Donovan 💻 Grant

University of the Arts London

Imparting my knowledge in business analysis, I dispense job focused training and coaching, enabling student progression, advancing experience and ensuring wellbeing. As a business coach, I manage numerous training programmes, providing instruction and coordinating activities. Handling stakeholder communications, I partner with senior management to formulate bespoke plans. Orchestrating and facilitating groups and one to one workshops, analysing training results and testing knowledge to confirm understanding.

Here are some of the highlights of my achievements:

• Coordinating efforts with Business Analyst Managers, facilitating workshops; improving capabilities throughout business analysis teams.
• Identifying skills gaps presenting training and career coaching; enhancing careers of junior and senior staff.
• Forming strong and mutually beneficial relationships with internal and external stakeholders, collaborating with business
teams to share ideas and best practice; troubleshooting and resolving issues.
• Delivering Business Analysis on the university’s digital business transformation programme; confirming value and usability are delivered across change management plans.

Lead Business Analyst & Coach

Metadata Training

One-on-One Mentoring: Providing regular, personalised one-on-one coaching sessions to apprentices, ensuring the seamless integration of training course knowledge into practical workplace applications.

Bridging Theory and Practice: Playing a pivotal role in bridging the gap between theoretical learning and real-world workplace practices, ensuring that apprentices can effectively apply their skills.

Tailored Learning: Customising the learning process to align with the specific needs of both the employer and apprentices, ensuring that the training directly addresses the challenges faced in the workplace.

Alignment with Real-World Problems: Ensuring that apprentice learning aligns with the real problems they encounter in their day-to-day work, fostering practical problem-solving abilities.

Guiding the Learning Journey: Guiding mentees throughout their learning journey, helping them develop technical proficiency, and fostering their confidence.

Practical Skill Development: Enabling the transformation of theoretical knowledge into practical, hands-on skills, empowering apprentices to excel in their roles.

Coaching Through Challenges: Providing support and coaching to apprentices during setbacks and challenges, helping them navigate and overcome obstacles in their professional development.

Business Analyst Mentor

Heroic Public Benefit Corporation

Heroic is a dynamic platform that unites ancient wisdom, modern science, and world-class, scientifically validated tools to drive personal growth. 

In my role as a Heroic Performance Coach, I offer customised one-on-one coaching to help you unlock your fullest heroic potential and spark transformative change—one individual at a time. 

If you’re inspired, explore more at heroic.us or drop me a DM.

Heroic Performance Coach

London Metropolitan University

As a senior business analyst and coach, I executed business analysis, delivering group workshops and developing process improvements. A major part of my role, was to plan projects, share progress and evaluate results.

Here are some of the highlights of my achievements:

• Spearheaded Lecture Recording Project as part of virtual learning programme; delivered change, achieved results on time and within budget.
• Conceptualised and integrated continuous improvement initiatives, including focused project meetings; provided focused feedback and progress updates to ensure future business transformation.

Senior Business Analyst & Coach

HSBC Commercial Banking

Working with HSBC, I led requirements gathering workshops and obtained feedback from stakeholders to create business requirements documents and support the delivery of strategic initiatives and key projects.

Here are some of the highlights of my achievements:

• Motivated and coached team members; increased knowledge and confidence in use of systems, business analysis, project management and change management.
• Integrated continuous improvement initiatives; triggered improvements in reporting and strategic planning.

Visa Europe

In my role with Visa Europe, I assessed business conditions, considered project feasibility, identified areas for improvement and outlines solutions to deliver digital transformation. Partnering with internal and US stakeholders, I delivered global projects and met standards.

Here are some of the highlights of my achievements:

• Managed digital change projects; designed and instituted more transparent and secure payment options for members and customers.
• Played a pivotal role as an agile team member across three countries, mapped and documented business processes; originated improvement initiatives to achieve project deliverables.
• Contributed significantly to the launch of the new Visa Apprentice programme; delivered training and career coaching, marked assignments, tested knowledge and offered mentoring to develop a diverse range of IT professionals.

A decision maker and motivational communicator, a coordinator of key performance goals, I have coached individuals and teams to achieve digital change objectives. 

