Resume

Alex Ashton
Washington, DC
email: alexashton at gmail.com

Career objectives – short-term

  • Continue to grow in current role as Platform Stability Analyst
  • Continue to learn more about SaaS platform operations
  • Continue to learn more about the software development process, specifically UX design and research

Career objectives – long-term

  • UX/UI design
  • Technical communication and writing
  • Product management

Education

  • Arizona State University – BS Technical Communication/User Experience; anticipated graduation Spring 2020
    • Current GPA: 3.75
    • Courses completed/enrolled:
      • TWC 301: Fundamentals of Writing for Digital Media
      • TWC 401: Fundamentals of Technical Communication
      • TWC 411: Principals of Visual Communication
      • TWC 414: Visualizing Data & Information
      • TWC 421: Principals of Web Authoring
      • GIT 340: Information Design and Usability
      • HSE 325: Human-Computer Interaction
      • CIS 105: Computer Applications & Information Technology
      • CIS 308: Advanced Excel for Business
      • COM 263: Elements of Intercultural Communication
  • Northern Virginia Community College – AA Liberal Arts; graduated in Spring 2018
    • Summa Cum Laude: 3.85 GPA
    • Phi Kappa Theta honor society

Skills/Experience

  • Technical Communication/UX Design and Research – 8 years as secondary skill, 1-year primary skill/duty
    • Experience with technical writing styles, AP style, citations, XML
    • Familiarity with: 508 compliance
    • Experience with communicating and analyzing data using Excel and Tableau
    • 6 credit hours completed in Technical Writing & Communication – User Experience program at ASU; enrolled in 12 credits; 15 additional credits slated between Summer 2019, Fall 2019 and Spring 2019.
    • 3 years supporting UX/UI and development teams and performing business analyst duties in support of such teams
  • Technical Support Management – 10 years
    • Support platforms: Remedy, Jira, ServiceNow, ZenDesk
    • 8 years in ITIL environments, including practitioner experience in ITIL service strategy, service design, service transition and service operation
  • Asset management – 3 years directly managing hardware assets of a global organization; 7 years working in a heavily managed organization and enforcing adherence to asset management policies
  • Technical recruiting – 9 years in a hiring manager capacity
    • 1 year of direct recruiting experience – authoring/editing position descriptions, resume screening, reference checks, phone screens, face-to-face, on-boarding
  • Microsoft Office Suite – expert level
  • Windows Server Administration – experience with Active Directory, Exchange, Office 365 (including a migration from Exchange to O365), RSA, SCCM, Great Plains, print services

Professional – Relevant

  • Platform Stability Associate – Optoro – July 2018-present
    • Process SaaS platform incident and bug reports and feature requests from external customers and internal clients
    • Act as the communications liaison between product and DevOps teams, external and internal clients, business operations and senior management
    • Provide data analysis to product teams and management using Jira and Tableau
    • Propose, develop and implement projects for continuous improvement initiatives
  • Technical Writer (contract) – eXtensia Technologies – August 2016-December 2016
    • Created and turned over end-user manual and engineering documentation for a hardware product developed by eXtensia Technologies for HID Global
    • Products used: Help & Manual 7, Adobe Creative Suite, Slate, GitHub, Jira, Microsoft Office, PHP Storm.
    • Skills used: HTML, CSS, XML, Linux commands, PHP
  • Global IT Support Manager – Liquidity Services – 2013-2016
    • Manager of IT Support field technicians located across the United States, England, and the Philippines
    • Set up and maintained global asset management database to account for all IT assets company-wide
    • Worked with vendors to negotiate contracts for IT hardware and software procurement
    • Acted as a primary point of contact for C-level staff in the corporate office for IT needs
    • Constant travel to field offices for projects and staff support
  • Desktop Support Manager – L3 Communications/Unisys – 2006-2013
    • Managed desktop support team contracted to the White House/Executive Office of the President under the direction of the Office of Administration
    • Interviewed, hired and led a team of 50 temporary staff in support of the 2008 presidential transition
    • Acted as primary point of contact for VIP level support, up to and including the President of the United States
    • Project manager for tech refresh program during 2009 Presidential Transition
  • Systems Administrator – URS Corporation (now AECom) – 2003-2006
    • Supported end users in primary office in Virginia, as well as secondary offices in Maryland and Ohio
    • Supported a range of IT needs from computers, phones, and other desktop hardware to servers and network infrastructure
  • Customer Service Agent – Verizon Data Services – 2003
    • Inbound telephone support for customer technical and billing needs.

Professional – Recent

  • Bartender – BadWolf Brewing Company – April 2018
    • Bartender and manager on duty for two locations; open and close duties; assisted the company with winding down operations and selling off inventory as the main facility closed in April 2018.
  • Bartender – Brew Republic Bierwerks – January 2017-March 2018
    • Bartender and manager on duty at a brewpub
    • Perform open and nightly closeout duties
    • Act as manager on duty to ensure staff schedule compliance and compliance with ABC laws and regulations

Volunteer

IVHQ – March 2016 – April 2016 – two-month project in Villa Allende, Cordoba, Argentina, repairing a municipal library which sustained extensive flood damage.