Michael Cook
607-595 River Avenue
Winnipeg MB R3L 0E6
Tel. 204-452-2720 (home), 204-805-1099 (mobile)
E-mail: mcook2@mymts.net
Challenging and interesting technical and/or customer support work with a leading organization.
More than six years experience providing IT support and other customer services in call centres.
Proven customer service, creative, business, project management, and team leadership skills.
Successful independent contractor January 2000 through 2003 providing software technical writing, testing, and training services.
IT professional having strong multi-disciplinary skills and experience in operations, systems and network administration, sales and technical support, software development, training, technical writing, consulting, providing client services and customer advocacy.
Extensive skills and experience in mainframe, PC, and UNIX-based operating systems, applications and systems programming, networking, security, database, web server, content and change management.
References and portfolio available upon request.
Completed a term position as an inbound telephone customer service agent on contract to HP for the Bank of Canada (CA-Assistant III), answering client calls, providing client authentication, payments, account information, web site assistance, using systems to mail forms and document issues.
A few days casual call centre work taking inbound calls for non-profit clients of FineLine Solutions. Answering caller questions, explaining program options, taking donations.
Completed a term position as a General Duties Clerk SP01 (SP0301) with Winnipeg Tax Center (Canada Revenue Agency WTC-T1) working in Electronic Processing Selections and Numbering.
Short term outbound telephone sales position for a client of 24/7 in Winnipeg.
Short term inbound customer service position with SR&J Customer Care Call Centres Inc. in Winnipeg, working on a insurance claims application. The project closed on August 9th 2010.
January 2004: 4 weeks in house training with Convergys Customer Management Canada Inc.
Thereafter 6 months Tier 1 inbound customer technical support position on contract to a large US cable Internet provider (residential).
August 2004 transferred to Tier 2 position providing inbound technical support for Home Networking application within Broadband Business Services.
December 2009 added inbound support for Commercial Online services (TV, Voice, and Internet).
The call centre closed March 26th 2010.
Short-term call center contract.
Open Source technical writing contract for a small UNIX software vendor in Winnipeg. Produced a product user manual and PHP developer manual using DocBook XML. Documented installation, configuration and use of products and services on OSX, Linux, and Windows 2000. Recommended various product enhancements.
Short technical writing engagement for an independent financial software company using RoboHelp HTML. Provided advice on migration strategies, including uses of XML.
Editing class at University of Waterloo.
Relocation adviser to an independent service provider.
Technical Writing Consultant on contract to KING Products Inc., reporting to KING Director of Product Management and CEO:
Provided customer documentation for Internet kiosk/payphone-hardware and software, using MS Word 2000, Visio, and Acrobat.
Created online help using RoboHELP and JavaHelp, including writing test drivers in Java and conducting product testing.
Worked extensively on marketing proposals, specifications and other sales documentation including flyers, PowerPoint presentations, and 60-page product catalog.
Created and managed internal web site. Developed and maintained content including procedures, QA process documents, templates, corporate style guidelines, logos, and project information.
Developed, tested, and manufactured product install packaging, including creation and testing of Linux tarballs and install procedures, preparation and manufacture of multimedia CD images.
Performed extensive product testing and integration work, including frequent operating systems and network installation and configuration. providing feedback to product management, development and service staff. Modified server scripts using Perl-DBI and MySQL. Provided tools in C and programmed scripts.
Formed and led weekly Software Release Team Meeting in order to implement Quality Assurance processes and procedures for software release to Sales and Service departments, VARs, and customers.
Participated in ISO certification project.
Designed, developed, and delivered numerous fee-based customer training events.
Help Desk Analyst with IBM Global Services Toronto Lab Help Desk. Worked in an inbound call center providing general infrastructure and IT services assistance to a large development staff. Prototyped Help Desk web site. Teamed with IT support staff on various migration projects. Constructed several private web sites.
IBM Canada Lab lead technical writer for IBM Distributed Database Connection Services (DDCS) and DB2 Connect products. DB2 certified. Led a small writing team producing install and user documentation for OS/2, Windows, AIX, and other UNIX platforms. Produced and managed project plans. Maintained reference documentation and produced online help. Participated in a large-scale data migration project to SGML from BookMaster. Recognized with several awards. Participated in ISO re-certification. Worked extensively with Release and QA teams and Service departments as part of customer satisfaction initiative.
