Carien Marais
Singapore
Summary
I am highly observant and analytical, adept at understanding group dynamics and cultural nuances. My ability to forward think allows me to plan several steps ahead, effectively dissecting problems and identifying risks. I excel in communication, sharing information, and empowering others. Building strong relationships is a priority, fostering stronger collaboration and ultimate growth. I maintain resilience and professionalism under pressure, with a sincere but serious approach to work. My continuous learning attitude, strong questioning skills, and excellent retention of information enable me to empower and develop others effectively.
Overview
13
13
years of professional experience
1
1
Certification
Work History
Platform Owner - ServiceNow
Investec
07.2021 - 12.2024
- Led the ServiceNow platform team, ensuring optimal functionality and maintenance
- Facilitated daily engagement and weekly coaching to the team in order to create a high-communication environment and aid in personal development
- Aligned development tasks with strategic roadmaps to drive business value
- Collaborated with the platform architect on enhancement requests from the business to validate solution design decisions
- Defined the platform's strategic roadmap, using prioritised business value and team capacity to drive velocity allocation
- Drove stakeholder engagements to maximize business value
- Acted as a liaison between development and change delivery teams, translating business requirements into actionable stories
- Allocated work based on team capacity and approved stories to be committed for each iteration
- Reviewed stories in accordance with the agreed service development life cycle and to ensure alignment with acceptance criteria
- Delivered on auditing requirements, implementing country and global standards, where findings were part of an outcome
- Ensured compliance with ServiceNow contracts and clarified contract implications to stakeholders
- Created team documentation to conduct 'business as usual' and project engagements to ensure business value is achieved
Service Design & Transition Specialist
Investec
07.2021 - 11.2024
- Engage with stakeholders on a one-to-one level to create engagement templates, improving communication efficiency
- At the Initiation forum, built relationships with new service owners, ensuring smooth production transitions
- Delivered design and definition artifacts in collaboration with stakeholders
- Defined and documented maintainable service offerings to foster alignment between business and technical teams
Product Owner, Technical developer & Business Liaison Manager
NTT Limited / Dimension Data South Africa
07.2019 - 06.2021
- Defined and drove the vision for the scrum team, aligning efforts with business objectives to ensuring consistent progress
- Transformed problem statements into clear, prioritized stories allowing for effective backlog management
- Optimized the flow of work by grooming the story queue and ensuring efficient task distribution across team members
- To align changing business needs with technical strategy, successfully collaborated with Product Management ensuring consistency in business value delivery
- By implementing a service development life cycle process in the scrum team, I created the ability to effectively evaluate team deliverables and ensured high-quality work
- Served as the key point of contact between dev team and stakeholders, building relationships for effective communication
- Resolved dependencies and supported team coaching, ensuring smooth project execution and development
- Became the team coach, guiding the team through ceremonies and deliverables to achieve business value
Service Desk Problem Analyst
Dimension Data (Group) South Africa
10.2011 - 06.2015
- Implemented a tailored Problem Management process, optimizing it to suit business needs and improve issue resolution
- Trained and communicated the Problem Management process to stakeholders, ensuring clear understanding and adoption
- Managed the problem record backlog, resolving all problem tasks to improve overall service efficiency
- Managed the flow of incidents and requests, ensuring timely resolution from logging through resolution
- As part of reporting requirements, developed and distributed performance reports, to track SLA compliance and team performance
- Documented and maintained customer service offerings, ensuring accuracy and availability of key information
Service Desk Team Leader
Dimension Data (Group) South Africa
10.2011 - 06.2015
- Led and managed the Service Desk operations, ensuring seamless service delivery for incidents and requests
- Ensured effective communication, prioritization, escalation, and resolution, meeting stakeholder expectations consistently
- Achieved SLA compliance, ensuring timely and accurate reporting for performance tracking
- Defined and documented Service Desk processes (Request, Incident, and Problem Management) to align with ITIL
Education
BCOM - Law
UNISA
Bachelor of Science - Information Systems
Kennesaw State University
KENNESAW, GASkills
- Highly observant and analytical, adept at understanding group dynamics and cultural nuances
- Ability to forward think allows planning several steps ahead, effectively dissecting problems and identifying risks
- Excel in communication, sharing information, and empowering others
- Building strong relationships is a priority, fostering stronger collaboration and ultimate growth
- Maintain resilience and professionalism under pressure, with a sincere but serious approach to work
- Continuous learning attitude, strong questioning skills, and excellent retention of information enable effective empowerment and development of others
- Management of international clients & teams (Africa, Asia, EU, US, UK)
- Stakeholder & client relationship & expectation management
- Collaborative engagement and problem solving
- Team thinker, leader, champion and coach
- Design thinker with process design, definition, and implementation
- Analytically minded for business, stakeholder and process analysis
Certification
- Leading SAFe
- SAFe v4 Scrum Master
- SAFe v4 Introduction to SAFe
- SAFe v4 Program Consultant
- ITIL Operational Support & Analysis
- ITIL Service Level Management
- ITIL Service Excellence
- ITIL Foundation v3
- Mathematics of Computing
- Information Security & Assurance
Accomplishments
- ServiceNow platform project for a total of 11K employees (phased approach).
- Logical data separation.
- Platform to platform integration.
- ITIL Process design (to map to the platform), build, operationalize to maintain.
- Platform documentation.
- Successful ServiceNow contract negotiations.
- Template design & deploy for service onboarding.
- ServiceNow platform deploy project to 42k employees (big bang).
Timeline
Platform Owner - ServiceNow
Investec
07.2021 - 12.2024
Service Design & Transition Specialist
Investec
07.2021 - 11.2024
Product Owner, Technical developer & Business Liaison Manager
NTT Limited / Dimension Data South Africa
07.2019 - 06.2021
Service Desk Problem Analyst
Dimension Data (Group) South Africa
10.2011 - 06.2015
Service Desk Team Leader
Dimension Data (Group) South Africa
10.2011 - 06.2015
BCOM - Law
UNISA
Bachelor of Science - Information Systems
Kennesaw State University
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