RAJ B.KANAGA BALASUBRAMANIAM

• Enhanced team collaboration by providing clear communication of complex findings through visualization and reports.
• Collaborated with cross-functional teams to identify opportunities for process improvement and increased efficiency.
• Heading the Experian Micro Analytics(Dynamic Airtime Advance) and Power Score L1/L2/L3 support and operations function from Experian KL office
• Leading end to end IT support and operations management for the team from IM, CM and PM ITIL flows
• Lead high severity bridges/WAR room, as an Incident manager and to drive end to end investigation with our internal teams with PIR/RCA for our clients
• To manage client and stakeholder experience/perception management, running weekly/monthly service review calls
• Working with my team and stakeholders, to ensure that our client contractual service/operations SLA and uptime are not breached
• Cross-trained existing employees to maximise team agility and performance.
• Developed and maintained relationships with client and internal stakeholders through account development.
• Achieved departmental goals by developing and executing strategic plans and performance metrics.
• Reduced operational costs through comprehensive process improvement initiatives and resource management.
• To lead all client onboarding process which involves solution/contract review, team up-skilling/enablement, client training and continuous support process improvements activities as well.
• Ensuring the team adheres to our support COE/organisation standards and best practices at all time with both internal/external stakeholder escalation management.

• Leadership and Team Management: Spearheaded a high-performing 24x7 support team, overseeing the delivery of exceptional service and support for Telco clients, while driving a culture of excellence and adherence to organizational standards and best practices.
• Operational Excellence : Successfully led the Experian Micro Analytics and Power Score L1/L2 support and operations function, ensuring seamless end-to-end IT support and operations management, aligned with ITIL flows (Incident, Change, and Problem Management).
• Incident Management and Crisis Resolution : Effectively managed high-severity incidents, led war room sessions, and drove end-to-end investigations, collaborating with internal teams to deliver root cause analysis (RCA) and post-incident reviews (PIR) for clients.
• Client Experience and Perception Management : Fostered strong relationships with clients and stakeholders through regular service review calls, ensuring contractual service level agreements (SLAs) and uptime commitments were consistently met.
• Client Onboarding and Enablement : Led the client onboarding process, encompassing solution review, team upskilling, client training, and continuous support process improvements, ensuring seamless integration and adoption.
• Process Improvement and Innovation : Spearheaded the Greenbelt project, focusing on monitoring and alerting optimization, resulting in a 70% reduction in overall support team efforts and a 50% uplift in support team capacity to absorb additional L3 scope and new products without incremental headcount.
• Legacy Experience : As a Senior Analyst, contributed to end-to-end support and process improvement initiatives for various Experian products, including PCSM, PCCM, PCO, Fraud and ID, and Hunter, within the Experian support HUB.

Key Responsibilities:

• Provided Business-As-Usual (BAU) support for various applications, ensuring seamless operations and resolving issues promptly.
• Managed enhancements to existing systems, collaborating with stakeholders to identify areas for improvement and implementing changes effectively.
• Coordinated with internal and external vendors, as well as stakeholders, to ensure successful project delivery and maintain strong relationships.
• Maintained and supported critical applications, including BNM Regpro, BNM ITEPS, CCRIS submission, and Payroll systems, to ensure optimal performance and compliance.

• Application Support Specialist (PSS) - STS (Payments) and I Banking (Channels) : Spearheaded the delivery of exceptional application support services for Standard Chartered Bank's STS and I Banking systems, ensuring seamless system stability and adherence to Service Level Agreements (SLAs).
• Leadership and Team Management : Led a junior team of 5, providing guidance and oversight on task delegations, ensuring Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and Turn-Around Times (TATs) were consistently met.
• System Support and Stability : Utilized in-depth knowledge of supported applications to provide day-to-day support, introduce new strategies to handle application issues, and contribute to overall system stability.
• Knowledge Management and Transfer : Maintained a knowledge repository, conducted cross-training and knowledge transfer sessions, and ensured that fellow team members were equipped with the necessary skills and understanding of STS system modules.
• Incident Management and Escalation : Prepared Weekly Incident Graph (WIG) documents for Incident Management teams, updated on issue trends, and initiated Conference Bridges for high-severity issues, ensuring timely resolution and Root Cause Analysis (RCA).
• Quality Improvement and Preventive Measures : Focused on reducing Batch service failures and Low-severity ticket inflow by deriving Incident Analysis (IA) documents for PSS Code fixes and implementing preventive measures.
• Stakeholder Management and Communication : Provided end-to-end support for code fixes, coordinated with L3 teams, and attended to stakeholder enquiries from users on system functionality, ensuring effective communication with business stakeholders, country service managers, and interface teams.
• Reporting and Performance Analysis : Prepared weekly reports for Country Managers and PSS Managers on system performance and problem trends analysis, providing insights for improvement.
• Project and Initiative Contributions : Contributed to various PSS initiatives and projects, including Project Theia (Audit), AE & PK CBS Replication activity, PK, BD, OM, AE Jasper Migrations, and change activities within the supported application portfolio.
• Technical Expertise and Knowledge Expansion : Expanded technical knowledge of the IT industry, communicated effectively with business stakeholders, and attended approved training, e-learning, and compulsory training on ILDP.
• Single-Handed Project Delivery : Successfully completed PK, BD, Jasper Migration with no impact to customers, resolving minimal problems within agreed SLAs.
• Process Improvement and Optimization : Managed SCM source syncing activity for countries and applications supported, ensuring production and clear case source version synchronizations, and optimized weekly End-to-End Jasper New customer Deployment for PK, BD, and LK.
• Leadership and Recruitment Support : Assisted managers with the interviewing process and people selection for overall CCM KL.

