Cisco Experts in Germany

• Set-up of the data center in Oberkochen (Defence division)
• Planning of the fiber-optic ring and simulation of Wi-Fi coverage
• Installation plan for WAN and LAN cables for office and production (infrastructure)
• Adaptation of the SAP system (R3) for the Oberkochen site (software)
• IT transformation of the SAP system to SAP HANA
• Planning of network infrastructure and server technologies in the SAP environment
• Pre-sales support and establishment of change management
• Independent coordination of utilities according to time, budget and quality
• Mapping of the project in MS Project and SERVICENow
• Development and design of hardware and software
• Demand management and portfolio management
• Set-up of a risk register and migration plan
• Preparation of payment-supporting documents in coordination with the responsible finance and commercial functions
• Budget: 5 million - 34 FTE

• Strategic planning, detailed technical preparation and operational management of an email gateway migration in a security-critical government environment.
• Preparation of the technical specification and development of technical concepts and migration approaches in line with BSI requirements.
• Technical requirements management with business units, information security and operations.
• Coordination of external service providers, integrators and implementation partners; maintenance of project plans, milestones, resources, risks and dependencies.
• Regular reporting to project management, the program environment and internal stakeholders.

• Development and implementation of tailored information security strategies

• Introduction and further development of ISMS according to ISO 27001, BSI baseline protection, and other standards

• Risk management and creation of security concepts

• Consulting for KRITIS, PCI DSS, TISAX, and VdS 3473/10000

• Building and improving security organizations

• Creation and implementation of guidelines, policies, work instructions, and process descriptions

• Audit support and certification preparation

• Conducting trainings, workshops, and awareness campaigns

• Selection and consulting on the introduction of IT security solutions such as SIEM, DLP, IDS/IPS, firewalls, and encryption technologies

• Conducting penetration tests and vulnerability analyses

• Consulting on the selection, integration, and management of security architectures in complex IT environments

• Consulting on ITSM and managed security services and SOC

• Leading and managing complex projects to improve information security

• Process analysis, optimization, and management according to ITIL, ISO 27001, and cybernetics

• Introduction and quality assurance of management, documentation, and knowledge management systems

• Support in complying with regulatory information security requirements (e.g. GDPR, HIPAA, SOX, GMP, KRITIS)

• Development and implementation of risk analysis procedures

• Organizing initial response, forensic investigations, and organizational measures in the event of security incidents

• Designing and running targeted workshops on topics such as ISMS, IT risks, and current threat scenarios

• Awareness campaigns to promote security culture in companies

• Special trainings on ISO 27001, BSI baseline protection, KRITIS, and other relevant standards

• Simulations and exercises to prepare for information security incidents

• Interim management for leading information security projects or IT security organizations

• Taking on the role of an external CISO (Chief Information Security Officer)

• Support in developing and implementing IT security and corporate strategies

• Coaching and mentoring of managers in the field of information security

• Building and leading security departments as well as recruiting and qualifying employees

• Temporary assumption of management responsibility in critical situations

• Development of a comprehensive transformation model for IT departments and ITSM organizations, from operational stabilization through structuring and optimization to strategic advancement
• Design of a transformation matrix that connects development phases with the implementation activities Position, Focus, Model, Enable, Anchor and Develop
• Development of assessment, maturity and decision-making logic to determine the operational starting point, the appropriate entry point and the prioritized areas of action
• Structuring of an end-to-end approach from current-state assessment and target vision through operating model, roadmap and service modules to implementation and integration into steady-state operations
• Derivation of combinable consulting and implementation modules, including methods, deliverables, role models, governance structures and transformation paths
• Collection, structuring and prioritization of business requirements from the perspectives of IT management, service management and operational roles
• Translation of requirements into target visions, process and role models, decision criteria and traceable deliverables

Environment / Tools: ITIL 4, IT4IT, Operating Model Canvas, SIAM, maturity models Kanban

• Operation and further development of the network and security infrastructure.

• Monitoring, analysis and resolution of network and security incidents.

• Cross-department collaboration with other specialist teams for operations, further development and reporting.

• Firewall vulnerability analysis.

• Firewall rule approvals.

• Troubleshooting IP communication issues in the network and firewall infrastructure.

• Security-critical IT infrastructure, processing of personal data, compliance with legal regulations.

• Products: Palo Alto Networks Firewalls, Cisco ACI, Checkpoint Firewalls, F5

• Technologies: SDN, SDWAN, Cisco EPIC, Cisco ACI

Project: Process optimization & IT support in an insurance broker office.

