Makau Kelvin
Head of IT Operations
Nairobi
Summary
Team Leader experienced in directing activities of workgroups. Develops strategies, provides training, sets goals and obtains team feedback. Excellent interpersonal and communication skills. Big picture focus with excellence in communicating goals and vision to succeed. Problem solver, networker, and consensus builder.
Overview
23
23
years of professional experience
Work History
Head of IT Operations
Equity Bank Limited
Nairobi
11.2019 - Current
- IT Operations
- My duty is to oversee and direct the day-to-day group activities of Enterprise IT department, ensuring that applications, services, and infrastructure are reliable and secure, availability, provide continuity, confidentiality, and continuous improvement
- I manage a team of application owners, provide direction and guidance in the implementation of solutions, allocating resources based on their skill level
- I provide the leadership needed for troubleshooting and resolution of issues that may arise while supporting the business and /or deployment
- Promoted a positive work environment by fostering teamwork, open communication, and employee recognition initiatives.
- My role also involves project management and enterprise architecture responsibilities
- Key responsibilities: Manage applications availability & uptime Manage Continuity - Business Continuity Management Manage Service Requests, problems & Incidents and SLA Manage Security Services - Audit & Exception Resolution Manage Business Process Controls/ Optimization Optimal performance and uphold quality standards for enterprise/business applications Analyse, diagnose, and resolve application errors, malfunctions, misconfigurations, and enhance capabilities to prevent outages
- Resume – Makau Kelvin Page 2 of 10 Deploy releases and patches ensuring that agreed entry/exit criteria and process checkpoints are completed before go-live, ensuring Team leads approval is in place
- Ensure operational contact with users for enquiries, incidents, and ensure problems are managed and recorded according to a pre-defined set of standards Propose specific application and infra-structure improvements where problems are recurrent Ensure backup of applications and ensure easy retrieval of same
- Availability of procedure and manuals for effective operation Ensure all Changes to production follow the change management procedure
- Ensure Backup and restore/disaster recovery plans strategy is in place
- Documentation of capacity utilization and monthly trend analysis of capacity issues Budgeting and tracking of OPEX and CAPEX Vendor management and payments
ICT Technical Lead
I&M Bank Limited
01.2018 - 10.2019
- Projects – special assignment
- I was responsible for all technical aspects of core banking suite of applications implementation and upgrade
- It entailed the following: Requirement Specifications through standardization and Localization workshops Defining business Parameters Installation and configuration of Finacle Core Banking system ver 10 Carrying out Migration of data and testing for accuracy Developing test cases and carrying out UAT Developing Job Cards Conducting End User Education Training both Functional and Technical to staff Developing Reports Go-Live Preparation and Data Migration to Production Go-Live and post-go live support
Manager
01.2017 - 12.2017
- Systems
- This role was responsible for the development of application that complies with the industry standards and addresses unique requirements of business
- It entailed the following: Responsible for all technology configurations, development, and integration of core applications with other business systems
- Responsible for evaluating performance of team members in line with HR procedures and framework
- Developed plans and schedules for core applications in coordination with business functions and middle office operations
- Integration of desired values in application development to enhance controls and trust in systems; i.e
- Frequency of reports generation, water-mark features, process alerts, notifications, audit trails, flexible access assignments and self–healing to service disruption
- Resume – Makau Kelvin Page 3 of 10 Collaborate with business function to test concept papers on portfolio products and qualities of applications
- Organize and coordinate team members, break down complex tasks into manageable units to facilitate visibility and progress
- Assess personnel needs for re-skilling, coaching / training or induction and personal development to improve effectiveness
- Develop programs to transfer knowledge among operational personnel to enhance competency
- Analyse trends in the assignment of system access for user profiles applied in the administration of operations of ICT activities
- Boost working morale for staff and provide challenging task to team members to build competence and expertise
- Develop application processes that eliminate intermediary roles in business operations and enhance responsiveness in the management of customer’s issues; in and out of the system; real time to near real time processing, batch processing
- Coordinate and consult with other functional units in managing changes in ICT environment, business process re-engineering, patch and release management
- Integrate team members (squad) into ICT programs to cut down time spent on application development, testing and operations
- Design applications systems flexible for future infrastructural growth, simplifies integration requirement and flexible to changes in interfacing development
- Collaborate with strategic vendors and cross-functional units to develop BCP programs on service resumption strategy
- Instilling compliance discipline and share vision among team members to facilitate the achievement of business goals and objectives Develop automated and self-services capabilities that are value driven and minimize the number of touch points used in the accomplishment of tasks
- Consultation and core-create applications with vendors and business managers to enable the bank develop product portfolios that address changing customer preferences
- Integrate core applications with inexpensive tools and utilities that enhance capabilities in operations
- I.e (Use secure and readily available browsers, Simple for use utilities etc)
Manager
02.2013 - 12.2016
- Banking Applications Management & Support
- This role managed and supported Banking Applications and Services
- The Banking Applications include software applications regarding Core Banking, Delivery Channels, Business Support and Process Management
