Asif Ahmed

A highly knowledgeable, experienced and technically astute IT leader with more than 10 years of relevant experience in progressively more senior roles. A creative and disruptive leader with an impressive track-record of IT development and transformational projects for SMEs and larger corporate entities.

Asif is people-oriented professional with amicable communication and team skills and agility which enable him to thrive in various business cultures. In addition, he is a calm and goals-oriented individual that is able to maintain his composure under high pressure. Asif is commercially astute and is able to align IT strategy with an organization’s strategic objectives.

Asif brings experience across a wide range of industry sectors that include Banking, Public (Government and Local), Retail, Construction, Telecommunications and Postal/Courier & Logistics.

Royal Mail Group Sep 2015 - Present

Test Manager - Chesterfield

Role & Responsibilities and Selected Achievements

• Provided assurance and overall test approach with managing the execution of testing. 
• Assured multiple suppliers test approach and coverage through strict quality assurance and governance controls.
• Overall ensure all programmes and projects risks are mitigated through robust test management and assurance of supplier deliverables. 
• Being the single point of contact for the quality of the solution at any given stage.
• Liaising with different technical architects and leads covering the wide array of technology used for appropriate coverage and management of testing.
• Coordinated and arranged necessary test resources for each testing phase.
• Clear understand the high level E2E business and technical requirements and intended implementation.

Projects 

Test Lead, RMG (IT Transformation), Waterfall

Transforming the RMG IT estate from single supplier to multi-supplier virtual IT estate.

Working on one of the largest IT transformation programmes in Europe (£105m). Transformation of the RMG IT estate which includes infrastructure, application and service. This required liaising with old and new suppliers to manage transition of applications and specifically 2000+ interfaces.

My role was to assure the testing approach for this transition and be overall responsible for the assigned projects under this programme. I worked on this programme for over 1 year with successful delivery of 21 projects.

Test Lead, RMG (Redelivery and Track & Trace systems), Waterfall

Liaising with business owners in transferring the applications into a new data centre.

Responsible for all testing and assuring vendor testing approach. This required several phases of testing which includes but not limited to connectivity, infrastructure, technical, SIT and UAT.

Test Manager, RMG (Mobile App), Agile

Involved in RMG’s first mobile app for customers U.K wide.

Working with a number of platforms to develop new features via API functionality. This required assuring supplier testing approach and liaising with business for testing and acceptance. Several phases of testing from numerous teams were required for (£0,000,000) delivery.

Test Manager, RMG (Letters & Parcels Hardware/OS Upgrade), Waterfall A (£18m) technical hardware and OS upgrade of 39 Mail Centres throughout the U.K.

Overall responsible and in coordination with the RMG Engineering department and Lockheed Martin to ensure the upgrades do not adversely affect normal business operation. Several phases of testing (FAT, PIT, and Operational) were required to ensure robustness of delivery.

Outstanding success for a project delivered on time and on budget with no impact to the business.

Test Manager, RMG (MS Teams), Ring Staging

Rollout of Microsoft Teams to 28900 users covering laptops, mobile devices and conference facilities.

This involved a staged ring project approach from PoC to eventual wide release across the business. Working with our suppliers and Microsoft. Ensuring assurance and triaging issues to configure deployment package for successful roll out.

BT Plc Nov 2013 – Mar 2015

QA Manager – Sheffield

Role & Responsibilities and Selected Achievements

• Responsible for several delivery units of testing activity with variety of streams of projects - BT Global Services, PlusNet Business, Service Management, Web/Mobile and 2 further project teams
• Managed the Quality Assurance schedule to underpin and deliver the business roadmap and support team deliverables to quality across DUs.
• Lead the development and implementation of ongoing management of the Quality Assurance framework as a combination of tools, techniques and measures.
• Recruited and line managed (onshore, offshore, contractors and permanent) and ensured that robust processes and protocols were in place for optimum quality of client applications and its subsequent delivery.
• Managed engagement and collaborated with BA/BI, infrastructure, operations, security and client relationships within the functions I am accountable for.
• Lead and facilitated team planning, including sizing, prioritisation and capacity plans in collaboration with Delivery Unit Leads.
• Supervised test plans, test scripts and test reports while initially overseeing the test process and conducting of test phases.

