Michael Portwood

Michael C. Fina Company

, New York, NY

2013 - present

Director, Client Facing Technologies

Working directly for the Chief Operating Officer, architected the modernization of this leading global employee recognition company’s ecommerce and social media service offerings by leveraging cloud computing coupled with responsive web design to deliver optimized smartphone, tablet, and desktop immersive experiences. Managed the technology portfolio accounting for over 85% of the company’s income. Technologies include Amazon AWS, Ruby on Rails, Perl, PostgreSQL, Linux, Apache, Heroku, semantic markup using HTML5 and CSS3. Accountable for the business analysis, architecture, engineering, quality assurance, release management, and data development functions. Managed vendor relationships including offshore and near-shore contractors, usability consultants, and SSAE16 auditors.

• Increased development efficiency over 400% by implementing a customer-centric agile methodology.
• Reduced delivery cycle frequency to 2 weeks, realizing early revenue generation opportunities.
• Improved client application issue resolution time by 92%.
• Migrated data centers into Amazon AWS realizing significant cost savings and operational benefits.
• Improved customers’ experiences by leveraging untapped server capabilities including response compression, image optimization, and asset management.
• Developed an engineered quality program based upon behavior-driven development (BDD), multi-tiered regression and automated architectural quality analyses.
• Rolled out ITIL framework improving organizational quality and reliability.
• Implemented a professional talent development program emphasizing soft skills and full business engagement.

The Nielsen Company

, Lancaster, PA

2003 - 2012

Team Manager and Vice President, Application Development

Directed the transformation of this consumer insights company’s offerings into a platformed web and mobile-based global presence leveraging the multi-tenant Software as a Service (SaaS) model. Client-facing services were delivered via web browsers, web services, and smartphone devices. Responsible for business analysis, architecture, engineering, quality assurance, release management, technical and customer support documentation departments distributed across seven locations. Managed the technology portfolio accounting for over 95% of the Spectra brand’s income.

• Developed an agile leadership methodology that addresses agile execution issues, enhances corporate governance, and contributes to improved staff performance and satisfaction with low turnover.
• Built an employee engagement model for a technology team resulting in 1% annual turnover.
• Increased development efficiency over 1,700% without staffing increases by implementing agile development methodologies that yield $50M in annual efficiency savings.
• Improved delivery cycle frequency from 18 months to 2 weeks, realizing early revenue generation opportunities.
• Reduced fielded defects to exceed 1 per 100,000 lines of executable code resulting in $6M annual cost savings.
• Replaced 23 products with a single platform architecture that met budget and timeline resulting in no customer loss.
• Directed deployment improvements resulting in essentially zero service downtime.
• Delivering up to 70% annual training budget by leveraging state economic development grants.
• Selected and led the implementation of the Deming corporate quality program.

Exuberance

, Baton Rouge, LA

2000 - 2003

Chief Technology Officer

Delivered the product technology roadmap for this enterprise rapid application development (RAD) software tool company. The Exuberance™ product simplified software development by automatically creating extensible internationalized Java-based applications that interacts with enterprise resources, like databases and CORBA, RMI, EJB, and COM objects. Exuberance applications auto-determine configuration and change behavior, allowing delivery as web applets, desktop, client/server, handheld, and Internet applications running on most modern operating systems without modification.

• Conceptualized, researched, architected, and developed the Exuberance platform.
• Served as a product evangelist by presenting the Exuberance platform at international conferences along with associated technologies including advanced Java, wireless (including Bluetooth), and peer-to-peer networking.
• Mentored the technical staff on the development methodology and Exuberance platform.
• Built domestic and international channel partner relationships.
• Demonstrated value leadership by managing expenses at or below budget, creating a virtual office culture that realized a 60% savings on rent, and working with patent attorneys to economically secure international intellectual property rights.

Delphinus

, Baton Rouge, LA

1996 - 2000

Chief Technology Officer

Directed the architecture, technology selection, and development for this automated patient pharmaceutical compliance services company. Nereus™ provided high availability medical information service that connects physicians, patients, and insurance companies, using the Internet and wireless technology to improve patient health while reducing healthcare costs.

• Architected Nereus service platform and worked closely with patent attorneys to secure intellectual property rights resulting in multiple patents.
• Oversaw and participated in the development of software components in Java utilizing EJBs, JDBCs, servlets, and JSPs.
• Delivered service using the Application Service Provider business model, presented as a case study at the Sybase Conference and two ASP Conferences hosted by Ziff-Davis in Sydney and Melbourne, Australia.

The Portwood Group

, Baton Rouge, LA

1994 - 2000

Practice Principal

Helped global clients create a technological competitive advantage through the use of specialized rapid application development tools and techniques, emphasizing the integration of emerging technologies into existing business frameworks.

Texas Instruments

, Dallas, TX

1984-1994

Computer Engineering Manager

Performed as technical individual contributor, rapid response team member, technical manager, and customer technical liaison for this Fortune 50 technology conglomerate.

Optics Design Center:

• Directed the hardware and software modernization of real-time automated optical system testing.
• Participated in budget oversight, delivering all milestones as scheduled with a 20% cost savings.

Office of Governmental Affairs:

• Liaised between international government customers and project management, improving both project efficiency and customer satisfaction.
• Led the implementation team responsible for earning the Baldridge quality award.

Automatic Video Tracking Systems:

• Designed, developed and delivered the first object-oriented real-time test equipment, written entirely in Smalltalk.

Louisiana State University

, Baton Rouge, LA

1995 - 2000

Adjunct Instructor

Instructed undergraduate and graduate students in advanced Computer Science coursework. Designed and delivered original material for Introductory Java, Advanced Java (J2EE, JDBC, RMI, EJB, servlets, CORBA, I18N), Object-Oriented Design Patterns, and Project Management.

MSc Applied Cognition and Neuroscience (Artificial Intelligence)

1992

University of Texas, Dallas, TX

Focused on computational neuroscience and cognition theory emphasizing artificial neural networks and Bayesian statistics.

BSc Computer Science

1990

University of Texas, Dallas, TX