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  B. Diane Blackwood

PROFILE:  Analytical Applications Architect experienced in successful management and team building with diverse groups of people with in-depth understanding of emerging technologies and their practical applications.  Architect business intelligence in interaction with multiple systems and software applications.

Extensive experience in multiple industries and can lead businesses in the following:

•     Implementing business intelligence and informatics solutions

•      Bridging the gap between development, design and management teams

•      Managing programs and projects including selecting systems and software

•      Initiating and sustaining process improvement  

Apr 2017 to present - BendixKing
IT Project Manager

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May 2008 to Apr 2017 - Strafford Technology LLC.
Project Manager/Senior Business Performance Management Consultant/Senior Business Intelligence Consultant

Full cycle project management specializing in Business Intelligence implementations completing projects on time and within budget. Process engineering with JAD principles and Agile project management.

•          Delivered 10 successful new full cycle Business Intelligence software implementations and 7 upgrades including customizations and additions of functionality.

•          Achieved 3 successful data warehouse designs and implementations including one with a unique calendar-weeks-in-month reporting calendar.

•          Guided 4 fiscal year conversions; and implemented complicated automated load and consolidation processes including designing formulas with custom drivers for 5 companies.

•          For one subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, developed custom sales reporting with automated distribution resulting in sales figures emailed out to international sales staff 1 hour after final daily figures reported reducing the turn-around time by 12 hours.  

•          Increased visibility into patient care, prescribing patterns and profitability  for 2 hospitals and a clinic using QlikView as the front end delivery for custom data warehouses combining data from multiple source systems

•          Creating transaction to reporting solutions with Analysis Services and SQL Server, Outlooksoft (SAP BPC), Infor MPC (BPA, CPM, PM10) relational and Analysis Services, Microsoft BI suite, QlikView and SAS FM; including upgrades and customizations reducing time gap from financial close to business reporting.

Aug 2005 to May 2008 - RSM McGladrey Inc, Division of H&R Block
Manager, CFO Advisory Services - National Consulting Practice
 

Full cycle project management specializing in Corporate Performance Management Consolidation and Reporting implementations for industries ranging from micro-electronics to heavy equipment manufacturing, insurance, medical & health care, legal, and retail sales industries. Lead teams from planning to implementation of business applications.

•          Helped a client resolve a significant reconciliation issue between their transaction system and their General Ledger by taking a systematic approach in identifying and quantifying the issues, fixing the problem, and putting the controls in place to ensure the errors would not happen again.

•          Rescued a client implement of a CPM package after the client had tried and failed twice previously without our assistance. Instrumental in understanding why the previous implementations had failed, I put forward a more reasonable scope, approach, and utilization of the software for the client implementation to be successful.

•          Contributed to audit team projects by providing technical and database support so that the audit reporting was accurate and timely.

Oct 1999 to Aug 2005 - Kirkland & Ellis LLP, Chicago, Illinois
Applications Development Specialist 
Business Systems Analyst, Integration Specialist and Programmer/Analyst

• Realized the Chief Financial Officer’s vision of a Management Dashboard opening with four quadrants leading to detailed information - first person to integrate Comshare and SharePoint websites to realize this vision. 
• Created and maintained accounting and financial analysis programs including identifying and correcting Y2K potential issues before they became problems. 
• Recognized gaps in processes and designed solutions, then persuaded stakeholders to adopt those solutions becoming the ad-hoc systems integration specialist. Integrated Microsoft applications, Lotus Notes/Domino, intranet applications, SQL Server and iSeries (AS/400).
• Implemented a programmatic data consolidation and extraction for the anual partnership contribution reporting reducing the report preparation time from three weeks to three hours. 
• For more information follow this link

 Languages: RPG400, RPG-ILE, Assembler (mainframe), AS/400 CL, Basic, C/C++/C#, COBOL, FORTRAN, HTML, IBM 370 JCL, Java, MDX, Pascal, Perl, PL/I, R, SAS, SQL (Microsoft, Oracle and IBM), Visual Basic.

