Chris Fitzgerald Email & Phone Number

Saint Petersburg, Fl, Us

Sarasota, Florida, United States

Responsible for 18 retail locations within two franchisee organizations operating in multiple states. Leadership, Operations, Facilities, Maintenance, HR, Accounting, FP&A, Marketing, Training, Project Management, IT functions.

Sarasota, Florida, United States

Tampa/St. Petersburg, Florida Area

Manage up to six direct reports responsible for sixty resources performing plan administration of health and retirement benefit plans including: Claims Processing/Distributions, Contributions, Document Management, Call Center, Billing. Includes management and oversight of daily operations, IT prioritization, operational strategy and process improvement approach.• Reduced claim reimbursement review from 27 days to <5 days in less than four weeks. Reduced NIGO claim volume and achieved ongoing SLA adherence of >98%. Automated recurring claims.• Led matrixed, cross-functional effort to implement client portal and automate contribution process, resulting in improved client experience and operational performance, and >97% SLA adherence.• Managed client and participant escalations; Rebuilt critical partner relationships and renewed confidence in service delivery model, resulting in no additional partner attrition.• Reduced processing costs by 50% and improved service levels through leadership development, process improvement/automation, backlog management, standardization of exceptions, cross-training.• Standardized and systematized objective metrics and SLA’s for each functional area; resulting in improved processing quality, accountability, and culture of performance management through data analytics.• Designed and implemented billing system to replace manual 1x1 billing approach with systematic, batch processed billing. Reduced billing cycle from 120+ days to roughly 35 days, improving revenue accuracy, collections, cash reconciliations and cash flow.• Designed and implemented strategy map and quarterly incentive system based upon OKRs/MBOs to align associate and organizational objectives.• Consistently supported leadership team as needed, taking on critical functions such as cross-functional platform migration project, call center operations, and audit responsibilities with little notice.

Tampa/St. Petersburg, Florida Area

Manage seven direct reports responsible for ninety resources performing ERISA and non-ERISA retirement plan processing functions including Trading, Enrollments, Transfers, Contributions, Distributions, Call Center, Revenue Cycle Mgmt, Revenue Share, Training. Includes management and oversight of daily operations, IT prioritization, operational strategy and process improvement approach.• Facilitated Business Continuity Plan; led remote Disaster Recovery team during hurricane Irma.• Reconfigured onboarding training experience for new hires and established enterprise Training Center to ensure continuity and consistency for onboarded resources and ongoing training.• Designed, programmed, implemented enterprise Power BI reporting to provide visibility to KPI’s across business. Introduced “apps” within BI tying undermentioned applications into centralized reporting suite.• Designed and implemented company intranet, a centralized knowledge base for procedures/processes.• Designed and implemented Distributions and Deconversions applications to streamline and automate workflow and enable visibility to KPI’s driving business performance. Resulted in $200k+ annual savings.• Partnered with Legal/Strategic Partners to reengineer enterprise corrections process to improve productivity, streamline complex loss calculations, and reduce losses.• Reengineered reporting and metrics process for call center, enabling visibility to KPI’s for more actionable decision making.

Tampa/St. Petersburg, Florida Area

Manage ten direct reports responsible for 50M+ in annual invoicing, accounts receivable, non-trade accounts payable, account reconciliation, revenue share reconciliation and reinvestment in immensely complex industry• Reengineered invoicing/payment workflow and designed billing application to automate invoicing, payment, and collections; applied six-sigma and TQM approach to reduce cycle times from 12 weeks to <30 days improving accuracy, quality, client retention and saving $153k annually.• Coordinated migration from QuickBooks to Microsoft Dynamics, led integration and new invoice design.• Reduced DSO from $1M to $40k and eliminated 95% of manual cash application/receipting to invoices.• Standardized and systematized SLAs/KPIs/metrics/dashboards/scorecards • Assumed ongoing reconciliation of key GL accounts.• Successfully presented strategic enterprise-level business cases adopted by executive management to mitigate risk, create efficiencies and reduce cost.• Defined and documented team standards, best practices, and workflows• Reduced organizational risk by defining and documenting team standards, best practices, and workflows • Redesigned and automated revenue share reinvestment cycle, thereby eliminating 600 trade rejects/quarter and yielding annual savings in excess of $50k.• Streamlined and systematically automated payment release process by which third party constituents receive payment notification and supporting data, thereby eliminating 98% advisor/TPA inquiries.• Led cross-functional, third party partner project to implement online fee submission for Advisors/TPAs, thereby improving accuracy and timeliness, reducing risk and eliminating $50k+ in cost/loss.

