Dean Brandt has lived in Wilkinsburg for 33 years, the rest of his life in neighboring Edgewood. He has had a colorful career: selling cell phones when they looked like bricks; managing local rock bands in the mid-90s; and establishing an award-winning, indie DVD rental store in the 00s. Since 2013, he has been with HCL America where he is currently Deputy Manager - Operations for a project dedicated to improving the Google Shopping experience. In his spare time, Dean enjoys playing board games, brewing single origin coffee, reading, meditating, running, cycling, cooking, and playing with his adopted family members, his dogs Luna and Costello. He donates his time to PMI Pittsburgh, Wilkinsburg Affordable Housing Advocates committee, Wilkinsburg Government Study Commission, Older & Wiser Wilkinsburg Seniors Day, his neighborhood Block Club, and his elected position, Judge of Elections for 2-5.

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Certified Project Management Professional (PMP) leader with a strong background in managing complex projects and operations for Google Shopping. I am an expert at building productive, cohesive, and happy teams and in leveraging data analytics to gain valuable insights and inform strategic decision-making. This includes visualizing data in real-time dashboards and collaborating with engineering teams to identify software bugs and implement process improvements. I have a successful track record of completing 95% of all deliverables on time and exceeding customer satisfaction.

EXPERIENCE
HCL America, Pittsburgh, PA — Deputy Manager: Operations — May 2013 - Present

• Leadership
  • Manage three operations teams with 45-60 employees focused on testing new features and  improving classification effectiveness and user experience for Google Shopping globally.
  • Successfully piloted office in Krakow, PL with a small team of four ops. Company now has 100+ employees based there.
  • Mentor my direct reports, all managers, in leadership, training, communication skills, and administration.
  • Built a welcoming, cohesive, and collaborative team culture.
  • Received highest performance appraisals in all but one year. Received multiple promotions.
  • Experienced managing within a union framework.
  • Developed individual performance Scorecards: determined metrics, wrote Google SQL scripts, and built dashboards.
• Innovation
  • Identify opportunities for more efficient and easier processes to ensure faster work and well-equipped employees.
  • Lead design, implementation, and launch of new tools and feature enhancements to complement Google’s; create progressive processes for team success. 
  • Help detect software bugs and test new Google tools.
• Administration, Planning & Performance
  • Project resource allocation needs; plan and assign responsibilities; coordinate across various stakeholders; and consistently ensure that teams meet or exceed client’s deliverables.
• Analytical & Technical Skills
  • Analyzed and labeled data for thousands of products in diverse verticals in order to train and evaluate Google Shopping’s machine learning classifier with the ultimate result of enhancing the end user’s online shopping experience.
  • Adapted to ever-evolving internal software tools and processes.
  • Served as liaison with engineering team, helping to detect software bugs and implement process changes that increased efficiency, improved classification effectiveness, and eliminated knowledge gaps on our team.
  • Elicited requirements from team members for new tools and features, evaluated and prioritized them based on impact and feasibility, and advised Google on recommendations.
• Collaboration, Documentation & Training
  • Collaborate with other vendor managers in India and across the globe.
  • Conducted manual quality assurance on team members’ work, ensuring only high quality categories were approved.
  • Created and presented training modules covering quality requirements, data flow, and technical evaluation tools. Mentored new teammates in these subjects.
  • Initiated and led bi-weekly team meetings focused on sharing best practices, discussing ideas for our tools, and helping each other troubleshoot difficult projects.

Dreaming Ant, Pittsburgh, PA — Managing Partner — January 2003 - January 2014

• Founded and managed a 2-store, DVD rental operation with over 9,500 members and a staff of 2-6 employees.
• Curated an eclectic inventory of more than 18,000 movies.
• Developed an innovative website that showed real-time availability of inventory across both stores.
• Provided award-winning customer service
• Creatively operated a successful retail business within a 250-square-foot space within a coffee shop.
• Utilized SQL to run reports on customers, rentals, and inventory.
• Worked with software developers to turn single-location off-the-shelf software into a distributed, multi-location database.

BillingZone (PNC/Perot), Pittsburgh, PA—Sales Executive — November 2000 - February 2002

• Business Development
  • Wrote pre-call briefs for CEO and leadership team and worked with business development staff and outside analysts, Yankee Group and Jupiter Research, to develop sales/marketing strategies and business cases.
    
  • Established entertainment industry as a viable, new market by demonstrating profit potential of industry leaders such as Sony, Universal, BMG and Ingram Entertainment, and by defining specific product needs and interest within these organizations.
    
  • Researched healthcare, transportation, and insurance trading networks, and briefed sales team on findings.
    
• Sales
  • Sold high-level executives and front-line managers value proposition for innovative, web-based, business-to-business, electronic invoice presentment and payment (EIPP SaaS) financial service.
    • Scoped, researched, cold called, qualified, presented to, and successfully developed relationships with senior executives at key Fortune 500 prospects during 18-month sales cycle at PNC-Perot high tech joint venture.
    • Defined and analyzed business processes, inefficiencies, and system requirements across multiple departments at prospective customers, and provided written documentation to BillingZone’s business and software development teams.
  • Designed, created, trained, and supported sales and business development teams on sales tools.

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EDUCATION
University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA
Bachelor of Science: Marketing & Finance, Magna Cum Laude

• Completed Percipio Generative AI Business Transformation Course (February 2024)
• Project Management Professional (PMP) Certification, May 2024
• Professional Scrum Master (PSM) Certification, June 2024
  

SKILLS
Leadership • Mentorship • Operations, Program & Project Management • Problem Solving • Strategy • Innovation • Clear Writing & Oral Communication • Collaboration • Conflict Resolution • Editing • Adaptability • Flexibility • Budgeting • Marketing • Presentations • Training • G-Suite & MS Office • SQL • iOS, Chrome, Android & Windows

VOLUNTEERISM

• Revitalize Wilkinsburg Board, Secretary / Webmaster, July 2021-Present
• Wilkinsburg Affordable Housing Advocates, Committee Member / Webmaster, September 2021-Present
• Wilkinsburg Block Club, Captain, January 2022-Present
• Judge of Elections, Wilkinsburg 2-5, March 2022-Present
• Older & Wiser Monthly Seniors Day, Founder & Host, May 2024-Present
• Wilkinsburg Government Study Commission, Commissioner, January 2024-Present
• PMI Pittsburgh Board of Directors, VP of Programs, November 2024-Present
  

INTERESTS
Boardgames, cycling, running, health+fitness, reading, film, coffee, meditation, mindfulness, community development, affordable housing, local government, dogs, philosophy.

I organize a small, international annual boardgame convention in Pittsburgh – SplotterCon.com. We also publish boardgames & related media.