Key Achievements:

• Gained comprehensive understanding of the organization's business structure and developed applications, enabling effective collaboration and strategic decision-making.

Core Responsibilities:

• Spearheaded full product cycle testing, creating and executing Master Test Plans to ensure seamless delivery of high-quality systems.
• Developed and maintained test repositories, streamlining testing processes and improving efficiency.
• Conducted System Integration Testing (SIT) and User Acceptance Testing (UAT), preparing test plans, test scopes, and test scripts to guarantee customer satisfaction.
• Collaborated with customers' end-user groups and technical teams to deliver fully acceptable and quality systems, meeting customer needs and expectations.
• Created User Guides, conducted functional training, and supported User Acceptance Testing to ensure successful system adoption.
• Analyzed solutions provided by third-party vendors, providing constructive reviews and recommendations for improvement.
• Prepared user documentation, training documents, and user acceptance plans to facilitate smooth system implementation.
• Established standard test documentation and processes as a pioneer test team member, setting the foundation for future testing initiatives.
• Participated in MasterCard and Visa compliance testing, ensuring adherence to industry standards and regulations.
• Contributed to project planning, requirement gathering, documentation, and testing, demonstrating versatility and expertise in multiple project stages.

Key Achievements:

• Developed in-depth understanding of the organization and supported application functionalities, enabling effective support and issue resolution.
• Successfully led a team of 4, ensuring timely and efficient resolution of incidents, emails, and change tickets within agreed Service Level Agreements (SLAs).

Core Responsibilities:

• Provided general support for day-to-day incidents, emails, and change tickets, ensuring prompt action and escalation to meet SLA requirements.
• Conducted proactive monitoring of Service Manager and Support Inbox queues to ensure timely issue resolution.
• Updated process documentation and support notes as required, maintaining accurate records and knowledge bases.
• Ensured timely closure of incident tickets and maintained the DCISC support inbox, responding to and resolving emails within agreed SLAs.
• Assigned and escalated issues to team members, ensuring effective workload management and issue resolution.
• Provided Business-As-Usual (BAU) support for various applications, including:Xchange (Dispute Management System)
  Xpress/Relay (Diners Club International Authorizations switch system)
  Franchise Bridges
  Interchange (DCI Electronic Interchange system)
  GUI 1 (Diners Club International Franchise Applications)
  Discover/MasterCard batch Clearing
  GUI 2 (The Global Fraud Database)
  AER Global Vision (AER Global Remittance Processing System)
  
• Conducted root cause analysis for supported application issues, implementing fixes and changes as required.
• Provided on-call support for out-of-hours application support, focusing on XPRESS, BRIDGE, and AUTHORISATION support.
• Advised franchise users on technical enquiries and data extraction, ensuring effective communication and issue resolution.
• Developed and implemented development plans, participating in all stages of production fix implementation, from testing to deployment.
• Completed assigned e-learning and training courses to enhance skills and knowledge.
• Collaborated with diverse stakeholders, including franchise users, issuers, acquirers, and global teams, to ensure effective communication and issue resolution.