IBM Canada lead technical specialist in national Systems Management team for batch scheduling, file transfer, software distribution, electronic change management and system reporting program products. Worked on commission for software sales. Developed and delivered numerous marketing program segments and product service offerings. Participated in sales programs and trade shows. Performed fee services: consulting and implementation assistance for numerous Government, finance industry, and other clients. Programmed NetView DM DLLs in C for customer use. Co-authored four IBM "red books" on technical subjects. Designed, developed and delivered customer training deliverables for NetView Distribution Manager and Software Delivery Manager products. Worked with development and International Technical Support organizations to achieve product implementation, performance, and usability improvements. Designed and implemented multi-homed system implementation for NetView DM/MVS. Ran North American customer field test program for IBM Cary Lab on SAA Delivery Manager product using VM and SQL/DS host side, and OS/2 client. Recognized with numerous awards.
MVS Systems Programmer, IBM Canada Limited. Worked in team providing and maintaining production system images in national data centre. Provided implementation and expert technical support for various Systems Management software applications including Operations Planning and Control / Advanced (OPC and OPC/A), and Service Level Reporter (SLR). Updated and maintained system user exits (Assembler). Defined subsystem security configurations using RACF. Maintained PL/I.
Product Support Specialist (Systems Engineer), IBM Nordic Lab, Stockholm. Provided expert technical sales and non-defect customer support for premier MVS scheduling product (OPC/ESA). Designed, developed and delivered product education, marketing deliverables and related programs internationally. Provided fee services to numerous customers and national marketing organizations. Recognized with numerous awards.
MVS Systems Programmer with IBM United Kingdom Limited. Supported Sort and PL/I and other mainframe software products in large production data centre. Wrote and implemented statistics management program suite for IBM 3790 data entry application in PL/I. Installed, implemented, and supported Systems Management software including OPC and SLR. Wrote and implemented system user exits and SVC routines in Assembler. Worked on various teams (data center, national and corporate) performing system audits and producing and presenting reports and working papers for executives including product requirements. Member of IBM UK and IBM Europe DP audit teams 1981-1984 addressing corporate security requirements. Wrote first "OPC Implementation Guide" (300 pages) in 1984 for IBM Nordic Lab. Provided sales support and fee services to customers. Recognized with numerous awards.
Computer operator, Data control clerk, PL/I applications programmer. Worked on team supporting primary Order Equipment and Inventory databases and systems. Recognized with numerous awards.
Extensive systems, application, and network installation, configuration, administration, and problem solving experience using Windows 95/98/NT/2000/XP/Vista/7, UNIX/Linux, Mac OS9 and OSX, MVS, VM, using SMP, SNA, TCP/IP, DSL, PPP, SSL/SSH, routers.
Proven ability to perform PC and network software and hardware installation, configuration, maintenance and and upgrades (memory, disk, add-on cards, BIOS configuration, routers, cabling, and modems).
Proven ability to perform content preparation and data management tasks using Apache, Tomcat, and IIS web servers, together with DB2, DB2 Connect, MySQL, Sendmail, SSL, SSH, FrontPage, James Java mail server.
Experienced using virtualization tools VMware and VirtualBox.
As well as:
Extensive pre- and post-sales technical support and customer service experience.
Excellent oral and written communications and interpersonal skills.
Proven excellent time management and planning skills.
Proven ability to perform complex project management, team leading, group facilitation and negotiation.
Proven technical writing, editing, document/book production, online help, and web content creation skills using various tools including Adobe Acrobat, InDesign, HTML, MS Office, Open Office, RoboHELP, DocBook SGML and XML.
Extensive experience providing quality assurance, development support, product management, sales support, and customer advocacy services.
Used to working with executives, product managers, sales, support, development staff and end users to plan, manage, and execute software documentation projects:
Expert knowledge of IT Systems Management and support processes
Extensive programming and systems analysis experience using ASP, Bash, C and C++, Java, Perl, and PHP. Strong SQL, HTML, SGML, XML and XSL. Strong mainframe PL/I and Assembler experience. Familiar with web services solutions including SOAP, WebSphere, Axis, Struts
Design, development, and delivery of complete training and support programs using PowerPoint and similar tools
Proven graphics and visual design skills using PhotoShop, The GIMP, PaintShop Pro, Visio, MS PowerPoint
Experienced at product CD design, testing, manufacture, and packaging including printed material (us ing Adobe InDesign, and various graphics tools as above).
Page 6 of 6 MCookResume.2012-02-15.*