- Core Duties: Provide leadership to the Banking Applications Management & Support team
- Manage, support, and provide ownership of service delivery of the entire suite of banking applications
- Manage the team to create failovers to avoid person dependencies
- Ensure adequate resource
- Resume – Makau Kelvin Page 4 of 10 management & team strength always
- Provide technical expertise, training and L3 Support on various banking applications, services and processes
- Conduct periodic performance and security reviews
- Provide solutions to issues concerning the management and utilization
- Contribute to improvements & enhanced efficiency of banking applications and related processes for effectiveness and efficiencies
- Participate in new product rollouts, testing, documentation, and operational improvement projects
- Manage and monitor Change Management process for banking applications
- Ensure that all processes and procedures related to banking applications are documented and updated from time to time and communicated all the concerned
- Adhere to Bank’s policies and procedures in managing and support banking applications
- Support conducting DR drills
- Provide SLA management for banking applications
- Submit periodic report for health, performance, data integrity, changes done for all banking applications
- Manage and ensure the following: EOD / BOD activities are performed successfully and timely
- Mock run for month / quarter / half-year / year end are planned and executed
- Uptime of services being offered through banking applications as per SLA
- Proactive monitoring of services and transactions
- The issues related to bugs, fixes are taken with the vendor and regular follow-up is being done for delivery of patches and testing after receipt of patches
- The issues raised by the business users are resolved in time and communications to business users and service desk is done after done
- Regular and timely communications
Team Lead
Cooperative Bank of Kenya
11.2010 - 01.2013
- Projects Division
- This role contributed to the bank’s business processes design, reviews, change management process, policy reviews, training and documentation for the bank to achieve the desired level of efficiency, rationalized within an agreeable control framework and cost
- Business Process Reviews Assist in the identification, development and design of the new business processes
- Assist in the establishment of links between strategy, systems, processes and people
- Be involved in developing and evaluating new business processes in all areas of the bank
- Assist in the evaluation of all the changes to the new business processes to be in line with the business requirement as well as assist in the implementation and user acceptance of the new business processes
- Work with all business areas to re-examine current systems and processes vis a vis new processes, propose changes and amendments and continuously ensure that the bank’s processes are efficient, minimize costs and inherent risks
- Resume – Makau Kelvin Page 5 of 10 Identifying other alternative methods of handling new processes and making proposal on alternatives to be used which are user friendly, cost effective, time saving Proactively analyze the regulatory requirements and other directives to identify the required changes, the resultant impact and develop an implementation proposal/plan
- Assists in providing continuous feedback on how the applied new solutions are impacting the overall bank’s strategic objectives
- Project Management Being involved in all stages of the bank approved application development and deployment framework
- Co-ordinate user’s requirements definitions gathering stage across the bank
- Involvement in the Technical and functional design with the respective Technical project managers
- Ensure the Business scope defined is deployed as per the banks strategic objective
- Assess the Exhaustiveness of the User Acceptance test scripts and make recommendations to all business areas
- Assist in the development of the test strategy and plan
- Be involved in the Software Testing and Simulation with all users
- Assist in the Validation of the product features as well as data migration in the new platform
- Assist in the change management and training of the new processes across the bank
- Assist in all systems integrations, documentations, and data validations to ensure they meet the overall bank objective
- Be part of the project closeout process
- Operations Procedures, policy, and control Development Keep track and ensure documentation of all the versions changes to the software by the Bank and the Vendors
- Be involved in all the processes that require change and assist in version control Work with functional area managers to develop operational and system controls in line with bank’s control objectives Support the Information security officer in the requisites process, systems and people controls required to meet the desired bank controls objectives
- Performance measurement Develop performance measurement aids and tools to help business managers better manage their domains
- Develop quantitative and qualitative performance measurement attributes in agreement with business managers and integrate these into performance measurement matrices
- Make recommendations on the best support structure to be put in place to best support the running of the new application across the bank
- Ensure that all the systems reports developed meet the business objectives and assist in validation of the output
- Assist in the reconciliations process of the existing and new system
- Key achievements Saved the bank expenditure worth over $200,000 by implementing an open source test case management and bug tracking web-based systems Assisted in user requirements gathering in the bank and documented in a Business Requirements
- Document (BRD)
- Resume – Makau Kelvin Page 6 of 10 Spearheaded the team in re-designing and documentation of new process flows
- E.g
- Account opening procedures and capturing of additional MIS Evaluation of change requests for the business teams and following up on the implementation Evaluation and documentation of report requirements Development and review of user test cases for all business units Developed a test strategy document for both SIT and UAT for the project team Developed a simulation and migration strategy document for the project team Assisted in project management right from initiation to the testing and simulation stages of Core
- Banking, Treasury and Trade Finance systems
- Knowledge transfer (IT, Banking and Project Management) to the project team.
