Ross

Ross Williamson
[відкрити контакти](див. вище в блоці «контактна інформація»)
Email: [відкрити контакти](див. вище в блоці «контактна інформація»)

PROFILE:

Technically adept, senior leader in Information Technology, having over 20 years of experience working with major
multinationals, delivering the technology and capability required to reach business goals. Demonstrated ability in
strategy, design, management and execution often within the framework of highly regulated environments. Described
by employers as a professional, conscientious, creative, excellent communicator, with a self-motivated and delivery
focused attitude and a capacity to produce a very high standard of work. Complete flexibility to live and work anywhere
in the world.

MAJOR ACHEIVEMENTS:

• Formed high-performing Engineering and Automation function at Singtel, increasing efficiency across the Group
• Implemented “Cloud First” onboarding & migration strategy at Standard Chartered Bank
• Delivered Disaster Recovery and Remote Access capability for the European Central Bank
• Reduced the £2.5bn held in capital reserves by Aviva, driving a pan-European compute project

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS:

Director Engineering Singtel Telecommunications Singapore
01/2023 – 10/2024

• Architect and build of "Regional Best" Infrastructure as Code based Platform Engineering capability from
zero. Function, team (30), technology, budget ($2m). Operational Leadership, coaching and mentoring a
high performing team.
• Design and end-to-end delivery of ServiceNow CMDB integrated, Server Owner self-service patching
solution, for 4500 Windows and Linux workloads. Reduction in number of instances across Azure, AWS
and On Prem with patching non-compliances from 90% to zero. Reduced workplace toil by 3000 hours per
month.
• Automation of application deployment and configuration for over 100 in house applications. Reduced wait
time for new application infrastructure from 6 months to 20 minutes.
• Extended CMDB visibility from 30% to 100% with accurate near real-time configuration data.
• Conception, development and end to-end delivery of automated Platform Security Compliance. CIS
hardening, dashboarding and continual enforcement on Unix and Windows. Monitoring and enforcing 20
million security metrics daily. Reduction in Platform Security non-compliance from tens of thousands per
day to zero.
• Delivered Singtel SOE Windows 2019, Windows 2022, RHEL 8 and RHEL 9 platform build and
configurations resulting in consistent OS and cloud agnostic platform infrastructure.

Global Head Consulting Pragma Cybersecurity Singapore
06/2022 - 01/2023

Led a consultancy team to automate ISO27001 and Monetary Authority of Singapore compliant policy creation,
developed a self-service portal for regulatory gap analysis with dynamic reporting, and prepared for SOCI/II audits in
cybersecurity.

Head Risk & Governance Standard Chartered Bank Kuala Lumpur
08/2021 - 08/2022

Managed Standard Chartered Bank's Global Control Room, ensuring compliance with banking regulations on Personal
Account Dealing and Transactional Conflicts. Oversaw Global Gifts & Entertainment function, and supervised 12
teams responsible for Transactional Risk and Compliance functions including Trade and Communication Surveillance.
Vice President FinOps Standard Chartered Bank Kuala Lumpur
12/2020 – 08/2021

Implemented and defined best practices for cost control in AWS and Azure cloud across Enterprise Technology and
Business Lines, developing processes and tools for cost compliance. Identified savings strategies that saved $2m within
first two months. Assisted business application teams with understanding consumption and maintaining financial
compliance. Held cloud vendors accountable.

Vice President Production Control Standard Chartered Bank Kuala Lumpur
10/2016 - 12/2020

• Managed 50+ global IT contracts, reducing costs and eliminating non-compliances. Created real-time metrics
dashboards for contract compliance, saving significant costs with Oracle, Bell, IBM, Microsoft, and RedHat.
• Examined IBM licensing before Bank's IESSO contract renewal, identifying a nearly $1bn risk. Swiftly learned
the technology,applied system fixes, took ownership of the issue and coordinated with IBM to mitigate
concerns.
• Managed and resized approximately 1500 under-utilized virtual machines at Atos, leading to a $12m cost
reduction.Simultaneously developed and implemented a tool to detect and eliminate zombie servers, saving
an additional $3m.
• Oversaw production controls on global Windows and Unix servers, enforced policy compliance among support
teams/vendorsand represented technical teams in external audits.
• Led CCM Remediation, successfully rectifying 20,000 security non-compliances in our global Unix
infrastructure highlighted in three audits, ahead of schedule.