Software: Analysis Services (Microsoft OLAP);  Access (95-2010); Application Studio; ASP;  BPA 10; BPC (SAP); Cognos (9,10); Cognos Planning 9; Crystal Reports; DBU; DTS; Excel (95- 2016); FDC (GEAC; Comshare); FrontPage; GEAC Infor MPC V4.5 through 10.4 (BPA, PM10); Hyperion Financial Management; J.D. Edwards; KBSQL; LMS IV & V; Microsoft Dynamics/Financials (Great Plains); MPC (Infor GEAC Comshare) V4.5- 10.4; MS Office; Microsoft BI Suite;  OLAP MS Analysis Services; MS Project; Oracle PL/SQL; Oracle BI Desktop and Cloud; OutlookSoft; Pagemaker; PerformancePoint; Photoshop; PM10; QlikView; QlikSense; Quick Books; Quicken; Rippe & Kingston LMS IV & V; SQL Reporting Services(SSRS); SAP BPC; SAS; SAS FM (4.2; 4.3); SAS HCM; SharePoint; SPSS; SQL Anywhere; SSIS; SSMS; SSRS; Tableau; Talend; Visio; VBS; Visual Studio; VSAM; Wordpress; Websphere.  ETL programming in MS-BIDS, Talend, SAS.

Databases: : MS SQL Server 2000-2016; Oracle(9-12); Linux; Sybase IQ; AS/400 DB2 (iSeries); MySQL; PostgreSQL; HBOC on UNIX; Raintree.  

2013                 SAP BPC 10 NW Certification

2010                 KB-SQL for HBOC.  Sybase IQ 7 install, tuning and maintenance.  

2008                QlikView

2007                Outlooksoft 4.3-5.1 (SAP)

2006                 SAS FM, HCM, SAS Programming I & II, Data Integration Studio and Installation.

2005                 IBM certified DBA.

2004                 MBA II certification, Tulane University - Freeman School of Business - International Business

2003                 Microsoft M2072 SQL Server Administration.

2002                 Microsoft M2093 advanced MDX for OLAP with Analysis Services.

2001                 Fall Common Users Group speaker (Intro to Integration Methods); IBM certification RPG IV(RPG ILE).

2000                 AS/400 System Operators advanced training. Instructor – Intro to Computers – Robert Morris College

1999                 AS/400 Application Development from Computer Systems Institute, Skokie , Illinois consisting of an intensive six month course including 240 hours of lecture and 300 lab hours. RPG III, RPG IV, & CL.

1996                 MA in Sociology, University of North Dakota.  Extensive statistical analysis using SPSS and SAS.

1991                 BA in Sociology, University of North Dakota. (cum laude)  Focus areas:  Marketing Research and Organizational Communications, minors in Computer Science and Accounting. 

· 2012 - present Member and presenter SQL-Pass      

· 2006 - 2008 Member American Management Association. Member of and webmaster for the International Press Club of Chicago. 

· 2000 - 2003 Newsletter editor Omni Users Group

· 1999 - 2006 Member Omni Users Group (Chicagoland AS/400 programmers organization). Member Common Users Group (midrange computers users group)

· 1997 - 2000 Director of Publications for the 58th World Science Fiction Convention held in Chicago Labor Day weekend in year 2000.  Responsibilities of budgeting and financial decisions, web-page management, press relations, publicity, recruiting staff for editing, production, and advertising sales for seven reports to membership of 6000+, conference program book, on-site daily bulletins, on-site web updates. 

· 1995  Chairman of small, international academic conference (SFRA),  instrumental in developing program for Grand Forks, North Dakota, handled all aspects of convention production which included facilities liaison, promotion and fund raising, and staff recruitment.  Supervised program design and implementation, budgeting and accounting.

· 1994  Hotel liaison and programming shift supervisor for the international (54th)World Science Fiction Convention.  Responsibilities included contract negotiations and on-site innovation and implementation of solutions to  problems for 3500 participants.
 
· 1994-1997  Non-fiction editor of the SFRA Review, an academic book review and news journal for the Science Fiction Research Association.