Project activities:

• Analysis of processes and definition of requirements
• Consulting for the implementation of a cloud solution (soho)
• Installation and verification of new infrastructure HW
• Cloud installation & configuration
• Definition and creation of use cases
• Performing user acceptance tests (UAT)
• User training / training
• IT support (cloud, PC, server, printer, network)

Label: Insurance, infrastructure, configuration, training, support

I served as the Lead Designer for two cross-functional teams at Casavi, a software platform for property managers. Casavi is a central platform for all aspects of digital property management, which streamlines operations and business processes.

SmartTask: The team focuses on ticket management, workflow automation, AI integration, enhancing communication between property managers and their clients.

Customer app/portal: The team is dedicated to fostering community engagement among residents of managed properties. The customer portal in combination with the Casavi app solves the challenges for property and facility managers.

My role spans the full design lifecycle, covering UX/UI design, user research, usability testing, and strategic design planning, across Casavi's web platform, mobile app, and customer portals. Each team comprises around 10 members, including a project manager, designer, developers, and QA testers. I am also responsible for the accessibility assurance of the whole product.

Design unit role: In addition to my core responsibilities, I actively contribute to the development and maintenance of the company's design system and style guide ensuring consistency and scalability across all products. Mentor junior designers is my official and moral responsibility.

Successful delivery of projects on behalf of customers:

• -> 2023 – present: Project management for the consolidation of sites/data centers for a large telecommunications provider (infrastructure project, customer: Telefonica)

• Opening and preparing new sites

• Application migrations

• Decommissioning and handover of old sites

• -> 2021 – 2022: IT multi-project management for a large car leasing company (customer: Athlon)

• Migration of applications to the cloud and to another data center

• Additional projects to expand and optimize the application landscape

• -> 2021: Project management for the development of a platform providing internet access on aircraft operated by various airlines (customer: m3Connect/German Telekom)

• -> 2017-2020: Responsible management of an IP network consolidation (infrastructure project, customer: Cisco/Vodafone) at a large telecommunications provider

• Planning and coordination of migrations and their rollout

• Team leadership and integration of different teams (network operators, hardware and service providers)

• Documenting the current Incident Management, IT Service Request Management, Problem Management, Change Management and Service Configuration Management processes (including CMDB)
• Conducting maturity assessments for these processes based on the ITIL® 4 Maturity Model
• Analyzing the various service value streams based on the ITIL® 4 value stream model
• Agreeing on maturity levels for the assessed processes
• Developing and approving a roadmap to achieve and measure the respective maturity levels
• Presenting the approach, including milestones, to management for approval
• Managing external service providers in 1st Level Support

• Training AI models, evaluating images and text UI/UX, turning the provided data into insights through OpenAI Feather as part of the machine learning workflow

Technologies: OpenAI Feather

• Delivery of various end-customer projects in server and network infrastructure on time, in quality, and within budget.
• Project 1: Firewall renewal, replacement of an ASA firewall with a Fortinet firewall at an automotive supplier.
• Project 2: Migration of file services from dedicated servers at 5 branch locations into a central managed file service, including DHCP, directory, and print services, as well as decommissioning of the old domain controllers.
• Project 3: Renewal of the network infrastructure at the headquarters and branch locations of a logistics company and transition of the LAN, WLAN, and firewall environments into a managed network service.
• Project 4: Network renewal, replacement of the core and access switches at the headquarters of a medical technology company and transition into a managed network service.
• Project 5: Firewall renewal, replacement of an ASA firewall with a Fortinet firewall for a city.
• Environment: ASA and Fortinet firewalls, Cisco network components, ITSM Heat/Ivanti, Confluence.

• Technical leadership and further development of a team of 28 IT staff (internal & external) in the areas HelpDesk/HelpLine, RHEL (Red Hat), MUREX (trading system & applications), SAP basis operations
• Managing external service providers (including FI-TS for SAP basis operations)
• Personnel, resource and budget planning for the IT department and projects
• Introducing and establishing regular communication formats (weekly status meetings, team and cross-department meetings)
• Ensuring application operations in a hybrid environment (Windows/Linux with database and web/application servers)
• Supporting transformation projects to modernize the application landscape (e.g. DevOps approaches)
• Setting up and implementing a digital IT procurement for hardware & software (e.g. with DELL)
• Developing and managing the "IT Operations DOS" department based on corporate strategy
• Preparing management reports & decision papers on IT projects, optimization potential and automation opportunities
• Representing the department in the advisory boards of the Rentenbank and ensuring regulatory compliance (BaFin §44, GDPR, BSI, MaRisk)

