Resume
Chevas Balloun
920 NE 63rd St. #104, Seattle, WA 98115
chevas@gmail.com | 307.222.4020
EDUCATION:
Bachelors of Arts, Comparative Religion, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 2003
Honors: University of Washington Dean’s Scholar
SKILLS & QUALITIES:
- Perceptive, organized, goal-oriented, very detail-oriented. Well rounded verbal and mathematical skills.
- Self-taught web design and entrepreneurial aspirations including XHTML, HTML, CSS, graphic design. – Ansel Foster.com
- Extensive professional customer / client interaction, highly aware of individual and team needs and capable of communicating them in realistic terms to internal and external audiences.
- Regularly produces results by organizing projects into workable modules and task lists.
- Maintains a personal blog with an emphasis on technology, design fitness, and life. – http://chev.as
EXPERIENCE:
Resolute Solutions Inc. – Bellevue, WA
Technical Project Manager for Microsoft: Oct 07’ – Present
- Designed over tens of customized series portal websites for internal Microsoft groups including the Chief Operating Officer, Kevin Turner, other executives to host their media content on the internal Microsoft podcasting platform, Academy Mobile.
- Integrated complex hierarchical navigation, content organization, and design features into channel websites.
- Developed logos and branded banners for several internal groups and their feature pages.
- Deployed unofficial design code into the AcademyMobile SharePoint platform to push the envelope of available features to users including rotating galleries and embedded videos which were eventually officially integrated.
- Created the first editorial process for AcademyMobile and was responsible for weekly delivery of podcast showcases and the creation of their respect banner advertisements
- Designed and managed the CodePlex release of Podcasting Kit for SharePoint (PKS) for the Academy Mobile team within Microsoft (www.codeplex.com/pks).
- Constructed the PKS CodePlex project site and updated its editorial.
- Authored a memorandum of understanding and created the formal engagement process for Microsoft customers and partners to join the “PKS Child Project Network”. This network is a partnership between PKS and customers and partners who are willing to create and release new features for PKS via CodePlex.
- Supervised the support process for the Microsoft internal Podcasting platform, Academy Mobile.
- Assisted in the migration of the legacy version of Academy Mobile to PKS.
- Composed feature improvements and prioritized bug fixes for Academy Mobile and drove them through the Quick Fix Engineering (QFE) monthly update process.
- Assisted in the migration of the Academy Group’s internal Microsoft portal from SharePoint 2003 to SharePoint 2007.
- Provided user-interface and user-experience consultation for the Academy Mobile platform.
- Overhauled the Academy Mobile help section by categorizing all of the content, establishing an intuitive navigation, and writing an FAQ compiled from fielded support questions.
- Crafted a series of visually stylized web pages showcasing a podcasting incentive program to encourage the Microsoft field to adopt Academy Mobile.
AT&T / Cingular Wireless – Bothell, WA
Curriculum Designer: April ’07 – Sept. ‘07
- Managed multiple development projects simultaneously to meet the demand of technical training.
- Interfaced with the methods & procedures groups, audience management, trainers, and subject matter experts to ensure quality, accuracy, and comprehensiveness.
- Presented design documents to stakeholders outlining important milestones and helped drive their completion.
- Completed six instructor-led courses within 12 weeks while historically our group has allotted a 10 week development time-frame for a single course.
- Authored a variety of training materials including instructor guides, participant guides, job aids, web based training modules and network diagrams for wireless technical support groups.
- Framed courses based on the ADDIE learning model and Gagne’s Nine Events of Adult Learning (ADDIE: http://ed.isu.edu/addie/ GAGNE: http://www.e-learningguru.com/articles/art3_3.htm).
Training Specialist: May ’06 – April ‘07
- Conducted two to four week courses for new hire ANS and ETS representatives (see below for ANS and ETS definitions).
- Achieved consistent positive feedback from the majority of students in each class determined by training manager inquiries.
- Analyzed deficiencies in current curriculum and created new materials, entire lessons, and training aids to increase learning, improve knowledge retention, and accommodate new products, policies, and procedures.
- Completely streamlined the ETS new hire curriculum by reordering topics based on relevance, assessing topic durations and reducing the duration from ten training days to eight.
- Communicated regularly with ETS and ANS management to maintain course objectives, policy alignment and general rapport with lateral groups.
