California State University, Fresno

University of Southern California

Chief Operating Officer  -  Change Agent  -  Integrator  -  Sales Consultant  -  Certified AWS Cloud Solution Architect

Dallas, Texas, United States

I am currently seeking an executive-level role (CEO, President, COO, SVP, VP of Operations) at a  company with a passion for quality and a vision for growth. I am industry agnostic and have experience in Internet services, finance, e-commerce, 3rd party logistics & academia. I can leverage my considerable experience to move that business forward with strong leadership, strategic alignment, process improvement, cost management, and people development. I am also open to consulting opportunities.I am located in the DFW area, but I am open to relocation for the right opportunity.

In Transition

Senior Operations Executive

Responsible for all aspect of the operation, including the design, manufacturing, importing, and marketing of products.•	Assessed international suppliers and chose vendor to manufacture the company's inaugural product.•	Launched product on multiple e-commerce platforms•	Improved Amazon rank > 90% using digital marketing & SEO to create awareness and drive sales.

New Century Ecommerce, LLC

Founder

Responsible for all aspects of Operations, including controlling costs, shared services, performance management, contract negotiations, projects, process improvements, and production. Reoriented the organization to focus on client and customer needs. Closed gaps in the service offering, identified and reported on KPIs, introduced new technologies, developed leaders to manage growth, reduced waste and expense, and developed a culture of continuous improvement. Worked with executive team to develop short-term goals that aligned with longer-term strategic objectives.Key accomplishments:•     Increased top line revenue more than 300% over 3 years, while realizing over 40% reduction in average cost per shipment.•     Improved employee performance.  Eliminated process errors, set goals, provided feedback, and developed a culture of continuous improvement, thereby increasing throughput in the fulfillment operation over 175%•     Identified client risks and developed tools to help them avoid unnecessary problems, save money, and better serve their customers.•     Redesigned Fulfillment process for Make-On-Demand products. Reduced fulfillment time by 30% and eliminated pick errors, over production, and reshipping.•     Increased average daily throughput over 350% with less than 50% of staff required after redesigning processes to meet the needs of a key client.•     Created a safety program to prevent employee injuries, limit exposure, and make the plant OSHA compliant. •     Trained operational leaders to focus on goals, data, performance, accountability, progress, and continuous improvement

Amplifier

President & COO

Hired by entrepreneurs to take an idea for a social media application and develop a business, leveraging the enthusiasm for Facebook. •	Wrote this business plan for the company, and this included developing the operating model, strategic marketing, growth plans, and Pro Forma financials for the business.  •	Developed the investor presentation & coached the CEO on how to deliver his pitch to angels and VCs.•	Delivered value proposition to venture capitalists and angel investors•	Worked with founders to develop roadmap for future application development.•	Worked with development team to create quality standards.

BidZzar

Independent Consultant

Despair, Inc. started as an inside joke among three friends and has grown into a company that ships products around the globe. Despair, Inc. is a direct-to-consumer, internet-based consumer products & online media company. Despair was a pioneer in the use of online marketing, including audio and video podcasting, social media, and email marketing. This enabled us to extend our brand and create a community of followers that we enlisted in the co-creation and promotion of new products. By creating a community of advocates, we have been able to extend our reach in ways that leverage the power of word of mouth marketing. The company has been profiled in, or on, The Harvard Business Review, WSJ, Washington Post, London Times, Financial Times, Business Week, Fast Company, NPR, BBC, CNN, Nightline, and many others. •	Led public relations by representing the company on radio, television, and in print media.•	Led the transformation of the operation from traditional, offset printing to a digital, variable data production process that enabled the company to offer customized products.  Additional benefits include:       ✓ Improved cash management by enabling the company to save money on inventory, improve cash flow, and eliminate over 80% annual waste.        ✓ It enabled the company to engage in rapid product development and test the market’s receptiveness to new products at a fraction of the cost required for traditional product development.        ✓ Able to once again capitalize on aging intellectually property that had ceased generating revenue.•	Worked with third party logistics partner to improve reporting, analytics, and visibility.•	Developed UK distribution channel.•	Increased visibility by writing for major business publications on issues related to leadership, motivation, and engagement, and speaking to trade groups about entrepreneurialism, motivation, and culture.•	Created several of the company’s most successful products

Despair, Inc

Separate Account Solutions was a vertical application company that provided both SaaS & outsourced operations that enabled banks and financial services firms to offer institutional money management services to their high net worth clients. •	Built and managed the back office service operations, which included portfolio accounting,          reconciliation, vendor relations, and client service.•	Operations integration partner with a large international bank on a project whose goal was to         transfer several billion dollars of their customers' assets to the SAS platform.•	Oversaw all securities compliance and regulatory issues for the firm.•	Responsible for Human Resource functions, such as recruiting and benefits administration.

Separate Account Solutions

VP of Operations

I was part of a team responsible for migrating local operations of acquired companies to national business systems included billing, sales force automation, service provisioning, and a new network architecture. Midway through the project it became clear that additional development was needed on several of the enterprise systems and I was asked to lead the testing and change control function. Some of my accomplishments included:•	Developed communication plan prepare stakeholders for the introduction of new systems. •	Developed training materials to prepare stakeholders for change.•	Ceated a very effective testing team. •	Developed comprehensive testing plans.•	Developed processes and policies that required developers to schedule and submit system        modifications for testing.•	Developed an online test reporting tool that provided transparency to developers that enabled        them to better understand application failures and system interactions. •	Produced > 95% reduction in errors introduced into the IT systems.

Verio

Director of Change Management

I led the national support center for Verio during it's explosive growth phase. During my tenure in this role, we integrated the support operations of over 30 acquisitions to the national support center and were able to provide branded support. I was responsible for choosing and overseeing the implementation of our enterprise CRM applications, as well as telephony and web based knowledge bases. I was also responsible for a variety of OD functions such as the development of career paths, compensation systems, and incentives, the creation of a training department to meet the needs of the center, and an internal quality review team to provide feedback on the quality of our service. We consistently achieved better than 80% customer satisfaction with support services, which was 23% higher than the industry average.

Director of Customer Care

Onramp Technologies was a rapidly growing regional ISP in the DFW market. I had a leadership role in several facets of the business operation: Sales, Technical Support, Network Operations, Business Development, & HR. I was also part of the team that presented the value of the business to potential acquirers. Onramp was acquired by Verio.

Onramp Technologies

I was a member of Baruch's Business Communication Faculty and taught the following courses:Managerial Communication within OrganizationsCommunication for ExecutivesSpeech Composition and DeliveryAt other universities, I also taught courses in the following:Power and Politics in OrganizationsOrganizational Communication & DevelopmentEffective Team CommunicationA Team Based Approach to Improving QualityPersonal and Professional Interpersonal CommunicationPersuasive CommunicationNonverbal CommunicationIntercultural CommunicationCommunication Theory

Lawrence Kersten