Citrix Cloud Migration Architect LarfargeHolcim Holderbank
06/16 - 09/16

Migration of legacy data centre infrastructure in Switzerland into new data centre in France and Amazon EC2 Hybrid
cloud.

Technical Assurance Manager Walgreens Boots Alliance Nottingham
04/16 – 06/16

Embedded within a team of Project Managers, ensuring technical and service compliance of their deliverables.
Managing third party vendors and negotiating changes to Service Catalogues. Taking part in Project Boards, tracking
budget cost and variance. Proactively seeking opportunities and challenging Solution Designers in order to reduce cost
and improve benefits of proposed solutions.

Global Infrastructure Lead UBS AG Singapore
02/15 – 11/15

Successful delivery of core Alternative Trading System infrastructure in order to meet US Securities and Exchange
Commission Regulation SCI. I engineered and built a new AD, DNS, IDMU, WSUS, SCOM, RDS, McAfee ePO, MVM,
RSA 2FA, Solaris 10 and RedHat environment, all running under Hyper-V. Also responsible for migrating 14,000
XenDesktop 5.x VDI’s to XenDesktop 7.6. Defined new services, business processes, Operational Level and Service Level
Agreements.

Global Infrastructure Lead Zurich Insurance Group Zurich
02/14 – 02/15
Hands-on delivery of several key infrastructure projects, including the deployment of new insurance pricing platforms
to worldwide userbase, hosted from three regional data centres (Sao Paolo, Zurich and Hong Kong with XenApp 6.0,
XenApp 6.5 and XenApp 7.6 environments respectively). End-to-end project delivery, from creation of automated
Powershell build scripts and utilities through to management of third parties and deliverables.
• Powershell Scripting
• Windows 2008/2012 Active Directory Group Policy/Preferences
 • Application Packaging
• SQL 2008/2012 Administration and scripting
• Citrix XenApp 6.5 & 7.6, seamless apps, UPM and VDI Deployment/Administration
• Citrix Provisioning Services 6.x and 7.x
• Netscaler 10 Administration
• Documentation including Project Plans, Risk Logs, Change Requests, SOPs and Admin Guides

Technical Lead European Central Bank Frankfurt
01/13 – 1/14
Technical Lead for Windows XP to Windows 7 migration project for the bank. Also Technical Lead for team that migrated
five pan-European Citrix Presentation Server 4.5 farms to Citrix XenApp 6.5. Latterly working on design of new
XenDesktop 7.1 consolidated environment with Windows Server 2012, Netscaler and Storefront. Remediation of
application packages, customisation of Group Policy objects, automated deployment scripts, SCCM design and
deployment, team management.
• Powershell Deployment Scripts
• Active Directory Policies
• Citrix XenApp 6.5, Storefront, and Netscaler 10 VPX and MPX with GLBS/EPA
• Citrix Mobile Device Management
• System Centre Configuration Manager Design & Delivery
• Application Packaging (Including App-V Sequencing)
• Oracle Identity Management Integration

IT Lab Manager Novartis AG Basel
04/12 – 12/12
Member of global project team migrating 70,000 desktops from XP to Windows 7 and transitioning VMware Lab
Manager environment to ESX5i. Design/provision new Citrix XenDesktop 5.6 VDI infrastructure for Remote Access,
developers, training, packagers and support teams.
• ESX 5.x Deployment, Migration/P2V of Windows Server, Red Hat Linux and Windows Desktop OS
• Windows 7, Windows 2008 Automated Build Scripts
• Self-Service XenDesktops