Enterprise Technical Support (ETS): August ’05 – May ‘06
- Provided elevated level of enterprise-only data support for client IT administrators and help desks for 67% of the fortune 100 companies, the United States Senate, the Whitehouse, and other government accounts.
- Identified often ambiguous connectivity problems down to device, Cingular network, customer network, or frame relay failures and provided troubleshooting and/or solutions accordingly.
- Filed trouble tickets for network outages, roaming outages, and frame relay failures, and monitored their status by updating the clients in regular intervals depending on the severity of the issue.
- Delivered single point of contact support working with the client from start to finish on a given issue.
- Worked directly with clients, network engineers, and device manufacturers in conference calls to deconstruct more complicated issues that require more extensive troubleshooting.
- Demonstrated technical understanding of GSM/GPRS network flow and how a device interacts with network elements.
Advanced Network Services (ANS): August ’04 – August ‘05
- Fielded technical inquiries regarding network and device functionality and recommended wireless internet and email solutions for enterprise end users and small business owners.
- Performance tested internal tools for data tracking and rep-to-rep chat support.
- Configured RIM Blackberrys, modems, PDAs and cell phones for clients’ data connectivity.
- Investigated connectivity failures on the data network and devices and provided troubleshooting solutions.
- Discovered troubleshooting gaps and wrote content for existing knowledge base articles and initiated new articles when necessary.
- Consistently resolved client issues with one interaction.
Customer Care: March ’04 – August ‘04
- Resolved billing disputes, described network coverage and educated customers on our voice and data rate plans.
- Designed Excel spreadsheets for interim tracking needs including client contact renewals and tracking tool performance and functionality.
- Maintained “Resolved” ratings on each call recorded and analyzed by internal quality team for three consecutive months.
Achievement Dynamics Inc. – Seattle, WA
Associate Production Manager: April ‘03 – July ‘03
- Worked with a local celebrity to produce success skills television shows that aired on Channel 12, Wednesdays, 6:00pm, Seattle area, Fall 2004 – Spring 2005.
- Managed and aided video Editors to produce finished episodes for weekly airings.
- Crafted all 3D animation sequences, aided in set design, operated cameras, assisted with lighting, and edited video from raw footage to final cut.
- Directed and entertained an audience to laugh, cheer, clap, look serious, etc. for editing purposes.
New Horizons Computer Learning Center – Bellevue, WA
Desktop Instructor: July ‘02 – Dec ‘02
- Successfully taught full day computer courses to business executives, individuals, military personnel and company employees at New Horizon’s facilities and remote onsite classes.
- Gathered expert knowledge of software programs through self study materials and by teaching advanced level courses including: Windows 2000/XP, Word 97/2000/XP, Excel 97/2000/XP, PowerPoint 97/2000/XP, FrontPage 2000/XP, and Outlook 2000 (only trained).
- Coached advanced students in design considerations for websites in FrontPage classes, spreadsheets in Excel classes, and presentations in PowerPoint classes.
- Maintained an average score of 9.5 out of 10 in overall performance, determined by student surveys.
Structural Informatics Group, Dept. of BioStructure, UW – Seattle WA
Assistant Designer, Tester & Web Designer: Oct 01’ – June ‘02 & Jan ‘03 – Mar ‘03
- Tested the usability of a program-in-development, called Bodygen, invented to generate 3D models of anatomy using image slices of The Visual Human.
- Aided in the design of Bodygen by innovating over 35 improvements, solutions and work-arounds of existing limitations by compiling a list of detailed descriptions of each issue and presenting them to software developers.
- Reorganized the department website, using MS FrontPage, to increase accessibility of internal documents and created new department logos. http://sig.biostr.washington.edu
- Developed a system to provide download access for all department publications via the department website while simultaneously displaying scientific abstracts so that public viewers could read them without having to download the full publications.
COMPUTER SPECIFICS:
Web / Internet: Highly proficient with HTML and CSS, WordPress installation, management and template creation/design, domain & hosting registration & management, Microsoft Office SharePoint Services (MOSS) 2003 and 2007 site creation, maintenance.
Computer Applications: Highly proficient in several versions of MS Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Outlook, Visio, AMS Remedy, Lectora, Docutools, GIMP (Image Editor). Moderate proficiency with Adobe PhotoShop.
Computer OS’: Highly proficient in Windows 2000 | XP|Vista. Some familiarity with Linux and Mac OS X.
Computer Hardware: Capable of building PCs from the ground up. Hardware troubleshooting, ordering, replacements, maintenance.
