Mairaj Syed

Biography

Mairaj Syed I hold Bachelor of Business Information Systems and Diploma of Project Management. I am a CSM and PRINCE2 Practitioner. The Project Management Institute has also approved my application for the Project Management Professional certification so I will be sitting for the certification exam end of this year. Over the past 11 years, I have gained enormous business analysis and project management experience working in banking, consulting, media and communication industries. I am a collaborative, pragmatic, self-motivated and results driven individual who is able to work in a fast-paced environment. I am very skilled at balancing multiple projects or tasks and meeting deadlines. I am able to properly deliver critical requirements in tight timeframes with limited resources. My strong administration and technical skills have enabled me to work in increasingly challenging roles throughout my career. I have experience in managing waterfall, iterative and agile software development projects using PMBOK and PRINCE2 methodologies. I have always performed above and beyond the agreed goals and expectations to get the work done, and my managers have acknowledged it on numerous occasions. My stakeholders have also commented on my professional manner of communicating, leadership skills and ability to deliver solutions against business expectations. I gather requirements, facts and data from the stakeholders to put together the business case stating the benefits to the business, the costs, the measurements of success and the return on investment. I talk to the stakeholders to understand the severity of not delivering on time. If my deadline is constrained by dependencies, I talk to project managers of the upstream and downstream projects to get a better understanding of the interconnections and plans to reorganise things. To get the buy-in of the key stakeholders I try to position the information so that it highlights the benefits to their business area to improve the prospect of getting approval. During the development of business case I use my experience, lessons learnt and limited resources to provide plans and solution recommendations to the stakeholders. I always endeavor to find and implement a solution that is beneficial to the organisation and stakeholders involved. I use a variety of project planning, scheduling, scoping and resource management methods to organise and prioritise the workload and resources. I subdivide project deliverables into smaller and more manageable tasks. I then prioritise each task, define the dependencies and estimate the effort required while developing the schedule. I use various tools to manage changes to the project baselines through the integrated change control process. If the scope change has an impact on time, money and risks beyond the agreed tolerances and contingencies then I further discuss with the project board and stakeholders before the project plan is re-baselined. I have sound communication, influential and negotiation skills. I establish transparent information and feedback process to make my projects successful. I know meaningful stakeholder engagement is essential and mutually beneficial project activity that results in better-informed decisions and successful projects. I develop an appropriate approach for communication based on needs of the stakeholders to improve chances of receiving favorable response. I regularly negotiate with different stakeholders regarding competing priorities. I have the ability to build strong working relationship with the stakeholders to drive agreed strategic project outcomes. I have been involved during all phases of system development life cycle. I possess a keen eye for detail, understanding of how processes work, and how to quickly and efficiently resolve problems through process analysis and systematic thinking. I undertake analysis, problem solving and planning activities on a daily basis. I have the ability to understand information quickly, and present findings in a concise and meaningful way. I use various tools and techniques to comprehensively document the business and functional requirements. I also develop requirements management plan to define how the requirements will be documented, communicated, tracked and changed throughout system development life cycle. Especially for large and complex projects I also develop conceptual system design using various tools and techniques to receive feedback about the final solution. At the ACMA we don’t apply one size fits all approach and tailor the software development methodology depending on the project size, available resources and implementation requirements. Generally for large projects we use agile methodology and for small to medium-size projects we use hybrid agile-waterfall methodology. I have been managing project since I started my career at the ACMA as Senior Business Analyst. During my career at the ACMA, I have worked on major transformation projects to build broadcasting licence, online and broadcasting content and media ownership compliance reporting, monitoring and investigation systems. I have also worked on numerous strategic initiatives such as developing a business case to implement integrated planning and performance framework, providing input into the information management strategy development, and providing advice to decommission and replace legacy applications, implement the cloud solutions and software upgrades. I have also been part of numerous projects responsible for regulating telecommunication such as building a system to collect Telecommunications Industry Levy and Annual Career Licence Charge, allocate and administer phone numbers, investigate complaints related to radio communication and domestic system interferences and investigate complaints related to unsolicited messages and calls. Currently I am managing portfolio of minor software development and upgrade projects using PRINCE2 and agile methodologies. I also use PMBOK methodology to plan the project and measure its performance. Due to limited resources at the ACMA my current position as Project Manager is broad. In addition to managing portfolio of minor projects I am managing BAU engagements, gathering business requirements and performing testing activities. I am also active member of the change advisory board. I usually supervise the entire staff of the Application and Information Management section and perform higher duties when my manager is away on leave. I have thorough understanding of ACMA’s other duties such as issuing telecommunication licence, enforcing compliance with relevant obligations, release of mobile broadband spectrum, monitoring the compliance with the Telecommunication Consumer Protection Code and communicating the national broadband network rollout. Prior to my career at the ACMA I worked on numerous transformation projects in retail banking with various financial institutions.