Consultant CSC / Zurich Financial Services Zurich
03/11 – 02/12
Design and Implementation of new Citrix XenApp 6.0 server farm using Provisioning Services 5.6 supporting users from
across the globe via Citrix Netscaler 7000 series. Transition from legacy Presentation Server 4 & 4.5 farms hosting 6000
users. Design and delivery of Appsense Management Suite infrastructure together with all Group Policy Objects,
Preferences and templates required for security. Designed and delivered small, 500 seat XenDesktop environment
for developers.

Consultant IBM/Novartis Basel
04/10 – 03/11
Working as part of the Joint Engineering Team on the Novartis account. Architect and Design of VMware Site Recovery
Manager solution for IBM at Novartis. Global Wintel deliveries and technologies, especially with regards to new
Windows 2008 builds and VMware ESX and VSphere based platforms. Other involvements with Citrix XenApp6,
XenDesktop and Veritas clustering.

Consultant European Central Bank Frankfurt
03/07 – 11/09
Architect and design of new Presentation Server 4.x and 5 farms for use by ECB and also by National Central Banks of
the member states. Implementation of customised web interfaces and VPN solution using Citrix Access Gateway.
Implemented other core services provided by VMWare VI3, SQL 2005 clustering, mirroring, replication and System
Center 2007.

Strategic Consultant Esteem Systems Wetherby
2006 - 2007
Defining IT strategy and assisting IT managers, FD’s and CIO’s map technology to business benefits and objectives based
largely upon ROI and TCO type arguments. This role involved strategy definition, architecture, design, technical design
authority and project delivery responsibility. Esteem is a Citrix Platinum Partner and I was involved in the delivery of
solutions incorporating Citrix PS4, Access Gateway, VMWare VI3 and Softgrid, all running on Windows 2003.

Technical Architect Marks and Spencer London
2006
Designed and delivered new Citrix infrastructure to support the sale of M&S Money to HSBC on VMware ESX. Also
responsible for Windows 2003 R2 DFS design for new stores infrastructure.

Technical Specialist Atos Origin Dundee
2005
Project delivery migrating 1500 General Practitioners throughout Scotland onto a centralised system for patient
records. This environment consisted of Citrix Metaframe Presentation Server 4 on IBM blades, with multiple Microsoft
SQL 2000 clusters hosting consolidated databases, all monitored by MOM 2005.

Senior Technical Consultant Huntsman Tioxide Teesside
2005
Transitioned support for a 7000 user, follow- the-sun, Citrix Presentation Server environment on Windows 2003 and
SQL 2000 replicated databases, from a third party consultancy back in-house for Huntsman. The role involved helping
up-skill the new support team, writing technical documentation and dealing with all Citrix support and half of the AD
support during the six-month transition period. This was a global environment with client connections ranging from the
west coast of America, across Europe and China, to Australia.

Senior Technical Consultant Norwich Union York
2002 – 2005
Employed as an end-to-end role infrastructure designer in the IT Solutions Delivery Team, I was heavily involved in the
design and implementation phases of a number of large projects. From August 2003, I was seconded to Aviva Head
Office and was the Technical Lead on a large project encompassing IT deployments across Europe. A summary of the
technologies, skills and responsibilities follows:

• Hibernian Insurance (Dublin). Design, delivery and support of IBM x Series Windows 2000 cluster, plus 35
Windows 2000 special application servers running a high availability financial projection package. Access
into the environment controlled by a Citrix Metaframe XP server farm deployed and supported by my team and
integrated into their Windows 2000 Active Directory with 3000 users. As part of the project, I augmented their
existing Directory infrastructure with two more Domain Controllers and created custom AD policy templates to
control both the Citrix and special application environment. Post deployment support included helping the
Hibernian team through their Windows 2003 migration, fixing cluster issues, publishing new applications and
troubleshooting Citrix and connectivity issues.

