Contact Information

Dennis Cozart

• Email Address: dennis@denniscozart.com
• Web Address: www.denniscozart.com
• Mobile Phone: (480) 272-1035
• Street Address: 11558 North 120th Street, Scottsdale, AZ 85259

Summary Information

Product Management

• Twenty years of progressive experience with consistent delivery of significant business and software improvements to customer and partner systems.
• Proven track record of managing a portfolio of products and projects in a complex, worldwide business environment.
• Drove all aspects of product lifecycle, including product roadmap, vision, planning, positioning, requirements, prioritization, and implementation.
• Proven ability to research, evaluate, refine, and subsequently deliver version 1.0 products across multiple types of technology.
• Delivered 67 releases (including 12 version 1.0 type releases) in over 20 systems to varied user classes (small/medium/large business, direct/indirect partner, and IT pro).
• Designed primary research and leveraged secondary research to identify product, market, and customer opportunities.

Operations Management

• Completed approximately 70 business analyses, productivity improvement, and product/price analysis projects, including worldwide, cross organizational projects.
• Experience in multiple business functional areas including operations, marketing, finance, sales as well as multiple industries including software, Internet, and retail.

People Management

• Organization design, personnel acquisition, and team management in startup, growth, and large international organizations.
• Managed small and medium sized teams, including a 40 person internal startup that created a version 1.0 content management system.
• Organization morale and employee satisfaction metrics consistently ranked in top five percent of two Fortune 100 organizations.

Employment History

Blackboard Corporation

• Contactless Partnership
  Coalesced the Sony contactless reader opportunity into a cohesive, detailed plan for future contactless readers and five million dollar investment by Sony.
• Customer Satisfaction
  Attained a seven percent year over year increase in third party measured customer satisfaction of overall product functionality.
• Employee Management
  Turned a dysfunctional, non productive product management group into a product management group effective at managing hardware products and third party products.
• Internal Communication
  Significantly improved communication by creating the http://commerce web site which centralizes product information: 67% of Commerce employees visit it monthly.
• Product Analysis
  Created formal analysis criteria and approval process for third party hardware product; the criteria are based on category management criteria from leading retailers.
• Product Throughput
  Drove a 135% year over year increase in equivalent functionality product releases from a 2006 starting count of 14 releases to a 2007 ending count of 33 releases.
• Product Planning
  Created a rigorous product roadmap with one year planning horizon and socialized that roadmap in a regular and well attended monthly planning and review meeting.
• Product Quality
  Achieved average of two severity 1 or 2 post production defects per KLOC versus industry average of five such defects per KLOC.
• Product Trajectory
  Reoriented product trajectory from one driven primarily by customer input to one driven by industry standards, market analysis, and customer input.
• Project Timeliness
  Shipped approximately 95% of all products (internally developed and third party sourced) within the product roadmap committed delivery quarter.
• Sales Training
  Consolidated training from multiple ad hoc sessions per month to a single, predictable session of live training for all new products and replayable webcasts for each product.

PatchLink Corporation

• Responsible for product roadmap creation and presentation.
• Product/program managed eight releases and two new products.
• Organized and formalized product life cycle, including
  • Product area with attributes, types, names, and versions
  • Encryption area with standard and high encryption variants
  • Release area with detailed external and internal milestones
• Improved pre release documentation to include
  • New product features, resolved defects, and known issues,
  • Compatible products, platforms, and virtualization managers
• Competitive, industry, market, and academic research.
• Organization design and leadership in start up phase.

Microsoft Corporation

• Envisioned and product managed 49 releases in 13 business applications
  • Contract processing
  • Transaction processing
  • Analytical processing
  • Content management
  • Content/file distribution
  • Email management
• New product concept, business case, feasibility analysis, and commercialization.
• Defined multi year product portfolio strategies and annual product plans.
• Delivered ten version 1.0 releases across multiple business areas.
• Completed approximately 70 business process improvement projects.
• Rolled out multiple sales/marketing/channel programs to 58 subsidiaries.
• Extensive experience in global business practices and internationalization.
• Invited speaker at regional and worldwide channel partner conferences.

Egghead Software

• Designed data warehouse and decision support system for retail and corporate areas.
• Supported logistics analysis, promotion effectiveness, and ad hoc queries.
• Owned retail systems for 166 store chain, including point of sale, merchandising, and inventory.
• Created innovative in store kiosk for high touch, low cost product information.

Pioneer Electronics

• Analyzed and forecasted sales by product and market.
• Evaluated venture proposals and performed competitive analyses.
• Developed cluster and media analyses for major product lines.
• Sponsored buyer behavior and patterning research studies.
• Developed data warehouse for large national retailer.

Acquisitions, Inc.

• Brokered California manufacturing, wholesale, and distribution companies.
• Solicited, negotiated, and coordinated relationships between sellers and buyers.
• Analyzed, valued, packaged, and marketed companies on a national basis.

Xerox Corporation

• Operating and capital budgeting, cost accounting, management reporting.
• Automated telecommunications/data processing inventory and chargeback systems.
• Developed state of the art decision support models to forecast supply and demand.

Bank of America

• Supported business and technical analysis functions for major account sales.
• Needs analysis, proposal preparation, product demonstrations, client training.
• Developed telemarketing group, direct mail program, CPA public relations campaign.

Education History

University of California at Los Angeles

• Focus on strategic and international management.
• Awarded certificate in general management.

Columbia University Graduate School of Business

• Consistent Dean's List. Graduated Beta Gamma Sigma.
• Simon Gluckman Academic Fellow academic scholarship.
• President of Columbia Business and Economics Society.

Columbia University Graduate School of Arts and Sciences

• Consistent Deans' List. Graduated Phi Lambda Upsilon.
• Thesis in organic chemical structure determination.
• Laboratory instructor and teaching assistant.

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

• Consistent Dean's List. Graduated Cum Laude.
• Faculty Research Fellow in Chemistry.
• Financed 50% from own earnings.

Shipment History

Version 1.0 Products

• Here is a list of my 12 version 1.0 products and products that were rewrites from scratch.
• For all of these products, I had product management and user interface responsibility.
• For four of these products, I had product, program, development, and test responsibility.

Software Product Releases

• Here is a list of 67 software product releases that I shipped from 1995 to the present.
• For all of these releases, I had product management and user interface responsibility.
• For 25% of these releases, I had product, program, development, and test responsibility.

Hardware Product Releases

• Here is a list of six hardware product releases that I shipped from 2007 to the present.
• For all of these releases, I had product, program, engineering, and test responsibility.