Responsible for $700M in annual invoicing in a fast-paced, very complex, high volume environment. Ensure billing, AR, and GL accuracy and timeliness. Provide timely, updated information to key stakeholders in an effort to facilitate continued process improvements and improved client satisfaction. Key focus on consolidating billing systems and achieving efficiencies through automation.• Oversee 30 employees, utilizing 6 billing systems, invoicing 5000 clients, 5800 invoices/month, $57M monthly billing• Reduced billing related billing mistakes to .01%• Recovered $400k+ in recurring annual revenue• Re-engineered leadership team, replacing 50% of team• Helped facilitate migration of $20M+ monthly billing to new systems and implement automated billing processes• Designed and implemented team metrics to align individual goals with that of the organization• Designed and implemented central repository for receiving 100+ monthly standard billing input files• Increased team efficiency, reducing expenses by $450k+ annually

Responsible for selling, tracking and analyzing server maintenance and other hardware ancillaries to national client base. Managed monthly revenue recognition, backlog analysis, and profitability metrics.• Increased profitability by developing and implementing a margin tracking system whereby project and salesperson metrics could be tracked and measured.• Improved workflow and efficiency by creating and implementing an order management system.• Organized and launched a customer service database to track product expirations and installed a proactive approach to renewing services.

Managed four staff accountants and associated day-to-day operations of accounting department. Provided accurate and timely reporting to Controller and management team and assisted with annual audit. Responsible for reviewing and approving all customer bills, journal entries, commission payments, and over 100 monthly balance sheet work papers across two subsidiaries. Also accountable for monthly transfer pricing, accruals, prepaids, fixed-asset reconciliation, software capitalization, and sales-tax returns.• Introduced the use of customer statements to improve accounts receivable collections.• Increased efficiency by automating accounts receivable collection call tracking and reporting.• Improved division communication by implementing weekly meetings and facilitating group projects and training.

Accountable for processing, auditing, and billing of all new customer contracts and employee commission payments. Responsible for sales tracking, backlog management, inventory, and monthly revenue recognition. Prepared monthly work papers for all related balance sheet accounts.• Improved operations and reduced expenses by developing and implementing a database to streamline the submission of contracts, commission process, and sales tracking. The database allows sales and implementation staff to submit, track, and review real-time sales information and offers reporting and tracking tools.• Automated the revenue recognition process for all revenue centers by developing a supplemental backlog database that streamlined revenue recognition, tracking, and reporting.

Responsible for preparing, reviewing and sending customer invoices. Processed and reconciled monthly sales tax returns, and prepared monthly work papers for all related balance sheet accounts.• Lowered company risk by organizing and streamlining billing processes and tracking mechanisms.• Streamlined the sales tax process by setting up online filing and developing a database for tracking confirmations, files, login information, historical information and issues.

Responsible for all related staff accounting duties including cash reconciliation, voucher processing and payment, compiling and sorting check requests, vendor management, check requests, receipting customer payments, collection calls, aging reports, researching customer discrepancies, journal entries, and monthly work papers.• Selected to repair a newly acquired subsidiaries’ general ledger in order to avoid audit failure.• Developed and implemented a Purchase Order system to track committed expenses and implement enhanced budget control.• Awarded employee of the month in April, 2005 for excellent customer service and value creation.

Mba, Masters Of Business Administration

Activities and Societies: Management and Entrepreneurship Concentrations, with Honors

Bachelor, Finance

Activities and Societies: Beta Gamma Sigma