• Aviva Esp (Madrid). Greenfield implementation of Windows 2000 AD infrastructure, with clustered file and
Oracle database servers. Citrix Metaframe XP supporting users from five other locations in Spain and, again,
the same high availability financial package was used across 35 IBM x Series servers. Storage was provided by
an IBM FastT600 SAN which I built and configured to support the clusters and other file servers. Subsequent
Windows 2003 migration of all servers was carried out by me, together with a full emergency DR of all servers
plus recovery of a terabyte of data from TSM. This new Active Directory infrastructure was designed to support
600 staff and provide DHCP and DNS services for about 800 network devices.

• Delta Lloyd (Amsterdam). Ground up design and build of a Windows 2003 Active Directory providing security
for another special application. Again, access into the infrastructure was controlled via Metaframe XP on
Windows 2003 and supported offices from multiple Benelux locations. IBM ESS SAN storage with Veritas Volume
Manager and TSM looking after backups and HSM; with, again custom policy templates used to control security
within the environment. Delta Lloyd was the largest European subsidiary with about 15,000 users.

• Aviva Italia (Milan). Design, deployment and support of Windows 2000 clustering solution on IBM FastT SAN
along with another 20 application servers. Citrix Metaframe XP again supporting users from multiple locations
with Veritas BackupExec for backups. Subsequently, and in common with most of the other European Business
Units, we were asked to come back to Milan and do their Windows 2003 migration for them.

• Deployments in Paris and Warsaw had a similar requirement for design and rollout work with continual support
 requirements coming from all of the Business Units over the course of the 18-month project. In the same period,
I set up an R&D facility for access by all countries hosted centrally in the UK. This was based around Windows
2003 and Citrix and hosted on IBM Blades.
• Norwich Union (York). Before being seconded to Aviva Corporate Office, I was involved in the design,
deployment and support of many solutions in the UK. The largest was the Distributed Change Programme which
replaced 36,000 desktops in the UK and migrated the legacy NT4 domains to Windows 2003 Active Directory.
I wrote some of the key design documentation for the AD infrastructure, in collaboration with HP and carried
out extensive proof of concept work in our Solutions Assurance Lab on key components such as MOM (Microsoft
Operations Manager). I was also involved in Project Smith which provided applications via Citrix to Call Centres
in India.

Senior Technical Support Consultant InTechnology Plc Harrogate
2000
I was employed by InTechnology on the ‘VBAK’ project. This was an off‐site backup product built on Windows 2000 and
SQL. I carried out consultancy and support work and saw new customers on a regular basis in an effort to tailor and
support VBAK in their environments. Product development and infrastructure design were a large part of my
responsibility, with regular visits to talk through product options with our developers in Canada. The role was very
customer facing and I particularly enjoyed the challenge of understanding and delivering into diverse corporate cultures
whilst at the same time, getting to grips with local IT technologies, strategies and policies.

Support Analyst InfoCom York
2000
InfoCom was a relatively new company working on ‘e-projects’ for some major payers. Shell, NHS, Carling and EMI were
amongst their clientele. The team that I worked in was responsible for a complete end-to-end solution to the
customer’s requirements, from writing the code (which I didn’t do) to sourcing and building hardware, infrastructure
and networking components such as load balancers and firewalls.

QUALIFICATIONS & EDUCATION:

• Postgraduate Diploma in Business Analysis – University of Lancaster
• Joint BSc(Hons) Chemistry with Pharmacology – University of St Andrews
• AWS Certified Solutions Architect
• Google Associate Cloud Engineer
• Azure Fundamentals
• FinOps Certified Practitioner
• Member of several professional IT industry organizations – for example The FinOps Foundation
• Current RP-T in Malaysia

HOBBIES & INTERESTS:

• Experienced and keen sailor
• Avid SCUBA diver