• Challenging consulting services as well as interim, transformation, program and project management
• Program Manager for dormakaba International Holding AG: responsible for the SAP rollout in the German subsidiary consisting of 16 projects for Sales, Service, Operation and Finance, preparation through a fit template pre-project, development and formulation of end-to-end business processes, guidance and coaching of the business in use case and technical concept creation, introduction of integration test concept and implementation of integration tests
• Senior consultant for AGRAVIS Raiffeisen AG: specification of ITSM processes Incident and Release Management based on ITIL, examination of implementation options with SAP Solution Manager, managing the cutover of an SAP project
• Interim manager for bofrost DL GmbH & Co. KG: analysis and redesign of the existing business process model, management of strategic PMO including control of project portfolio management (up to 40 projects), project initiation process management, coaching of project managers, comprehensive reporting, ensuring economic viability of all projects, direct reporting to the advisory board, guidance for process and ITSM areas, management of strategic program including greenfield approach, system landscape redesign, end-to-end process introduction, CRM POC and platform provider beauty contest, development of target specifications using LEAN A3, design and implementation of POC with two platform providers
• Program Manager/PMO/PPM for Henkel KGaA global SCM consolidation: management of international template team for SAP landscape redesign, management of strategic partner Accenture
• Program Manager/PMO/PPM for Henkel KGaA migration from SAP BW to Microsoft BI: complete development lifecycle, transition of services to Accenture and hosting from HP to IBM, implementation according to PMI-based and agile standards, management of 20 projects, turnaround program setup, root cause analysis, contract amendments, governance, reporting, controlling, coaching of up to 60 employees, 20 MEUR budget, all milestones achieved on time and within budget
• Program Manager/PMO M&A IT for Henkel KGaA: SAP rollout and infrastructure transition worldwide after acquisition, carve-out management, onboarding of approx. 5 000 new SAP users, consolidation of servers and data centres, management of 30 projects across WEU, CEE, LA, NA and AP, PMI-based implementation, governance setup, coaching of up to 150 employees, 85 MEUR budget, 300 people worldwide, international tender management with providers such as Accenture, IBM, HP and Cisco, program completed on time, on quality and below budget
• Interim Manager for Bertelsmann AG: strategic IT sourcing program for Corporate CIO including six projects, planning, controlling, reporting, coaching, quality management, stakeholder management, contract transitions, development of system to verify savings, achieved 20% above planned savings
• Interim Manager IT Governance for Henkel KGaA: professionalisation of IT service management, audit and development of PMI-based project management process with group adaptations, group-wide rollout of ITIL processes incident, problem and change management
• Agile project for ALDI-Sued: finalisation and implementation of demand management process for IT requirements with interfaces to other processes and service catalogue
• Senior Consultant for hagebau IT GmbH: analysis of business processes, conception and implementation of NDA, RFI and RFP for Managed IT Services tender with EUR 30 million volume, transition planning of two data centres to Atos managed services, development of service catalogue and cost allocation model
• Interim Manager for Henkel KGaA: development of international resource management system for global IT to improve cost and capacity control, agile planning, controlling and scope management, realization of 25% capacity reserves
• Interim Manager for Netrada GmbH: professionalisation of IT service management, conception and creation of 16 SLAs, process analysis and documentation, service quality objectivisation reducing ad hoc workload by approx. 20%
• Senior Consultant for Saudi Telecom: introduction of PMI-based project management process, development of PMO, coaching of employees, support in acquisition of customer projects by applying the introduced method

Europe-wide re-platforming & centralization

• Independently created the migration concept and implementation plan for the Europe-wide centralization and consolidation of IT services for around 20 European companies as part of a re-platforming program.
• Migration assessment: analysis of the existing IT, infrastructure, application, and service landscapes of the companies as the basis for the migration strategy.
• Development of the centralized target vision and target architecture based on a modern technology stack, taking platform and containerization approaches into account.
• Design of a highly available central infrastructure in an active-active model across two data centers; consideration of cloud, infrastructure, application, CMDB, and IAM services.
• Development of the migration and transformation roadmap, including defining migration waves, dependencies, requirements, and priorities for the move from decentralized services to the central platform.
• Analysis of technical and organizational dependencies, identification of migration risks, and development of a structured approach for step-by-step migration and centralization.
• Creation of target, solution, and implementation views for each service domain; design of the end-to-end join-move-leave process as a blueprint for the European rollout (Jira/Jira Asset Management).
• Alignment of migration strategy and roadmap with European companies, management, IT, providers, and other stakeholders; presentation of the 12-month roadmap to the Managing Director Europe.