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Could your organization benefit from the addition of a top-performing technology and business leader?

If the answer is yes, then we should talk.

I am a Portfolio Manager and PMO|VMO Lead with expertise in software development, program management, and Agile methodologies, who finds connections, brings order to projects, reduces ambiguity, and improves timely data-driven decision-making. Twenty years leading teams and initiatives, and collaborating across functions to increase value delivery aligned to strategy for FinTech and B2B clients: Amazon, ADT, etc.

• Team Leadership – Defined roles/processes that turned around delivery and decreased velocity variability by 10%.
• Agile Program Management – Led 8 teams on 3 continents, delivering features to lower costs and increase revenue.
• Value Management – Aligned delivery to business strategy, maximizing ROI using OKRs and value stream mapping.
• Business Agility – Introduced Lean portfolio management and feedback loop from implementation to prioritization.
• Governance Maturity – Developed Agile/financial reporting standards and risk management processes.

PMO Leadership | Organizational Change | Change Management | Coaching | Agile COE/COP

Most recently, I have served as PMO Lead for GDIT at NIH-NIAID-OCICB-OEB where I developed a custom Value Management Organization concept and increased visibility into ideation and prioritization for the Branch Chief.

As a Strategic Portfolio Manager in IT at FINRA, I worked closely with the SVP to improve financial reporting and reduce budget variances from 5% to 3%. I supervised portfolio obligations for a portfolio in excess of $110M in spend per year and over 550+ individuals.

As an Agile Program Manager at Element Fleet Management, I was directly responsible for software delivery on a critical client-facing web portal project. I lead 8 teams across three continents to provide on-time delivery of web portal improvements, leading to cost savings of $1M per year and initial revenue growth of $.5M.

In my role as CIO at National Security Partners, I helped to create a strategy for the company and develop measurable goals related to implementation.  I developed the IT strategy to support corporate goals in both client-facing and back-office functions and successfully led a portfolio of simultaneous related projects to implement the strategy.

With more than 25 years of diverse IT and business experience, I offer a proven ability to enhance revenue growth and reduce operating costs through innovative solutions and exceptional client support.  My career in PMO leadership, Agile Journey leadership, portfolio/program/project management across business initiatives, software development, and IT infrastructure management has included positions with a variety of organizations.  I have worked both with external clients and in back-office functions.  In each role, I have consistently led diverse teams that have effectively facilitated organizational goals. Perhaps this ability is best illustrated by these examples:

PMO \ Portfolio Management Experience:

  1. Defined PMO responsibilities, processes, and maturity roadmap at OEB.
  2. At FINRA, grew Portfolio practice team from 1 to 9 and implemented standardized practices in forecasting, financial reporting, risk management, and resource management. Applied the principles of lean portfolio management to prioritizing initiatives. 
  3. At Element Fleet Management, played a major role in development of a prioritization framework and a process for monitoring value delivered after projects were completed.
  4. Founded Enterprise PMO at National Security Partners tying strategy to programs and using lean portfolio management techniques to prioritize the highest value work.
  5. At Serco, established and lead business unit PMO covering both IT and non IT portfolio of projects.
  6. Created and led the PMO at the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency including leading a diverse set of project managers, portfolio management, development of processes and practices, mentoring, communications with senior leadership and allocation of resources. Implemented practices and standards for WBS and Schedule creation and maintenance, Risk Opportunity and Issue management, Earned Value Analysis and Management, and Quality Assurance.
  7. IT Portfolio management at Bates White Ballentine – managed a portfolio of IT infrastructure and software development projects.

Agile Leadership Experience:

  1. Developed coaching strategy and roadmap for increasing agile maturity across delivery teams.
  2. Worked closely with the product management practice at FINRA to blend the best of product and program management to transform to a value driven mindset and culture. 
  3. Developed an Agile Maturity Model for both agile processes and agile technical practices at FINRA.
  4. Played a guiding role in the Agile transformation at Element Fleet Management.
  5. Added value management capability to the PMO at Element Fleet Management.
  6. Agile coach for cross functional teams, business partners, and executives.
  7. Use Agile methods to manage non-IT back office functions at NSP and Serco.
  8. Coached team from fake Agile to high performing cross functional Scrum Team at Ciber.

Program Management & Software Development Experience:

  1. Used best practices in project management to manage multiple interrelated projects simultaneously resulting in the deployment of multiple software releases on time and without down time. Used best practices in software development to manage software releases that require no new builds during system acceptance testing due to development defects.
  2. Led team developing new budget and forecast tool – implementation of the tool reduced time to forecast by 50% and improved budget accuracy (used Agile methodologies primarily Kanban and Scrum);
  3. Improved back office efficiency – reducing accounting and program control staff by 50% by leading a cross functional team in implementing a single point of entry system of record for program control information and improving information transfer across back office systems (used SharePoint for information management and collaboration);
  4. Led geographically dispersed team on integrated hardware and software projects supporting the DoE including system deployments in foreign countries.
  5. Led a technical matrixed team of 60+ individuals on 10-12 concurrent projects while increasing utilization from 65% to 85%; delivered the first successful Oracle 9i RAC system in the federal government.
  6. Developed an enterprise level high availability system to support information transfer between disparate platforms in disparate geographical locations. Growing the use of that system from supporting one client application to supporting seven client applications using Service Oriented Architecture (SOA).
  7. Led team in roll out of a document management system which improved information and knowledge management and played a significant role in improving the analysis that our firm provided to our client, which lead to their win in a major anti-trust case.

In summary, the cornerstones of my success in contributing to organizational success include accurately identifying strategy and measurable goals and leading cross-functional teams in execution.

I would be pleased to speak with you further about how my qualifications could represent a strong match for your organization’s needs.

Please feel free to contact me. Thank you for your time and consideration. I look forward to speaking with you soon.

Warm Regards,

Tara E. Santmire, SA, CAL, CSM, PMP