Our Notes: This long running assignment will have an heavy emphasis on building & deploying Linux servers through Q4 2012 (and likely will be extended). No rack & stack nor pager duty involved. Would like:

• Experience building Linux servers—this is a Redhat environnment
• Experience with clustering—Redhat & Veritas clustering
• Will use Cobbler to build the servers & kick start process; will accept KickStart experience
• Scripting skills; Shell, Perl—to work with cobbler, etc
• Very little Solaris servers
• Dell hardware w/ some oracle

If this is of interest

Please send a copy of your resume or there is someone you can refer please respond to my email address SSchmidt@htassociates.com. Regards, Steve

Will provide a combination Primary support and Business Analyst for the firm’s legacy operations systems as well as participate in the implementation of a new WMS solution.

Responsibilities:

Develop and maintain a thorough knowledge of this multi-billion dollar firm’s operationalized applications and serve as the “point-person” for the enterprise-wide integration with ERP processes, implementation and rollout of a Warehouse Management System.

• Provide level 1 & 2 support for all the firm’s legacy applications; analyzing and identifying business functional and IT systematic opportunities for “process improvements” using standard, “best practice” processes.
• Provide off hours support on a rotating basis as necessary.
• Grounded in corporate IT; will be the “point-of-contact” between business community and the IT department analyzing/developing and documenting business requirements and solutions. Conduct analysis of client business processes and functional requirements and validate the information.
• Engage with cross-functional business community and IT SMEs to identify functional requirements, work flow, and system specifications for Operations systems.
• Develop the business cases including; cost, service, and ROI for business requests.
• Assist in all aspects of SDLC activities as needed and create training documents and system documentation.
• Lead small projects independently.

Experience

• BS in Business Administration, Computer Science, Management Information Systems, or related field
•  Two years plus background supporting Warehouse & Logistics business processes for multiple Distribution Centers in a 24×7 environment.
• Two years plus exp. of IT support and/or App Dev in a multi-location enterprise.
• Two years plus experience reviewing, and translating business requirements into functional designs that will help facilitate code and test logic.
• One year plus background in project teams leveraging a comprehensive standard SDLC process, preferably working on a team that supported at least 2 large, full lifecycle development projects (from analysis through post-go-live support) system/process level by proactively learning new technologies and/or processes.

Requirements

• Building of business relationships to interact with personnel at all levels of the company to obtain, analyze, and discuss business processes and solutions
• Demonstrated experience and success in the following with little to no supervision:

1. Analysis of complex issues
2. Incident and problem management
3. Managing deadlines and scope

If this is of interest to either you (please send a copy of your resume) or there is someone you can refer please respond to my email address SSchmidt@htassociates.com. Regards, Steve

This person will function as a key technology executive and have end-to-end ownership of the technology services and the operational components for the firm’s global web portal platform.  He/She will own the plan, build and run for the technology components that will service this global business unit.

• Lead the innovation, delivery & support for their next gen platform that will leverage cloud computing, LINUX, Windows, etc. developed and supported with internal Managers and SMEs.
• Will direct, plan, support, and manage application and hosting services and is the primary interface between the delivery functions, R&D, and business organizations.
• Ensure that the global web portal platform operations services meet the requirements of the organization, premier clients, consumers, and partners spanning the entire product lifecycle.
• Ensure alignment with service platforms objectives and internal business partner roadmaps.
• Evaluate emerging technologies; stay current with industry trends and innovations.
• Develop and present detailed reporting on KPIs, SLAs, project status, service availability/performance, and contractual performance of vendors.
• Lead and motivate a global technical staff working continuously in a 24x7x365 environment.

BACKGROUND:

• Be well versed with developing high volume, high availability web sites that have low maintenance and support costs.
• Experienced in establishing procedures and policies required to operate an application across a global organization.
• Detailed understanding of public and private cloud technologies, application security, and operational best practices for the online products and service industry.

If this is of interest

to either you (please send a copy of your resume) or there is someone you can refer please respond to my email address SSchmidt@htassociates.com. Regards, Steve

 Overview

Looking for an Application Development Manager. The Candidate must have Insurance industry knowledge, and if they have Billing and Collections domain experience that is a big plus.

Ideally, this person will some consulting background, preferably a large Consulting organization or a boutique organization with a strong Insurance vertical. This person should be highly driven to succeed.

This Manager’s team leverages a JAVA, J2EE, Oracle, UNIX development platform so candidate MUST have a strong JAVA/J2EE development b/g and experience leading a team of both onshore and offshore developers. They will also need to have insurance experience with a preference towards claims but  not likely a requirement.