Key Achievements and Responsibilities:

• Provided 24/7 system support to meet Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and ensured timely resolution of issues, adhering to business needs during online and End of Day (EOD) operations.
• Maintained a knowledge repository, gained in-depth understanding of EOD and online modules, and conducted cross-training sessions for the team.
• Prepared Weekly Incident Management (WIG) documents, updated issue trends, and recommended actions to the Incident Management team.
• Ensured high-severity issues were resolved within SLAs, initiated Conference Bridges for Root Cause Analysis (RCA), and collaborated with responsible teams to minimize business and financial impact.
• Improved support performance and quality by implementing preventive measures, reducing EOD service failures, and minimizing low-severity ticket inflow through Incident Analysis (IA) documents for code fixes.
• Provided End-to-End Support for code fixes at UAT and Production environments.
• Executed DB patches to the production environment for data-related issues, following established processes.
• Addressed business inquiries from users on system functionality and participated in conference calls with service managers to meet business requirements.
• Prepared weekly reports for Country Managers and PSS Managers on system performance and problem trends analysis.
• Participated in Disaster Recovery (DR) activities every 3 months to ensure DR servers were synchronized with Production servers.
• Provided End-to-End Support for Online and EOD modules during new version implementations, ensuring smooth transitions and complete handovers to PSS.
• Attended approved and compulsory training sessions on ILDP to enhance technical knowledge and communication skills.

Key Skills and Strengths:

• Technical expertise in core banking systems (eBBS)
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills
• Effective communication and collaboration with business users, country service managers, and interface teams
• Ability to work under pressure and meet SLAs
• Strong knowledge of IT industry trends and best practices
• Experience working with global teams and users from diverse countries (Falkland Island (UK), Australia, Japan, China, Pakistan, Taiwan, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, and Labuan)

Career Impact:

• Expanded technical knowledge of the IT industry
• Developed effective communication skills to interact with business users, country service managers, and other interface teams
• Enhanced problem-solving skills to resolve complex technical issues
• Demonstrated ability to work under pressure and meet SLAs in a fast-paced environment

Key Achievements and Responsibilities:

• Derived functional and technical specifications from business requirements to develop and implement projects or small changes in the in-house core banking system (eBBS).
• Coded, tested, and deployed projects or changes into the production environment, adhering to group procedures and processes to minimize costs, time, and improve quality and efficiency.
• Ensured high-quality deliverables by conducting various levels of unit testing and system testing during initial development stages.
• Collaborated with the team to share job knowledge and conducted cross-training sessions to educate team members and gain in-depth knowledge of the system and development processes.
• Provided daily progress reports to the team lead and line manager to ensure quality, efficiency, and effectiveness of task assignments and meet project timelines.
• Assisted the PSS and implementation teams during the project implementation stage to ensure smooth deployment and minimal disruptions.
• Ensured zero high-severity problems and zero audit issues due to change-related projects managed by the development team in the production environment.

Key Skills and Strengths:

• Technical expertise in core banking systems (eBBS)
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills
• Effective communication and collaboration with team members, line managers, and stakeholders
• Ability to work under pressure and meet project deadlines
• Strong knowledge of software development life cycles and best practices
• Experience with unit testing and system testing to ensure high-quality deliverables

Career Impact:

• Developed technical expertise in core banking systems (eBBS)
• Enhanced problem-solving skills to resolve complex technical issues
• Demonstrated ability to work collaboratively with team members and stakeholders to deliver high-quality projects
• Improved communication skills to effectively report progress and ensure project timelines are met
• Gained experience in software development life cycles and best practices to improve efficiency and quality of deliverables

Technical Helpdesk Analyst (1st Line Support) Natural History Museum London (SSIL Computer Services Client Site) May 2007 - Oct 2007

• Provided 1st line technical support to clients, resolving issues within agreed SLA times and escalating complex problems to engineers.
• Managed client calls, logged issues, and resolved problems remotely using Hornbill's SupportWorks IT Helpdesk, LANDESK Management Suite, and COMPELS (Intranet).
• Performed daily administrative tasks, including creating new users, managing user permissions, and account management.
• Conducted server and desktop (PC/MAC/Blackberry) troubleshooting and resolved issues through the helpdesk.
• Built and customized desktops according to user requirements.

Technical Helpdesk Analyst (SSIL Computer Services) May 2007 - Oct 2007

• Delivered technical support to clients, ensuring timely resolution of issues within agreed SLA times and escalating complex problems to engineers.
• Utilized Hornbill's SupportWorks IT Helpdesk, VERITAS Backup, and LANDESK Management Suite to manage client calls, log issues, and resolve problems remotely.
• Performed daily administrative tasks, including creating new users, managing user permissions, and account management.
• Conducted server and desktop troubleshooting and resolved issues through the helpdesk.