Projects 

Managing all agile testing activities across projects and coached all personnel while closely liaising with the development team and project managers to ensure a solution was driven forward to an acceptable state.

BT Global Services (Website Refresh and Products), Agile A private internet site for businesses i.e. Orange etc. Continual Agile development of the website which brought new commercial products and refreshed site in how it operates for the users.

PlusNet Business (Partner Fibre Products), Agile

Giving commercial partners the ability to now offer fibre through BT. 3rd party interfacing was required of backend systems which was implemented through Agile development.

Styles & WoodPlc Mar 2011 – Dec 2012

Test & Release Manager – Nottingham

Role & Responsibilities and Selected Achievements

• Worked on several projects for Tesco, Nationwide and Coop, replacing or upgrading the live environment, supporting up to 6000 user property systems, with zero user downtime, earning great plaudits from the client. This has led to fewer issues at Live release and better standard of software being developed for clients.
• Successfully documented and implemented streamlining of internal process that encompasses Release and Testing which resulted in significant improvement in quality of software products and faster turnaround for client releases.
• On the Senior Management Team where I lead a team to work on the post development phase of all projects - accountable for Quality Assurance and Release.
• In charge of all aspects of Quality Control and Service – encompassing testing, release management and 3rd line incident management.
• Produced project test reports, conducting project test reviews and reporting on monthly bases as functional head on testing and release.
• Liaised with 3rd party, 1st & 2nd line support, project managers, development manager and account managers to ensure quality of delivered systems and future support. 
• Managed all test environments and releases to each environment and scheduled with final sign off of all releases to live environment. Also ensuring there was minimum code conflict for such releases.
• Led and directed appropriate accreditation in Microsoft courses for the company and adopting ITIL and ISTQB courses. Also pursuing new technologies to adopt automated testing.

Projects 

Responsibilities included upholding the testing strategy, process and approach. Reviewed test plans and scripts and creating calculation tests. Managed promotion to internal environments and scheduling the live release in coordination with the project managers and client.

Nationwide (Asset Lifecycle Product), Iterative  A (£000,000) project for a newly developed product which evaluates the lifecycle of tangible assets and calculates future scenarios based of deprecation of these assets.

Successfully delivered with only 1 incident by adopting my test and release strategy.

Tesco (Planning Product), Iterative A planning tool for all programmes and different types of projects with built in reports. Projects could then be added with set events associated into a user desired programme.

Sopra Group Sep 2006 – Sep 2010

Developer – Glasgow

Selected Achievements

• Client site project delivery at several major clients such as Scottish Government, NAG, Northern Rock and RBS utilising SCRUM methodology.
• Worked in the public and banking sector developing and supporting web-based systems in C#.NET, ASP.NET and SQL server.
• Supported Senior Quality Management department on key projects.
• Documented and provided SQL training to 10+ testers.
• Went through the graduate program, gaining experience at different industries and several companies.
• Worked for one of the largest software consultancy companies in Europe.

Projects 

Responsibilities included consultation with clients and business analysts on delivered solution. Estimating on projects that were assigned and delivering within those timescales.

NAG (Credit Risk), SCRUM 

Working on an individual basis, developing a credit risk system which flags businesses at risk of defaulting.

Post Graduate Diploma in Information Management Sep 2004 - Jun 2005

University of Strathclyde - Glasgow

BEng (Hons) Computer and Electronic Systems with Business Studies Sep 2000 - Jun 2004

University of Strathclyde – Glasgow

Scottish Higher: Physics (A); Maths (B); Chemistry (B) and Geography (C) Sep 1994 - Jun 2000

Renfrew High School – Renfrew

Professional Qualifications: ITIL Foundation, ISTQB Advanced Security Tester, ISTQB Advanced Automation Test Engineer, MCTS ASP.NET 4, AGILE/SCRUM Foundation, ILM (ongoing)