Duke University

University of Oklahoma

Digital Portfolio Manager/Senior Manager, Digital Product Management at Free People

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States

- Lead a talented team of contributors tasked to continue delivering best in class experiences across all FP digital properties – for the US/ROW, UK, and China sites as well as the iOS app and FP Blog. Both product management and web operations.
- Work with merchandising, marketing, and analytics teams to prioritize requests to have the greatest impact on sales plans and to accomplish desired brand experiences. Help break down large objectives to achievable roadmap initiatives.
- Led the implementation of the FP China website. Included launching a new currency, price list management approach, site translation (Simplified Chinese), and alternative payment method (Alipay).
- Owned the Free People iOS app as the Product Owner through several releases until hiring a FTE. Built out a near term roadmap for iOS, working closely with business stakeholders and IT development teams. Managed separate queue of tickets for dedicated iOS team within IT.
- Familiar with stability and performance goals - oversaw the performance tuning and monitoring for the FP sites previously.
- Built out original Cart & Checkout and International portions of shared URBN platform as a product owner. Identified and wrote stories with business partners, groomed stories with development teams, ironed out needs and spec changes with vendors, guided QA team in identifying testing scenarios and data needs, and collaborated with UX to meet business requirements with optimized customer experience.
- Manage the ongoing production site queue of tickets including bugs, change requests, and new features. Prioritize these within a tight budget of allocated hours. Plan for releases and drive the dev team to hit our date requests.
- Created a new intake form and process for site issues and new feature requests from the business. Utilized JIRA to manage this queue and provide traceability to requests and development work. Part of a larger roadmap intake process that has yet to be fully implemented.

Free People

Senior Manager, Digital Product Management

- Formalizing the SDLC for eCommerce projects from Ideation to Deployment to Evaluation
-  Oversee template creation for deliverables in the SDLC – Project Charter, Test Plan, etc.
-  Engage projects through all phases of the SDLC, ensuring business objectives are clearly defined, designed, developed, tested, and delivered to improve customer experience and enable eComm to hit plan
-  Developed framework for defect tracking and workflow for eCommerce projects
-  Actively maintain the eCommerce project list – driving internal and external teams to execute
-  Oversee code build and release process, communication, and training
-  Review all new 3rd party relationships from an IT and business perspective, ensuring they are technically and operationally viable and beneficial to the site’s contribution to company financial goals
-  Provide day-to-day support for site operations of 2 brands – promotions, content management, analytics, AB tests, customer groups, categories & products, site search, store locator, URL management, etc
-  Administer site preferences and technical integrations for 2 brands
-  Oversee management of mobile site vendor for 2 brands
-  Identify areas in need of optimization and work with business counterparts to enact change
-  Provide reports/analysis on site features/campaigns when they go overlooked by business counterparts
-  Maintain development skills by actively designing and coding for projects on the active projects list
-  Manage 3 direct reports – 1 eCommerce Quality Analyst, 2 Web Developers, and a UX Designer/Developer consultant

The Limited

IT Manager, eCommerce

- Managed the front end re-platform project for both the full HTML site and our mobile site (12 month project)
-  Directed outside agency during site redesign efforts (entire site refresh of all creative elements) in preparation for re-platform
-  Worked with new platform vendors to define project deliverables and processes for the re-platform
-  Defined entire site functionality for new platform developers and tech leads; developed proposals for functionality for review with business owners
-  Managed workflow and task pipeline for developers – internal and external
-  Empowered my team to lead to QA efforts for the re-platform; worked with them to define process, deliverables, and timelines. Escalated any issues they had directly with business partners to meet deadlines.
-  Planned and executed the site go-live process to have minimal risk to lost sales and client issues
-  Manage the portfolio of existing defects from go-live and prioritize those against new defects, projects
-  Perform the role of platform SME, knowing everything the platform can do and what it could do with some effort applied
-  Primary contact with all site integration partners
-  Perform occasional development tasks, but primarily debug and diagnose issues from a code perspective
-  Managed 3 direct reports – 2 eCommerce Quality Analysts and an SEO Analyst
-  Provide updates to senior executives, including the CEO on site updates, enhancements, and fixes

IT Project Manager, eCommerce

- Led the implementation of the mobile commerce site for The Limited and continue to serve as the relationship owner
-  Communicated testing progress and resolution updates for new site launch
-  Developed defect tracking spreadsheet in lieu of existing defect tracking application
-  Prepared dashboard reports for daily and weekly meetings with stakeholders
-  Elicited and documented requirements for various website functionality components
-  Elicited and documented requirements for tools used to further develop eCommerce practices
-  Developed user documentation and delivered hands-on training for eCommerce tools
-  Explored workarounds in existing platform to achieve specific functionality needed to achieve business goals
-  Acted as a first responder to user issues and questions on the website platform and eCommerce tools
-  Defined and communicated production defects to website hosting & development company
-  Defined and communicated new projects (new functionality) to website hosting & development company
-  Requested status updates and drove priorities with account executive and developers when deadlines started to slip or visibility for projects and defects fell

eCommerce Quality Analyst

- Administrator of HP Quality Center test management application
-  Developed and implemented customized workflow for Quality Center projects
-  Responded to user issues regarding Quality Center and other HP test tools
-  Maintained custom reports via MS Excel macros to report specific metrics
-  Led requirement gathering sessions with business to document existing systems and detail changes in future state systems
-  Documented use cases and flow diagrams for existing and future state systems
-  Led requirement playback sessions to review functional requirement summaries
-  Worked with developers and the business to detail logical solutions for requirements
-  Planned, wrote, and executed test cases for System, Integration, User Acceptance, and Performance/Automated testing cycles
-  Prepped environments for testing phases and worked with other IT teams to confirm stable integration setups
-  Provided QA support to other IT teams as a primary QA resource for the department
-  Created and maintained project plans for several concurrent projects

Kyle Wright