Summary

Manage and coordinate the staff and activities of an IT area which provides research, systems analysis, solutions, design and application development or maintaining existing Apps for the firm’s systems. This position will focus on the management of designing or developing business applications and/or designing or developing alternative solutions.

Responsibilities

Manage the work activities and staff of an applications development and programming area and has full management responsibility for the performance and development of subordinate staff in accordance with corporate strategic direction. May include matrix reporting relationships.

• Participate in the planning and scheduling of application programming projects and allocating resources to those projects. Includes coordinating the activities with other IT managers and client department’s management team.
• Lead the App Dev, testing, implementation and integration of medium to high-risk App solutions and maintenance of existing applications in coordination with client department’s management team. Ensure activities adhere to quality and process standards.
• Manage the integration of vendor applications and/or consulting resources into existing applications and/or resources.
• Act as liaison between clients and applications area regarding system requirements and capabilities.
• Identify issues and risks and resolves and/or escalates them to senior management for resolution.
• Participate in the ID and selection of IT candidate technologies that assist the functional business units in meeting their business objectives.
• Act as liaison between clients and applications area regarding system requirements and capabilities.
• Identify issues and risks and resolve and/or escalate them to senior management for resolution.

Experience

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, or related discipline, or equivalent work experience.
• Seven years plus experience in application program development with previous supervisory and/or project management experience.
• Solid knowledge of client area’s functions and systems.
• Solid knowledge of the system development life cycle, system and application program development and integration of technological alternatives.
• Solid management and project management skills and ability to organize and plan effectively to meet both short and long range goals and objectives.
• Strong interpersonal and communication skills and the able to work effectively with internal and external business partners throughout all levels.
• Able to effectively lead and motivate others in accomplishing goals.
• Able to manage offshore and remote consulting resources.
• Able to exercise professional judgment and assume responsibility for decisions which have an impact on people, quality of service, and costs.

If this is of interest

Please send a copy of your resume or there is someone you can refer please respond to my email address SSchmidt@htassociates.com. Regards, Steve

Seeking a “right-hand” senior technical resource that can take on the “technical” leadership for the team for a large-scale environment and providing mentoring for a team of “mid-level” engineers able to use nonstandard approaches to resolving issues. This hire will take the lead in formulating and executing a strategy that will enable the current Linux platform to scale up from 400+ servers to 1000+ and support future growth and expansion. The focus of this role will be mostly on architecture however this sr. SME must be willing to engage in engineering and administrative tasks. Will ensure servers are functioning properly, connectivity is established between devices and servers, software deployment & updates, break fix, build & deploy, architecture through administration, etc. Some of the 2012 projects to be executed will include:

• Design a scalable architecture to expand the Linux platform
• Create a standardized template for their configuration process
• Design, document and execute a standardized automation environment.
• Develop metrics and process for the new platform environment
• Evaluate & analysis the current network management system [using Nagios] to determine its viability to be scalable for the growing environment

As the senior technical team lead will lead design, strategy and implementation of the web server environments which host and serve the mobile web browser for wireless devices. This is an integral role in planning, designing, configuring, implementing and managing their worldwide Linux environments which connect wireless devices to the internet.

• Build, test and maintain Linux based hardware and software infrastructure components.
• Document policies procedures and standards
• Ensures that infrastructure systems are designed and implemented to meet the firm’s internal and external standards (SLAs, capacity, management practices, etc.)
• Solve problems related to installation, implementation, maintenance, and operations of Linux and OVI Services
• Provide mentoring coaching and knowledge transfer to less experienced team members
• Assist in the development of ITIL based standards for change management, incident reports and system management.
• Provide 24×7 on-call support

REQUIRED EXPERIENCE:

• Six years plus LINUX experience as a key contributor
• Bachelor’s Degree
• Strong understanding of HTTP/HTTPS protocols & Web technologies
• Experience with SAN/NAS technologies (iscsi, NFS)
• F5 LTM management and iRule Development
• Load balancing
• Large-scale systems environment
• Capacity Planning and a track record of performance monitoring
• Experience with LINUX clustering techniques (DRBD, Corosync, etc.)
• Strong Networking (Switching, routing) Skills
• LINUX clustering techniques (DRBD, Corosync, etc.)
• Experience with Apache, Tomcat, Perl and Shell Scripting experience.
• Understanding of Kickstart/Jumpstart
• Administration of web proxy and cache systems (squid)
• Ideally: experience developing, implementing, driving, or participating in ITIL practices

If this is of interest

to either you (please send a copy of your resume) or there is someone you can refer please respond to my email address SSchmidt@htassociates.com. Regards, Steve

Summary

Will be a Senior Business Analyst and Process Team Lead for workflow process improvement and App Dev projects in business functional area.