Business Process Analyst
01.2010 - 11.2010
- I was in Change Management Office whose integral function was to assess and co-ordinate all project management activities across the bank with an objective of realizing greater financial returns and exceeding business goals from every project
- My mandate was to ensure the day to day running of different projects throughout the project life cycle with the aim of delivering customer and stakeholder expectations
- Core Duties
- Assess the effectiveness of our people, processes and systems with a view of identifying opportunities for improvement through planned business process reengineering exercises
- Continuously review and recommend enhancement to the bank's systems to ensure optimization of the various systems functionally
- Assess effectiveness of business change activity through post implementation reviews to quantify gains made after BPR exercises or implementation of new systems/projects
- Work with business areas to examine current systems and processes, propose changes and amendments through the Head - BCM, to continuously ensure that the bank's processes are efficient, minimize costs and minimize inherent risks
- Support the bank's project management framework to assess and coordinate the project management activities with the objective of realizing greater financial returns and exceeding of business goals from every project
- Proactively advise on future resource requirements based on review of current and planned processing activity and/or business strategies of each business unit
- Co-ordinate and/or carry out Post Implementation Reviews for IT related projects after the system/process has been introduced to the live environment to assess the realization of project objectives against user and regulatory requirements as well as financial value delivered
- Develop performance measurement aids and tools to help business managers better manage their domains as well promote analytical skills and techniques across the bank Provide leadership in all banks projects
- Key achievements Implementation of the credit reference bureau system FX income distribution to branches Money Gram directed receive via call center Implementation of Western union project Treasury Reports- Fixed and call deposits Reuters FX Deal ticket automation Automation of ATM card production notification through mobile banking
- Resume – Makau Kelvin Page 7 of 10 Assisted in the implementation of Cheque Truncation System Core banking system evaluation
Assistant Manager
I&M Bank Limited
01.2008 - 12.2009
- I was the Team leader for Application support, development, Training and
- Project management
- This role entailed the following:
- Ensured the 24x7 availability of core banking system
- Analysed user requirements and developed new process flows
- Development of MIS reports both for internal and statutory reporting
- Managed change to ensure smooth adaptation of the new system
- Supervised ICT staff under application support to ensure delivery of quality service
- Monitored end of day operations and ensured that all processes run successfully
- Ensured the availability of reports to the users
- Customized the core banking system to meet users' requirements
- Setting up and testing of new products
- Coordinated with users to ensure that requirements are addressed
- Ensured that backups are taken regularly
- Setting up of testing environment for users
- Trained users on functional and technical areas
- Managed new projects that were related to the core banking
- System
- Documentation of all configurations and modification
Project Supervisor
08.2007 - 07.2008
- I was involved in the implementation of the core banking system alongside other modules that interface the banking system
- E.g
- Card management system, Call Centre, Mobile, etc
- Core duties
- My duties as a project supervisor were but not limited to: Understanding the core business of the organization and its requirements
- This included knowing the strategy of the organization both short term and long term
- Setting up of a project center and training room Carried out a detailed study of the current operations and developed a detailed systems study document
- Understanding the functionality and features of the new core banking system and align with the business requirements Planned and set up the project objectives and helped the project manager in coming up with a work plan/ work breakdown structure
- Coordinated the project activities with the aim of ensuring a seamless core banking implementation
- Business process Definition- I was involved in defining and setting up of MIS codes, Roles and Work Classes, and parameters for the new core banking system
- I was involved in work breakdown and resource allocation and assigning responsibility Change management and configuration management
- Resume – Makau Kelvin Page 8 of 10 I was involved in risk identification and mitigation in the project Monitoring and Controlling project execution Progress reporting and documentation Managing the concept phase of the project, ensuring the concept remains consistent with the organization’s objectives (e.g
- Policy, strategy) Business process re-engineering- this included defining new processes in line with the new core banking system
- Data migration
- I developed a tool that helped the bank to successfully migrate data from the old system to the new core banking system Testing and support of systems to ensure proper functionality
- Functional and Technical training
- I trained users both in functional and technical areas including carrying out executive appreciation training
- Achievements during this time: Successfully migrated data from Oracle Flexcube to Finacle core banking systems
- Developed MIS reports for the new core banking system
- Customization of the new core banking system to meet business requirements
- Defining of the new business processes in line with the new core banking system Guided and offered leadership to the project implementation team and ensured a successful change-over
- Successfully trained and mentored employees both technical and functional Provided full time support for the newly implemented system
- Headed the application team and delivered quality service to both internal and external customers
- Established a good rapport and trust among my peers and people above me.
