated their conversion to their own turnkey systems. I developed an optical character recognition software system for use in legal document processing.
May 1977 - November 1984: Elmer Hubbard Jr., Chevron Wholesale Jobber Flagstaff, AZ
Vice-President/Operations Manager
I managed all operations of one of the largest bulk petroleum distributorships in northern Arizona, including order entry and dispatch, inventory control, and accounts receivable in excess of $3 million per year. As our company became computerized, I controlled all billing activities at the main plant and three satellite plants, utilizing modem communication technologies. When I realized the pre-written software would not fulfill our needs, I taught myself the MIIS and MUMPS programming languages and re-wrote the application software to fit our accounting needs. I was also in charge of training users on the use of the new computerized accounting systems.
Hardware Systems Experience:
Data General S130-S140 Series
Digital Equipment Corp. P350 Series
Commodore Computers
Apple Computers (including MacIntosh)
IBM PC Systems (8088 through Pentium)
IBM AS400 (limited)
Operating Systems Experience:
MIIS/MUMPS
Commodore DOS
MS DOS v3.x through 6.22
LANtastic v3.01 through 7.0
Novell Netware v2.12 through 4.10
Windows v3.1
Windows for Workgroups v3.11
Windows 95
Windows NT 3.51 and 4.0 (limited)
Unix (limited)
NetBios Communications
TCP/IP
HTML WEB Page Authoring
Education History:
1997 Continuious training at Artisoft in the areas of Networking, Internet, and Telephony
1984 Miller Institute of Technology, Computer Programming
1977 University Of Arizona, General Studies
1976 Flagstaff High School, Graduated
I have attended the following in-house management training courses while employed at Artisoft:
* Time and Performance Management
* Behavioral Styles for Managers (2 parts)
* Problem Solving and Decision Making
* Conducting Performance Appraisals
* Telephone Skills
* Stress Management
* Meeting for Results
* Project Management
Salary history and references available upon request.