• Serve as liaison with business stakeholders engaged to develop plans & conduct working sessions to elicit and review business requirements as approved by senior management.

• Define strategy and implement practical approaches for creating deliverables and all supporting documentation for the “concept and definition” phases of the project.

• Perform necessary research to fully understand the business issues, develop reasonable solutions and to support development of innovative, cost effective solutions, and recommend most viable business/technology solutions to management for adoption.

• Ensure necessary resources are assigned to project teams, manage resources and teams, review and provide input on performance of team members as appropriate.

• As requested, will oversee design reviews to ensure project & system designs meet business needs.

• Provide in input as a technical resource on “best practices”, which may include technology or other business/functional areas.

BACKGROUND:

Bachelor’s degree in Business, or related discipline, or equivalent work experience.

• 7 plus years experience Business Analysis or other related field, i.e., accounting, finance, insurance operations with experience identifying and documenting business requirements.

• Project leadership experience is a plus.

• Experience with SDLCs, and technology. alternatives; understanding of interface design and user-centric work methods.

• Track record of managing and prioritizing multiple projects leading elicitation and live proto-typing, documentation and  deliverable of large-scale business solutions.

• Experience Providing Balanced analytical and problem solving skills.

If this is of interest to either you (please send a copy of your resume) or there is someone you can refer please respond to my email address SSchmidt@htassociates.com. Regards, Steve

SUMMARY:

Will provide comprehensive technical consultation to business & IT management as well as staff at the highest level of complexity on all phases of application programming and processes for diverse development platforms and computing environments.

DELIVERABLES:

This will include performance engineering, functionality testing, production implementation, application recovery and maintenance, application stability, defect resolution, and meeting service level agreements.

• Act as expert technical resource to develop and mentor staff in all phases of the development and implementation process. Participate in instructing, directing, and checking the design or applications work of others. Lead high risk projects.
• Will be the liaison between clients, vendors, consulting resources, and applications area. Analyze problems regarding detailed requirements and capabilities and works cross organizationally to resolve issues and solve problems.
• As an Individual contributor will provide the highest level of leadership in systems analysis, system design, application development and/or integration expertise on the most complex systems applications to support business needs. This person will provide an understanding of technical systems from an “end-to-end” perspective; how to develop automated solutions to business problems; and/or how to maintain centrally developed or integrated systems.
• Engage closely with other IT areas to contribute to the overall strategic direction of the applications portfolio; partnering with Architecture to assist with the overall technology direction of the firm.

EXPERIENCE:

• Bachelor’s Degree with Master’s preferred in Computer Science, or related discipline, or equivalent work experience.
• Min. of 9 years of solid, diverse work experience in IT with a min. of 6 years experience in application program development.
• Excellent project management skills & able to organize and plan effectively to meet both short and long range project goals.
• Knowledge of web portals/strategies required.
• Solid knowledge of interface design and user centered design method.
• Excellent interpersonal skills and the able to work effectively with peers, IT management & staff, and internal business partners/clients.

 If this is of interest

to either you (please send a copy of your resume) or there is someone you can refer please respond to my email address SSchmidt@htassociates.com. Regards, Steve

As a member a part of a Transformation Enterprise BI group, will engage directly with the business community for key global initiative. Will be the owner of the data model for a complex, growing global enterprise wide data warehouse/mart environment.

Project deliverables will include:

• acquiring/understanding the data elements for the enterprise model,
• evaluating and investigating data related problems working with the business to resolve them,
• developing and documenting detailed requirements and use case documents
• will be responsible for incorporating new subject matter or change requests, preparing data models (logical and physical),
• preparing technical recommendations for business executives that will meet needs, coordinating and assisting with testing of the developed solutions.

Requirements

•  Bachelor’s degree in Information Systems or related field
• 8 years plus experience in a data warehousing environment.
• Experience with warehouses sourced from ERP systems a must.
• Working knowledge of Business Intelligence (BI) tools.
• 4 years plus of significant modeling experience in new development and management of an existing model.
• 3NF and dimensional data modeling experience required.
• Cognos tool suite strongly preferred (Query Studio, Report Studio, and Analytics Studio)
• experience with a SDLC Methodology, SQL querying skills (PL/SQL, Toad or other tool), and formal testing methodologies.

If this is of interest

to either you (please send a copy of your resume) or there is someone you can refer please respond to my email address SSchmidt@htassociates.com. Regards, Steve

based in Chicago area (no relo assistance)

This architect will function as the “right-hand” person to the director & will be responsible for leading the effort to define the BI architecture. This person will also be the “go to” person technically and will need to be able to provide technical leadership to others on the team. The firm does not have much of a DW/BI presence today and recently went live with their ODS—operational data store—in 12-10.

