1. Craig E. Laski, CCP, CDP, ITIL, PMP, SSGB
Lemont, Illinois 60439
630-297-3168 craiglaski@yahoo.com
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/craiglaski
Senior Manager – Information Technology / Improved Services
High impact IT leader with a solid history of creating ideas managing projects and adding value to business
operations while developing flexible systems that address current needs and long term growth. Successful
background leading teams and managing complex projects that improve services, delivery and support business
initiatives to a broad variety of internal and external customers. Especially skillful in managing risks, relationship
building and implementing projects on time, under budget – exceeding the stakeholders’ expectations.
• Improving processes, procedures & productivity • Experience with AS2 e-commerce, CRM systems
• Hiring, training, coaching & team-building • Developing data warehouses, effective
• Monitoring budgets, resources & schedules databases
• Implementing quality management systems • Using technologies to gain business advantage
• Managing complex projects with PMPBoK - • Reducing costs & increasing efficiencies
PMI/Waterfall/SDLC/Agile and Scrum concepts • Knowledgeable in Six Sigma – DMAIC
• Building strong relationships with stakeholders
Technical and business applications: sales & marketing, CRM, financials, costing, MDM, order management, data
warehousing, manufacturing, inventory, network infrastructure, iseries, office hardware/software, business
applications, business requirements analysis/design/development and data architecture.
Professional Background
State Farm – Technisource Consulting 2013
-- Senior IT Project Manager/ ITIL Release Manager – Information Technology Systems and Services
• ITIL release manager for a 2 year CISCO unified communications ip phones end point roll out
• ITIL release manager for the enterprise telecommunications, infrastructure and networks on going delivery
enhancements and continuous service improvements
• Project manager for an iMACs end of life roll out delivery service project
• Project manager for an external/internal cloud IaaS and PaaS initiative
Sears Holding Corporation – DISYS Consulting 2012 - 2012
-- Senior Business Intelligence Project Manager/Scrum team leader – Information Analytics and
Innovations
• Managed a diverse on-shore and off-shore Scrum team by applying Scrum/Agile methodologies in
delivering sales and marketing BI and analytical processing to the Commerce Services business group
• Improvement process included: data modeling, ETL for DB2, Netezza or Teradata data warehouse
information and visualizing graphs/charts using Tableau or MicroStrategy tools
2. • One reporting process was improved from taking 52 hours down to 8 hours
• Reported project status to Sears Holding management weekly
WellPoint / AIM Specialty Health – Pinnacle Technical Consulting
2012 - 2012
-- Senior Project Manager – Information Systems and Technology Group
• Managed Information Systems and Technology (IS&T) projects related to DB continuous improvements,
MDM, enhancing the ETL process and archiving/purging client information. Activities included working with
IS&T, business owners and technical managers to define the scope, scheduling, coordinating, and
managing activities, resources and implementation
• Managed dynamic global project teams included: onsite, onshore, multi locations and offshore
• Interacted with corporate PMO by participating in project creation, initial review, resource allocations,
defining scope, execution, closing and regular updates/status reports
Professional development, pursuing career enhancing certifications and credentials 2011
TimeMed Labeling Systems, Inc . (healthcare/medical labels manufacturer) Burr Ridge, IL 2007 – 2010
-- Director of Information Technology
• Led project/development team in creating multiple interfaces for an Oracle e-business suite implementation
including a data warehouse to reduce the costs of Oracle, keeping phase two on track. Achieved project
deliverables in just under a year by solving mission critical business processes by collaborating with key
business process owners.
• Trimmed Information Technology software budget by 62.4%
Craig E. Laski
• Realized an 87.4% savings by redeploying bar code software while increasing functionality
• Presented and received approval of a formal project plan by the Steering Committee. Organized and
directed project teams in implementing an enterprise wide Lansa ERP system in less than one year.
Prepared project status reports informing the Steering Committee of progress, milestones and issues.
Proactively led business owners in resolving over 125 issues.
• Designed, implemented and managed data warehouses to support sales, sales/customer support,
manufacturing and custom labels quoting critical business applications.
• Formed a team consisting of finance, manufacturing and sales to audit and update product costs of over
15,000 items achieving 100% gross margins accuracy which lead to better sales targeting of items.
• Presented high level project presentations to company board members and wrote a series of articles for the
company newsletter keeping all levels of employees informed of project activities.
• Implemented an on-line shipping subsystem using hand held RF scanners for three plants that interfaced
with the ERP system. The shipping application processed over 500 multi-line orders per day, and is
scalable. The accuracy of freight charges and shipping information jumped to 100%, eliminating additional
manual entries and reducing the cycle time to invoice by two days.
• Deferred the upgrade and replacement costs of an IBM server for two years saving roughly a $300,000
investment at the same time improved system performance and added additional functionality.
rd
Benefits Systems & Services, Inc . (3 party health claims administrator) Westmont, IL 2004 – 2007
-- IT Project Manager
3. • Managed a database of over 2000 projects. Prioritized projects with functional leaders and completed
critical projects within target due dates with no increase in staff
• Managed external clients’ hardware and software SaaS applications and business options environments
• Directed the Pharmacy Benefits Management (PBM) application development and business processes
• Developed application interfaces to clients’ claims systems and to prescription drugs discount and mail
order systems including file transfers and claims adjudication functionality based on the iseries system
Kraft Foods North America Northfield, IL 1989 – 2003
-- Senior Business Systems Manager (2000 - 2003)
• Played a key IT PM role in the Nabisco/Kraft integration project to interface a diverse multi-plant
manufacturing system running on the iseries to the corporate order management and forecasting/planning
systems. The project reduced the overall merger costs and proved successful.
• Managed the IT divestment project of the Kraft Foods general line candy and confection groups
-- IT Project Manager, NABISCO Foods (1999 - 2000)
• Remotely coordinated all IT requests for four business operating units
• Developed and monitored a help desk procedure that streamlined the creation, communication and timely
resolution of help desk tickets, improving the service delivery and customer service levels to the internal
customers by over 65%
• Played a key IT PM role with Nabisco in the interfacing and integration of the various Favorite Brands
business units into a Nabisco corporate applications model
-- Senior Manager / Director, IT Projects, Favorite Brands International (1996 - 1999)
• Key team member in the merger of the Favorite Brands, Farley, Dae Julie, Trolli and Sathers systems
-- MIS Manager, Farley Foods USA (1989 - 1996)
• Spearheaded start-up of the EDI department using Sterling Commerce software on an iseries platform
• Achieved over 96% of the customer orders and invoice transactions being processed automatically,
streamlining order management and invoice processing
Certifications, Technical Knowledge, Training & Education
IceSrum, Sharepoint, Oracle, BPCS, Lansa, SOA, CRM, BI, DW, EDI, FTP, SQL, XML, DB2, IBM iseries
Significant training in leadership, conflict resolutions, business analysis BABOK, and ITIL v3.0.
MCTS and CCNA in progress
Diploma of Higher Education in Management Information Systems, Computer & Business Skills Institute, Chicago.
CCP & CDP, Institute for the Certification of Computer Professionals, Des Plaines, Illinois.
ITIL v3.0, Office of Government Commerce, London, United Kingdom
PMP, Project Management Institute, Newton Square, Pennsylvania
Lean / Six Sigma Green Belt, Chicago Deming Association / ASQ
Purdue University, Hammond, Indiana
-2-