Engaging in key training activities, I am passionate about providing group and individual coaching to prepare business professionals for future business transformation. I also greatly relish new and refreshing challenges, which give me great satisfaction when I resolve issues.

A career performance coach, I deliver bootcamps providing exclusive coaching for technology professionals, enabling them to become more influential and impactful.

Presenting internal and private coaching for technology leaders and managers, I offer strategic support to enable organisational change. I am regularly called upon to deliver high performance coaching and training in value driven business analysis.

I guide business analysts and Technology professionals to move their mindset and businesses from their current position to where they want to be in the future.

As a business transformational coach and business analyst, I excel while leading challenging digital development projects and change initiatives to advance learning and improve business processes. I am a high achiever and impacting leader, with a talent for refining and advancing knowledge in business analysis, project delivery and change management within major organisations, creating and developing people and strategy to improve engagement.

As an imaginative and analytical individual, I can easily visualise the wider business, allowing me to steer change and strategic advancement to achieve results.

~~~

𝘗𝘴. 𝘐𝘧 𝘐 𝘴𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘢 𝘳𝘦𝘲𝘶𝘦𝘴𝘵 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘢 𝘯𝘰𝘵𝘦, 𝘪𝘵 𝘸𝘢𝘴𝘯’𝘵 𝘢𝘶𝘵𝘰𝘮𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘥. 𝘚𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘣𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘮𝘢𝘥𝘦 𝘮𝘦 𝘤𝘭𝘪𝘤𝘬 𝘵𝘰 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘯𝘦𝘤𝘵. 𝘐 𝘩𝘰𝘱𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶’𝘭𝘭 𝘢𝘤𝘤𝘦𝘱𝘵! :)

Medtronic

Program Director, Process Optimization. A part of the Strategy & Technology team within Medtronic’s Global Ops. & Supply Chain.

Developed and led a transformational program to standardize capacity modeling across Medtronic's Enterprise Operations (66 mfg. sites, 20 Operating Units/BUs).

Developed and implemented an innovative operations analysis/operations research platform that delivers critical insights, leveraging a minimum viable data set to identify & mitigate risk, optimize performance, and target opportunities for improvement.

Program Director

- Data and Analytics leader for the General Surgery & Market Access (GSMA) Operations Network.  A large Operations network comprised of 4 Business Units and 21 Manufacturing sites.

Director of Analytics

Engineering Director, Operations Commercialization Engineering (OCE) within the Surgical Innovations Business Unit
- Led the creation of a new department chartered to streamline commercialization and transfer to Operations for the project pipeline of ~70 launches from 4 R&D centers in the US, Europe, & Asia
- Built a culture with world-class Employee Engagement – Organizational Health Survey (Qualtrics) results greater than 80% in all 3 company index areas (4 consecutive survey's)
     - Achieved peak Index scores of: Engagement = 88%, Inclusion = 94%, Innovation = 98%
     - Increased score for the question about “work being too hard” by 36 points in 6 months
- Protected revenue for new product launches by identifying and mitigating risk to production ramp-up and commercialization. 
- Integrated Business Planning core team member & subject matter expert for Supply, Capacity, & Analytics during process and tool design.  Acted as Change Ambassador for rollout across 10 mfg. sites within the Business Unit
- Created Governance process and tools to manage Long-Range Capacity and Expansion related investment.  Reduced the number of manufacturing lines above target Capacity utilization by more than 50%
- Delivered critical analytics  for Business transformation initiatives, Crisis response, and tiger-teams

Director of Engineering

Led team of 10 project managers & engineers within Strategic Project Management for Manufacturing Operations.  Core responsibilities:  business analysis, manufacturing strategy development, and strategic project management.
- Analyzed product lifecycle / footprint optimization opportunities and presented recommendations to upper management for long-term footprint strategy.  Gained approval for 2 large programs.
- Drove project management standard work and best practices across the portfolio of programs from initial concept evaluation & business case through execution & closeout

Manager, Strategic Project Management

3 companies have been 1 company and 1 company has been 3

I joined Tyco in 2003.  
Tyco Healthcare spun off to become Covidien in 2007
Covidien was acquired by Medtronic in 2015

Covidien & Tyco Prior to acquisition by Medtronic