Management Trainee
Kenswitch Limited
08.2006 - 08.2007
- I was trained and became proficient in the following areas
- Customer service Call Centre management Branch Operations Cash operations and teller functions Back-office operations Clearing operations Funds Transfer Trade Finance Credit- Pre-sanction, operations, and Post sanction Treasury dealing and treasury back-office operations
Systems Engineer
Makau Kelvin
02.2005 - 08.2006
- Ensured the availability of ATM services 24 hours a day
- Configured EFT systems and added new institutions and commissioned new ATMs
- Managed all the systems in the LAN
- E.g
- Ms Exchange, Ms SQL server, EFT system, Card Production system
- FTP system, Servers, Database systems etc
- Ensured that all system interfaces to the consortium of banks were up and running Network management and configuration including monitoring the links and bandwidth Generated reports and settlement for the banks and top management
- Ensured that replication and backup procedures were carried out successfully
- Developed in-house systems to meet both customer and organization needs
- Logged and followed up problems using the helpdesk system
- Customer support both on-site and off-site
- Enforced security for the systems in place by implementing security policies
- Performed testing and implementations of new systems
- Carried out preventive maintenance
- Handled and solved settlement issues with the banks
- Trained and mentored new employees
Customer Service executive
Insight Technologies Limited
09.2002 - 04.2003
- Supported ISP clients off-site and on-site Debts collection and recovery for bad debts Trained new employees Ensured the availability of quality service in the business
- Prepared quotations and sale of hardware and software
Education
BSc - Information Technology
Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology
Project Management - undefined
Kenya Institute of Management
ISO 20000-1:2018 certification - Lead Auditor
Skills
Operations management
Performance monitoring
Process improvement
Coaching and mentoring
Customer focus
Strategic planning
Project management
Risk management
Qualifications And Training
- BSc Information Technology, Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology
- Project Management, Kenya Institute of Management
- ISO 20000-1:2018 certification: Lead Auditor
- Six Sigma Certification - white belt
- Lean management
- Oracle Databases
- Linux/ Unix Operating systems
- Web servers (apache, resin, weblogic)
- Java programming
- Leadership training
- ESB Training (Fiorano)
Personal Information
- Date of Birth: 03/29/81
- Gender: Male
- Nationality: Kenyan
General Profile
I have over 18 years of IT and Banking experience. I have rich skills in problem solving, self-motivated, smart-working individual with impeccable organization skills and possess the ability to work in a dynamic, result driven environment.
Awards
- Best Innovation Idea, 2012
- Change Management Training
- Finacle Core Banking Technical Training- Infosys Limited
- Basic Banking /Banking Foundation Course Certificate - KIB
- Best student for Bsc. IT, 2nd year, JKUAT/ KCA 2003
- 2nd student conference on IT certificate
Other trainings
Six Sigma Certification
Lean management
Database training - Oracle Databases
Linux/ Unix Operating systems
Web servers (apache, resin, weblogic)
Java programming
ESB Training (Fiorano)
Timeline
Head of IT Operations
Equity Bank Limited
11.2019 - Current
ICT Technical Lead
I&M Bank Limited
01.2018 - 10.2019
Manager
01.2017 - 12.2017
Manager
02.2013 - 12.2016
Team Lead
Cooperative Bank of Kenya
11.2010 - 01.2013
Business Process Analyst
01.2010 - 11.2010
Assistant Manager
I&M Bank Limited
01.2008 - 12.2009
Project Supervisor
08.2007 - 07.2008
Management Trainee
Kenswitch Limited
08.2006 - 08.2007
Systems Engineer
Makau Kelvin
02.2005 - 08.2006
Customer Service executive
Insight Technologies Limited
09.2002 - 04.2003
Project Management - undefined
Kenya Institute of Management
ISO 20000-1:2018 certification - Lead Auditor
BSc - Information Technology
Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology
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