One sentence summary:
I have many years of experience, learn quickly and well, I have good communications skills, I love a challenge, and I am good under pressure.
My LinkedIn Profile is an excellent place to see more details about my professional experience, as well as recommendations. I can be found on Stack Overflow and related sites if you would like to see some of my public responses to questions posed.
Technical Skill Highlights
- MongoDB - Lead Support Engineer and Manager of support team in EMEA
- Load Balancing Technology and Concepts – specifically the Citrix Netscaler platform
- Networking – TCP/IP, PPP, RIP and more with experience in analysis and troubleshooting
- Linux System Administration – mainly Redhat (RHCE) and CentOS, familiar with other distributions
- Web Technology – HTTP/SSL, DNS, Apache, MySQL and more
- Content Distribution Networks – Caching, Origin configuration, GSLB. Worked with Akamai, Limelight.
Soft skill highlights
- Training – multiple modules written and delivered at various levels from technical to boardroom level
- Communication – have acted as a technical and relationship manager internally (between international business units) and externally (to large vendors and customers)
- On-Call – I've spent most of my career on-call in one form or another, for ISP networks, Linux systems, Load Balancers, general technical escalation and more.
- Analysis – performed with distinction as a Principal Analyst (planning and forecasting and performance management) as well as detailed operational troubleshooting and analysis.
Trinity College Dublin
Dublin, Ireland
Diploma in Information Systems
Sep 2009 – Sep 2011
- Year 1 Overall Grade: Distinction
- Year 2 Overall Grade: Distinction
- Diploma Complete – Received award for “Best Overall Grade Achieved”
BA in Computer Science
Sep 1997 – Sep 1999
- 2 Years of BA in Computer Science (Incomplete)
Technical Support Manager / Lead Support Engineer – EMEA
Jan 2012 – Present
- Current Position
- Building up the Support Team in Dublin from scratch
- Supporting 10gens customers and the MongoDB user community
Citrix Systems Inc
Dublin, Ireland
Technical Relationship Manager
Jan 2011 – Jan 2012
- Primary responsibility: To provide a premier level of support and manage/maintain relationships with large customers in EMEA and US at various technical and non-technical levels.
- This support included:
- Advanced technical support and troubleshooting
- Advanced testing, analysis and research
- Per customer environment and set up knowledge
- Feature/Enhancement requests
- Technical design consultation
- On-Site support
- Customer advocacy
- Beta program management
- Other duties include writing Citrix Knowledge Base articles, consultation and process documentation
- Citrix Certified Administrator – Netscaler 9
- Essential Staff (Netscaler Expert), Synergy Barcelona Conference 2011
AOL - Global Web Delivery Systems
Dublin, Ireland
Dulles, VA (US)
Principal Systems Analyst
Mar 2008 – Jun 2010
- This position has since been updated to Principal Site Reliability Engineer, which more accurately reflects the role, especially with respect to other Internet focused companies
- Relocated from Dulles, Virginia to Dublin, Ireland in March 2009. My role within AOL remained unchanged
- Technical Lead:
- CDN Configuration (Akamai, Level 3), Citrix Netscaler Configuration & Administration
- CDN, GSLB, Layer 4-7 Optimization, training, and evangelism
- Vendor Management – Managed relationships with Citrix, Level 3, Limelight, Akamai
- Tools Development and Administration – Developed support tools and systems for use with various technology platforms to enable more efficient management of global deployment and cross-departmental usage of services
- Role with AOL ended in June 2010 with the offer and acceptance of a significant voluntary redundancy package
Principal Systems Analyst
Mar 2007 – Mar 2008
- Technical Lead :
- Networking Infrastructure for “New Geographies” portal, Load Balancer deployment, configuration
- Creation of base configuration for application stack based on standard technologies (Apache, Tomcat, MySQL etc.)
- Extensive System Administration experience (Linux, Tomcat, Apache, MySQL)
- Team management experience – “stand in” manager during vacations etc.
- Work with multiple development teams in multiple countries and time zones (India, China, US, Europe)
- Obtained RHCE to formalize Redhat Linux expertise
Principal/Senior Network Analyst
Mar 2004 – Mar 2007
- Transferred to Reston, Virginia in March 2004 to take up a new role within the US business
- Managed AOL international network performance and customer experience
- Developed new tools to aid analysis and monitoring of Quality of Service on the network
- Provided expert sworn testimony in lawsuit (successfully defended) against AOL (Jan/Feb 2005)
- Received Special Recognition Award for “Excellent Performance” in 2005
- Promoted to Principal Analyst in February 2006
- Network Architect for the various projects involved with the sale of the EU Access Business to third party buyers
- Analyst and metrics lead at weekly service review presentation to US management (EVP/CTO)
- Mentored team members, providing training and training material as appropriate.
- Received “Top Talent” (top 5% of employees) designation for 2006 annual performance review
AOL UK Ltd.
Dublin, Ireland
Network Analyst
Feb 2000 – Mar 2004
- Represented the UK Network Department at various summits and meetings internally and externally
- Shared 24×7 on-call duties and responsibilities for the AOL UK Network (2/3 person roster)
- Managed vendor relationships – chaired performance reviews, escalated issues and problems as appropriate
- Acted as a technical advisor for drafting Service Level Agreements with UK vendors
- Designed and implemented multiple statistical reports to measure quality of service and identify faults
- Authored and delivered detailed training on various technical subjects internally and externally
- Designed automated tools (Perl, VBA) to process and deliver periodic operational performance reports
- Worked with various companies (e.g. BT, NTL, Energis, UUNet, Cable & Wireless) on technical issues across multiple platforms (e.g. Cisco, Nortel, 3COM, Lucent etc.) and across multiple ISP connectivity types
- Technical lead for all operational reporting sources within the UK organization
- Networks lead for Beta Testing, QA and client development within the UK
Skills and Certifications
- Netscaler 9
- Obtained 2011
- RHEL 4 (June 2006)
- Cert Number: 804006685620813
