Stuart Blake Email & Phone Number

Chicago, Illinois, United States

• Manage a team of infrastructure engineers responsible for planning, implementation and support of the infrastructure supporting over 425 shops. In addition, manage the IT helpdesk for first and second level support.
• Negotiated and deployed SD-WAN solution to over 325 shops. This reduced network costs while significantly increasing bandwidth and providing high availability by utilizing multiple network connections.
• Presented SD-WAN and UCaaS solutions to senior leadership to gain approval and budget. Highlighted business benefit, cost savings and benefits of leveraging cloud-based solutions.
• Spearheaded the negotiations and implementation of broadband services for 75 high volume shops.
• Negotiated and deployed UCaaS cloud-based solution to all shops replacing a premise based VOIP platform.
• Negotiated and upgraded data center infrastructure within a private cloud data center. Migrated nearly 100 VM’s to a VxRail hyper-converged infrastructure. Included 2nd datacenter to establish DR services.

Bolingbrook, IL

• Manage a team of engineers responsible for the design, implementation and support of storage, database, server platforms and network (voice and data).
• Negotiated telecom contract reducing cost by $2.7MM over 3 years.
• Led team in design and implementation of infrastructure at Azure to support the rollout of cloud-based mobile app and company portal.
• Negotiated and implemented monitoring and alerting solution with 3rd party vendor for core database, server and network systems.
• Managed the IT resources responsible for new clinic openings. Outsourced equipment build and configuration reducing cycle time to open a new clinic.
• Senior leader on team migrating email, file shares and unified communications to O365.

Oak Brook, IL

• Manage 7 engineers responsible for the design, implementation and support of LAN/WAN and network security infrastructures for DeVry Education Group campuses, call centers and corporate offices.
• Negotiated contract to implement broadband technology to supplement campus bandwidth to support video connected classrooms and telepresence conference rooms.
• Key leadership member of team that moved secondary data center to primary site reducing co-location expense of over $600K annually.
• Managing project for network team to upgrade infrastructure at 20 Carrington College sites, a DeVry Education Group institution, to support Cisco VOIP solution leveraging the MPLS network.
• Managed network security team in implementing network access control (NAC) and firewall management tool Tufin to automate firewall policy push and enforcement.

Chicago Area

• Manage 18 associates supporting key infrastructure services: Network Security, Network LAN/WAN and Voice Engineering while accountable for a budget of $8MM+ with additional oversight for $7MM telecom and maintenance.
• Spearheaded transition of network support to outsourcing vendor seamlessly, maintaining operational support.
• Designed, implemented and supported Avaya call center technology extended to Canadian operation resulting in cost avoidance to Canadian operation implementing own call center technology.
• Led network teams in initial design and implementation for secured connectivity to Office Depot which supported merger activities.
• Negotiated and implemented contingent labor plan to backfill for resource depletion to maintain operational support during merger while managing network teams through aggressive transition activities.
• Provided management oversight for network and firewall remediation for annual PCI and SOX audit contributing to acceptance of Report on Compliance (ROC).

• Managed 15 associates on Network Security, Network Operations and Network LAN/WAN Teams and accountable for a budget of $6MM+ with additional oversight for $6MM telecom and maintenance expenses.
• Led network team in design, implementation and support of a second data center which established active/active DR solution. Negotiated additional discounts on network hardware and services reducing overall cost of.
• Directed network team in design, implementation and migration of systems to new PCI segments which met PCI compliance requirements.
• Led the Network Operations Center Team meeting or exceeding SLA's resulting in excellent customer service.
• Developed justification and gained approval for refresh of the Call Center network infrastructure delivering added functionality and maintaining vendor support. Negotiated additional discounts for telecom services and.
• Worked closely with business leaders to gather requirements for an OfficeMax store initiative, Control Center (PC repair). Architected network infrastructure and negotiated telecom contract to deliver cost effective.