A career of turning challenges into outcomes
I care about improvement that makes work better, wherever it may be.
– Sandy Harris, Founder, POET
My career has spanned commercial, operational and supply chain environments — major programs, business integration, Operational Excellence, transformation and executive advisory. Along the way I’ve worked through significant organizational change, regulatory demands and operational challenges where getting the answer right mattered, but making it work mattered just as much.
That range shaped how I work today: I look at the whole picture, consider different perspectives, and connect decisions to the realities of execution. I believe the people closest to the work hold essential knowledge, that complexity can be understood without being complicated, and that improvement should have a purpose — not just create more change.
What experience taught me
Understand first. Improve second. Not a methodology — a mindset. Organizations don’t need more complexity. They need clarity about what matters. I’ve seen rigorous methods deliver — and I’ve seen the method become more important than the outcome. I’ve seen what becomes possible when people understand the objective, contribute their knowledge and take ownership. And I’ve seen good ideas struggle when operational reality isn’t considered soon enough.
That’s what shaped my approach: understand what’s really happening, focus on what matters, and find an approach that fits the organization, the people and the work.
Explore experiences
CommercialFrom the outside in: what customers need and value.
My career began in customer-facing and commercial roles — customer service, sales, account management, commercial agreements, sponsorships, brand initiatives and customer experience. It taught me to look at the business from the outside in: what customers need and value, and the operational and commercial decisions required to deliver it.
Operations & IntegrationDecisions that work in the real world.
I led teams through operational customer experience audits, COVID mitigation and the delivery of high-profile commercial imperatives — bringing functions, systems and priorities together without breaking operational continuity. In operations, decisions have to work in the real world, often mid-change. My remit covered operational systems, business integration, business continuity, and Business Intelligence across operational reporting, KPI development and regulatory reporting.
People & CapabilityBuilding on people’s strengths, growing their capability.
Leadership taught me to be clear about what’s needed while treating people with dignity and respect. Through growth, change and difficult decisions, I’ve learned the fastest way forward is building on people’s strengths. Employee experience shapes customer experience — so I involve people early, listen widely, and build the capability and ownership to carry the work forward.
MRO & TransformationAlmost a decade in Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul.
I spent almost a decade in Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul, starting amid significant organizational and financial change. My remit grew from transformation and the separation and sale of the business to customer account management and customer experience across airframe, engine, component and support contracts worth more than $1 billion — and later the Program Management Office and Continuous Improvement.
Supply ChainThe end-to-end flow as one connected system.
Product Supply gave me the end-to-end flow — manufacturing through inventory, warehousing and distribution to the customer. It showed me how a decision in one link affects performance everywhere else, and why the flow must be seen as one connected system, not separate functions. Combined with earlier supply chain transformation work, it gave me both an operational and an improvement lens on where supply chains can be strengthened.
Operational ExcellenceFrom GE-trained Black Belt to Master Black Belt.
Operational Excellence runs through my career — Six Sigma, Lean and Lean Six Sigma across different organizations and operating environments. As an early GE-trained Six Sigma Black Belt, later a Master Black Belt, I built improvement capability while leading significant transformation at a national airline, growing to lead the organization’s largest Six Sigma savings portfolio — major labour and cost programs delivering more than $220 million in annual savings.
Financial & PerformanceConnecting operational decisions to financial reality.
I’ve managed multimillion-dollar budgets and delivered financial benefits and performance targets through complex operating periods. Working closely with Finance sharpened my read on the financial implications of operational decisions — the levers, the discipline to validate and realize benefits — across revenue, operating expense, capital investment and cash flow, plus extensive Order to Cash and Cost to Serve experience. I connect operational decisions to their financial and business implications.
Programs & DeliveryMany workstreams, moving as one.
Major programs never happen in isolation. I’ve led integrations, transformations and system implementations — from operational and business integrations to enterprise systems such as SAP — where multiple workstreams, functions and dependencies had to move as one. That takes synchronization, governance, risk management and timely decisions, all pointed at the intended business outcome.
Executive & AdvisoryBetween the strategic and the operational.
Executive leadership taught me to move between the strategic and the operational — seeing the bigger picture while knowing what it takes to make something work in practice. In advisory roles I’ve learned to listen widely, question assumptions, and offer another point of view when it’s needed. Good advice, for me, is sincerity, integrity and operational reality: listen to understand, speak with purpose, and give people what they need to decide well.
Some experiences stay with you because they change how you think
Over the course of my career, I’ve worked on challenges where the scale, complexity or consequences demanded more than a good plan. They required people and functions to work together, decisions to be made with incomplete information and execution to continue while the business kept moving. A few of those experiences continue to influence how I work today.
I was the project manager for the integration of two national airlines, subsequently described as the most complex corporate integration program in Canadian aviation history. My responsibilities included integrating critical operations functions and delivering the unified operating certificate plan while both airlines kept flying. The experience demonstrated what can happen when people align around a shared objective, work across boundaries and take collective ownership for making it happen.
As an early GE-trained Six Sigma Black Belt — later a Master Black Belt — I built improvement capability while leading significant transformation at a national airline. My responsibilities grew to include the organization’s largest Six Sigma savings portfolio, including major labour and cost programs that delivered more than $220 million in annual savings.
My years in the MRO business included transformation, organizational and financial change, the separation and sale of the business, and the transition that followed. It reinforced how closely strategy, operations, customers, people and financial realities intersect during fundamental change.
Later, I led Operations Excellence and Process Optimization across a major operational portfolio, including cost transformation initiatives that generated more than $100 million in annual savings. The work also extended to customer experience, operational performance, COVID mitigation and future-focused approaches to improving the operation.
Across different organizations and operating environments, I’ve established, reinvigorated and evolved Operational Excellence rather than treating improvement as a one-time program. The objective is broader: make problems and waste visible, strengthen how work is designed, build capability and create the conditions for continued improvement and innovation.
There’s always more to learn
My career has given me experience. It hasn’t given me all the answers—and I don’t believe anyone has them. The work changes. Organizations change. Technology changes. And the challenges we face continue to evolve. That’s why I believe in staying curious, continuing to learn and being willing to look at something differently. Experience provides perspective, but curiosity keeps that perspective relevant. That thinking is part of POET too: bring what you know, remain open to what you don’t, and keep learning enough to recognize when there may be a better way forward.
I describe my practice as efficiency architecture: designing how the business actually runs — the operating model, the improvement system, the leadership cadence — and staying to oversee the build until the change sticks. It’s the discipline behind my book, Cut the Chaos.