• Also, will be actively involved in setting the architectural direction the firm will need to move the organization to a more sophisticated BI/DW platform that can support both corporate as well as the business verticals.
•  The position requires business intelligence (BI) experience leading teams through all facets of the project lifecycle from detail design through development, documentation, testing, implementation and user training.
• Exceptional BI technical expertise.
• Must have well developed SDLC skills including requirements definition, data analysis and data architecture.
• Requires a serious BI solution architect that can lead a technical team and play a role as senior developer, when needed

Requirements:

• 5+ years in the role of Business Intelligence architect/senior developer with full SDLC experience. 
• Multiple implementations of BI solutions, including data delivery requirements, architecture, development, testing, user training and deployment. 
• Cognos architect with 3+ years of full SDLC experience. 
• ETL developer with 3+ years experience.
• Strong team leader skills. 
• 5+ years of complex data modeling experience, both logical and physical. 
• Hands-on BI tools programming and architect experience.
• Demonstrated expertise in the analysis and extraction of data from back-office and transaction systems.
• SDLC and Rational Unified Process (RUP), Scrum, Agile Software Development, Zachman framework.

 Technology Experience needs to include from the following:

• Erwin, Power Designer, Rational Software Modeler, Rational Rose, UML
• SQL Server 20050 or SQL Server 2008, Oracle or DB2
• SSIS, Data Stage, Ab Initio or Informatica
• Cognos 8.x (preferred), MicroStrategy, Business Objects, Microsoft Reporting Tool Suite, QlikView

If this is of interest

to either you (please send a copy of your resume) or there is someone you can refer please respond to my email address SSchmidt@htassociates.com. Regards, Steve

REQUIREMENTS:
1. Strong JAVA development & architecture (design & analysis) background
2. Exp setting technical direction to other software engineers
3. Exp engaging with and directing off-shore developers
4. Exp with the following or similar tools:
a. JBoss or similar web app server
b. eclipse
c. build tools
d. content management tool-prefer fatwire but not req’d
e. Junit
f. Web development
g. Website development with a preference towards customer facing sites
h. JSP
i. JavaScripts etc.

Leverage the following:
- Java – J2EE: JSP, JMS. Java certification preferred
- Struts, Spring, Velocity
- HTML, CSS, Javascript, AJAX, JSON
- XML, SOAP, Apache Axis
- Unix/Linux – Red Hat, Fedora
- HTTP, TCP/IP
- RDBMS – Oracle, MS SQL Server
- JBoss, Tomcat
- Apache web server, Squid web proxy
- Virtual Machine environments
- UML
- CMS systems – Fatwire preferred

Key Duties & Responsibilities:
* Review and provide feedback business and technical requirements, high-level architectural designs, and interface specifications.
* Write detailed design documents that fully specific functionality and map to requirements
* Day-to-day technical leadership for specific issues, projects or initiatives with adherence to release timeline schedules – actively managing and escalating issues with web system(s) solution providers and partners.
* Provide level of effort estimates for new and proposed projects and change requests
* Review of all graphic designs and front end code – including HTML, CSS and javascript, delivered by design team to ensure standards, feasibility and technological fit
* Review of all artifacts produced by the Web development team – including design documents and code.
* Ensure that build, release and deployment processes and tools provide reliability, consistency and visibility
* Produce complete and detailed release notes
* Hands-on troubleshooting of technical problems with the web system(s), including code and environment issues.
* Provide web system(s) expertise, including input on architecture, standards, development processes and artifacts.
* Risk identification and mitigation on a daily basis ensuring appropriate communication and resolution delivery in a timely manner.
* Support testing, including review of test cases and procedures, helping to plan and execute performance tests, evaluate results. Review, assign and resolve defects
* Participate in examination of potential vendors for packaged software solutions and/or services, including review/input on RFIs and RFPs as needed

Required Skills & Experience:
() 4-6 years of experience in web site development, including portal and e-commerce websites, including at least 2 years with Java
() Experience with the entire software development lifecycle – including requirements analysis, design, development, deployment, testing and maintenance
() Experience with the entire software development lifecycle – including requirements analysis, design, development, deployment, testing and maintenance
() Familiarity with system and application server administration and monitoring
() Familiarity with fundamentals of TCP/IP networking and routing
() Demonstrate capabilities to work independently, with a pro-active, service-level oriented, customer-focused mindset.
() Ability to partner with various teams, soliciting help from and providing help to other departments as needed
() Superior communication skills required; demonstrable ability to communicate in both a technical and non-technical environment

BS in Computer Science or Equivalent. Advanced degree preferred