Hi, I'm Alex
I work as a freelance management consultant. My focus is on operational improvement programs. I cover process, organisation design, systems and data. I also have experience in strategy which includes corporate planning and acquisitions. Past employers and clients include the following.
I started my career as a graduate at Procter & Gamble where I spent 7 years working as a member of the global projects team. During this time my focus was on developing global business services (GBS). I started out as a systems analyst working on projects to:
I then went on to act as a project and program manager, leading the following:
Following Procter and Gamble, I moved into management consulting where I've worked for over a decade. I've helped clients with their global business services, shared services and outsourcing initiatives and their business systems landscapes. This often involves the design of target operating models, building business cases or deeper process and systems improvement work. I've worked both for major consultin firms and on a freelance/contract basis.
Recently I've been involved in several key strategy projects incluing:
Globally, Danone have a distributed landscape of ERPs, with multiple SAP and non SAP systems. This program aimed to design and build a new global core finance solution leveraging SAPs central finance to aggregate and standardise finance data and reports on a real-time basis. The project had further objectives to enhance reporting by introducing improvements in valuation (SAP material ledger) and profitability analysis (SAP CO-PA/margin analysis).
I joined the program, working for operations IT to both act as programme manager/director and to bring finance systems expertise to ensure the global design was fit for purpose. I led a team of 20 people (Danone IT, Accenture, SAP and freelancers).
Working with the executive committee, and leading a team of 5 Deloitte consultants I managed PersolKelly's 5-year strategic planning process. This covered 12 markets across Asia Pacific.
Over a period of five months and multiple day-long workshops with the executive committee, we reviewed economic, market and internal performance data and through deliberation developed the 5 year plan. This included:
Led a supply chain strategy review. As part of this, we reviewed demand, supply and production planning as well as procurement processes. We delivered a detailed analysis based on data from SCM systems and provided a tactical QlikView based dashboard to support better management of 3rd party contract manufacturer performance.
We also created a negotiation playbook for dealings with key 3rd party manufacturers, this included identification of gives and takes, critical minimum requirements, and discussion options for key negotiation sessions. Resulted in multi-million $ risk exposure reduction.
As part of business development responsibilities, I led $3.7m in sales within 9 months (3 engagements). Delivered various client projects. Created and led an international community. Developed and delivered blockchain technical training.
Developed a new target operating model for finance. This included applying effort analysis, the voice of the customer analysis and led to the creation of a process taxonomy, organization design, business case and roadmap.
Project managed the group finance annual close & annual report creation (finance content). Delivered an on-time, accurate full year annual report to the market with no material revisions.
Returned the following year to assist with the half-year report and also project manage a fast close project.
Process governance owner for source to pay. In both roles delivered end to end mapping of the banks processes covering inputs, outputs, process steps, systems and controls. Also coached change projects on continuous improvement.
Led the strategy phase of a global SAP ECC 6.0 implementation project covering finance, sales, logistics, manufacturing. Delivered a successful negotiation on the contract and statement of work for 3rd party systems integrator.
Business development and project management / SME support for various projects focussing on finance and finance systems.
Finance systems lead for Heineken's European shared service centre design & business case. Delivered a multi-million $ saving target operating model (resource model, organization design, process taxonomy, systems architecture and roadmap).
Transition services agreement design & management for Lehman Brothers covering the sale of Equities and Investment Banking to Nomura. Ensured trades could be executed in order to deliver returns to creditors.
Enterprise performance management solution architect for BBC worldwide.
Finance systems lead for a new planning & reporting model for Diageo. Delivered design for improved ExCo decision making (application architecture, chart of accounts, profit/cost centre hierarchies, SAP New GL design).
Manager, finance & performance management consulting.
Finance systems lead for AXA’s European shared service centre design & business case. Delivered a multi-million $ saving target operating model (resource model, organization design, process taxonomy, systems architecture and roadmap).
Finance systems lead, design of a major UK bank’s SAP-based application architecture.
Global supply chain SAP ECC 6.0 / Unicode program manager. Delivered a successful upgrade. Managed 4 regional projects incl. more than 100 resources.
Gillette post-acquisition integration program manager for Russia. Covering all aspects of integration; systems (SAP), process, people, commercials. Delivered $20m one time savings and $8.5m year-on-year savings. Managed > 50 people and $1.4m delivery partner contract.
Romania SAP upgrade, regional shared services & tax restructuring project manager. On-time delivery with multi-million year on year savings. Managed > 50 people.
SAP fast-track project approach lead. Designed a method to implement SAP in 4 months.
EU enlargement project manager. Delivered business continuity & compliance with respect to tax, import/export and intrastat reporting changes for the expanded EU of 25 states.
Pharmaceuticals business SAP R/2 - SAP R/3 upgrade project manager. Delivered a successful upgrade incl. Ground-up redesign of the chart of accounts, project and cost objects.
IT outsourcing governance lead. Successful design & monitoring of the governance for application development & support (DevOps) covering EMEA finance and supply chain.
European SAP R/3 implementation, shared services and tax restructuring systems analyst. Led the finance workstream for multiple countries across EMEA.
General ledger and purchase to pay process & systems owner for EMEA.
2nd level IT service management, the definition of ITIL / COBIT standards.
The following list summarises the different roles and responsibilities I can take on categorised by change program types that I have experience in.