Covidien

Led staff of 8 Engineers within Strategic Project Management function of Manufacturing Operations.
Core responsibilities included, Program Management, Industrial Engineering support for New Product Development, and Capital / Expense management.

- Managed the Program for a product transfer and mfg. start-up of packaging and sterilization facility in the Dominican Republic; relocated 10 manufacturing lines and exceeded project cost savings targets

Manager of Industrial and Project Engineering, Strategic Project Management

Managed Engineering team responsible for Industrial Engineering support for New Product Development.

- Rebuilt the team while maintaining internal customer service levels through an 80% staff turnover caused by an organizational change & promotions

Manager, Operations Analysis and Project Engineering

Large-Scale Program leadership including manufacturing transfers & start-ups, integrations of newly acquired businesses, and site closure & consolidations

- Executed mfg. site consolidation project; process development, product transfer, qualification, and production start-up for 3 product lines (Class II medical devices) 
- Expanded capacity and facility infrastructure across 12 focus-factories, to align with 5-year Strategic plan's growth, through $100 MM capital investment program

Project Manager, Strategic Project Management

Project Management and leadership for product transfers & manufacturing line transfers, and capacity expansion programs.

Sr. Project Engineer, Divisional Engineering & Operations Analysis

Tyco Healthcare Limited.

• Project Management for 7 new product introduction programs.  
• Analysis to support Business Unit Manufacturing Strategy development, including evaluation & optimization of Mfg. footprint & competitive benchmarking.

Project Engineer, Divisional Engineering & Operations Analysis

Industrial Engineering and Operational Analysis
• Developed cost estimates, line layouts, and capacity analyses for new product development (NPD) launches

Capital and expense budgeting/management
• Managed the business unit’s capital budget; created spending and forecast accuracy analytics and presented monthly summary reports to upper management.
• Managed expense spending, forecast, and accuracy for all projects within the business unit

Associate Industrial Engineer, Divisional Engineering

Luck. Drop your toast and it lands jelly-side-up, luck.

An Engineer by trade, but I've never engineered much. I’m at my best when leading teams, building culture, and developing people. It all started with luck.

My first job after college was as an engineer. But the work wasn’t engineering. Instead, I stumbled into the intersection of Project Management, Strategy, and Analytics. A sweet spot where I've spent most of the last 20 years.

• A decade of Project and Program Management. Delivering dozens of large strategic programs and business transformations. Some with budgets exceeding $20M.

• Led manufacturing strategy and footprint optimization workstreams to reduce costs by millions.

• Bridged the gaps between R&D product launches and Manufacturing, mitigating over $1B of risk to revenue.

• Established the global Analytics team of a 21-site Operations Network. Driving insights that informed strategic decisions.

• Developed new global standards through influence when I had no authority to do so.  Improving processes across global operations.

• I've led teams through growth. Standing up new functional departments twice, doubling headcount, and quadrupling scope.


I’m passionate about coaching, mentoring, developing future leaders, and helping team members grow.

A journey fueled more by influence than authority. The common theme? Leading people through the intersection of program management, strategy, and analytics. Delivering the toughest projects to earn the next opportunity.

- - - -

The biggest lessons I’ve learned in 20 years as a leader:

• People deliver better results when they like the work - they're more fun to be around too
• We aren't robots doing work; we're all people, and connection is powerful
• Heroes get the glory, but preventing fires is better than fighting them
• Asking good questions is more valuable than giving great answers
• Sometimes you'll catch a bad break - keep going
• Sometimes you get lucky - embrace it
• A great culture usually wins
• Simple is better

- - -

Guiding Values: 
Be genuine and make a difference

Core Beliefs:
Life hides lessons in plain sight. 
Pay attention to learn. 
Tell stories to teach.

First figure out what's most important to you in your life.
Then you can start making the right decisions to get it.

When you care about people, they’ll do the work.
When you only care about the work, you’ll lose the people.

taplio

The Battle

Donovan 💻 Grant

Aaron Alwine

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