Aaron Blake Email & Phone Number

• Design and manage organization’s compensation systems, processes, policies, guidelines, and procedures, including base salary structures, incentive plans, and recognition programs, recommending plan revisions.• Advise leaders on pay decisions, policy and guideline interpretation, and job evaluations. Assist leaders and evaluate re-organization requests. Review compensation change requests and ensure compliance with company policy and applicable laws.• Work with leaders to maintain updated job descriptions.• Conduct periodic wage surveys, market analysis and benchmark studies to evaluate the competitiveness of our compensation packages and make recommendations for adjustments as needed. • Ensure compensation programs and practices are designed to support the organization’s strategic objectives and are internally equitable, market competitive, and legally compliant.• Partners with finance and senior management to develop annual compensation budgets and forecasts• Accountable for the maintenance and evaluation of the salary structures• Provide guidance, analysis, modeling and recommendations on compensation-related matters, including annual base pay increases, promotions and adjustments.• Manages PayFactors system to price jobs, and perform market analysis.

Chicago, Illinois, Us

• Established strategic vision and direction for department which included resource management, rebranding Health & Welfare offering, and service model.• Responsible for the design, implementation, and management all health, welfare and retirement plans and programs that ensures benefits offerings are optimized while minimizing expenses.• Develops and maintains vendor relations with all providers and consultants, ensuring delivery with company standards including RFPs and contract/policy renewals.• Utilized benchmark data and industry knowledge to enhance plan design by providing more options, greater affordability for associates, and saving the company 12% of plan spend.• Identified and implemented operational and process improvements which saved 20 hours per month.• Collaborated with Finance and Payroll to develop alternative ways to recognize accruals, forecasts and budgets.• Partnered with compensation dept to introduce alternative methods and philosophy to incorporate best practices.

St. Louis, Mo, Us

• Responsible for the management and delivery of firm base and variable compensation programs.• Analyze, evaluate, design, implement, and administer programs, policies and procedures including, salary administration, job evaluation, annual salary review, salary budgeting, and external benchmarking.• Utilize MarketPay system to manage pay structures through job analysis and market pricing, external surveys and internal data to recommend appropriate salary ranges and adjustments.• Develop job descriptions, assign pay grades and midpoints; make compensation recommendations for new hires, promotions, and employee pay adjustments.• Co-lead major external benchmarking and Job Architecture projects for firm.• Develop employee and manager communications, training materials and job aids related to comp and benefits.• Consult with internal business partners, such as department heads and management, to assess benefits, compensation and compliance needs and advises on current and emerging trends.• Streamlined manual bonus calculation process.

St. Louis, Mo, Us

• Responsible for the design and management of benefit plans with an annual budget in excess of $400m, which includes design option projections and pricing, establishing employee premium rates, employee wellness discounts, and processing vendor payment for programs including medical, dental, vision, wellness, STD, LTD, Life, FSAs, inc.• Manage the Open Enrollment process from rate creation to end of period reporting.• Negotiate and contract with benefit plan providers, vendors, auditors and consultants for services, premiums and plan administration to maintain a competitive benefits package.• Create financial models to calculate the impact of initiatives on company costs, as well as provide monthly financial projections of all benefit plans, presenting period over period variances to management. • Use data visualization tools (Tableau) to create reporting packages for multiple levels of management which includes dashboards that track benefit plan performance vs budget, utilization, costs, trends, etc.• Leveraged IBM Watson Health's system to analyze and evaluate healthcare and life claims to identify cost and utilization trends to project future impact, as well as provides recommendations to control costs.• Lead annual budget process for HR division by challenging business owners and managers to control costs.

St. Louis, Mo, Us

• Identified opportunities for savings in the areas of surgical supplies, changing surgeon behaviors, improved scheduling, more efficient staffing, and improved vendor agreements, which resulted in $350k in cost savings. • Served as liaison and consultant for Surgical and Pharmaceutical departments by identifying trends, working with department management to improve labor per statistic metrics, reduce costs, increase productivity, and provide financial support. • Wrote and created management reporting packages using Kaufman Hall Budget Advisor software to produce isolated and consolidated financial reports. Revamped management reporting structure to provide a more comprehensive tool to better manage the business after two months of being hired utilizing Pivot Tables, V and H Lookups, and other advanced Excel features. • Responsible for implementation and training of PeopleSoft enterprise application to hospital management. • Served as lead for monthly closing and overall hospital budgeting processes.

St. Louis, Mo, Us

• Created and maintained senior management dashboard to identify both external and internal key business drivers, which is used to effectively manage all aspects of the business selling cycle. • Managed Enterprise Pipeline Forecast System (Oracle - based) and CRM tool to ensure accurate forecasts.• Created automated monthly forecast reporting model which reduced preparation time by 60% by writingqueries from several different operational databases, financial systems, and business intelligence tools.• Prepared and analyzed actual and forecasted financial data, and recommended the appropriate action based on the financial analysis results.• Analyzed monthly variances between forecasted, budgeted, and actual results from prior periods, and communicated variances to senior management.• Attended monthly financial and operational reviews to determine internal and project cost drivers.• Reviewed and analyzed financial statements and advised management of risks and/or red flags.• Created operational budget for business unit’s various departments.

St. Louis, Mo, Us

• Managed sales pipeline via Salesforce.com, and forecasting system including validating accuracy of project financials, and pipeline opportunities with Sales Leaders, Account Managers and Project Managers.• Provided senior-level planning, forecasting, analysis, and reporting while serving as financial advisor in sector/business unit sales efforts with revenues exceeding $250 million.• Provided financial support and analysis to Sales, Operations and Marketing departments for strategic business decisions and cost-savings initiatives.• Provided recommendations and analysis for sales compensation growth targets.• Utilized MS Excel pivot tables and Lookups to develop sales management tools to measure and analyze financial, sales activity, and operations data (financial ratios, KPIs, sales forecasting platform, product pricing, and call volume).• Developed and maintained metrics dashboard to serve as a management tool to monitor sales pipeline, current and next fiscal year forecast activity, and closing velocity by writing queries and extracting data from Oracle-based financial systems.• Produced annual operating budgets over $8 million and forecast models with functional department heads and senior management.• Analyzed, interpreted, and communicated monthly variances and trends between budget, actual, and prior results in developing projections and forecasts to Senior Management.• Created ROI models for evaluating financial implications of new products and assist in closing deals.

St. Louis, Mo, Us

• Served as primary point of contact for all financial functions related to Boston field office. Responsibilities included analyzing and reporting financial data, budgeting, tracking, analyzing, and reconciling operational expenses, vendor charges, office leases, IT/Shared Services, and T&E expenses.• Performed monthly and year-end closings of program sales & expenses based upon actuals and projections.

St. Louis, Mo, Us

• Served as primary point of contact for all financial functions related to Microsoft Corporation, which included overseeing the collection process averaging $35 million, while managing 3 accountants.• Determined and analyzed gross profit earned on travel programs to compare with target sales budgets. • Produced weekly financial reports, prepared final billing packages and various analyses for Microsoft Corp. • Provided suggestions to improve pricing and profitability to sales team. • Assisted in client presentations and RFPs to acquire new business.

St. Louis, Mo, Us

Bachelor Of Science, Accounting

Education record