Elena Shchetinina
Toronto,Canada
Summary
Program Management Leader with over 20 years of experience delivering measurable results across financial systems, data platforms, AI, and enterprise operations. Presented program strategies to executive leadership, secured buy-in from cross-functional stakeholders, and drove adoption of new initiatives across Finance, Legal, and Engineering teams. Skilled at leading programs from conception to execution, influencing decisions, and achieving initiative adoption. Expert strategic planning, risk management, and driving improvements in fast-paced environments.
Overview
23
23
years of professional experience
1
1
Certification
Work History
Senior Portfolio Manager, Data & AI, Enterprise Architecture
Bell
Toronto, Canada
07.2024 - Current
- Manage business-critical programs across Data & AI portfolios, collaborating with Product, Engineering, Finance, Legal, and Procurement teams to deliver enterprise-wide initiatives with measurable outcomes.
- Led ideation, requirements gathering, and validation for multi-stream projects.
- Developed strategic roadmaps and oversaw program planning and execution, resulting in accelerated delivery timelines.
- Coordinated cross-functional stakeholders to maintain delivery momentum, resolve dependencies, and ensure alignment with organizational objectives, achieving a 95% on-time delivery rate.
- Oversaw vendor engagement, budget tracking, program governance, and performance monitoring using KPIs and executive dashboards, resulting in a 20% reduction in project costs.
- Identified, assessed, and mitigated program risks, ensuring proactive issue resolution and structured escalation, minimizing project delays by 35%.
- Led financial data cleanup, normalization, and readiness efforts required for AI automation and system modernization, increasing data accuracy by 18% and enabling seamless AI integration.
- Implemented standard project governance controls, resulting in a 30% increase in throughput and reducing project delivery timelines by 2 months on average across five architecture and data programs.
- Executed Projects:
- Delivered Enterprise Architecture design requirements for Ordering/Payments processes within 4 months, improving operational efficiency by 25%.
- Developed and delivered the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) model, identified key data sources and drivers, and created AI data models and agents to calculate TCO costs. Completed the project within 7 months, provided data gap analysis and recommendations, published a playbook for gap refactoring, and implemented three automated solutions for TCO calculations, reducing manual effort by 40%, and improving cost transparency.
Senior Program Manager, Search & Catalog
Amazon
New York, USA
02.2022 - 04.2023
- Managed three large-scale transformation programs involving engineering, product, data analytics, sales, and operations teams, delivering all programs within 6–12 months.
- Managed cross-functional teams including data scientists, otologists, developers, and business partners to deliver programs on schedule and within budget.
- Presented program updates, risks, and progress metrics to senior leadership, influencing strategic decisions and securing executive support for new initiatives.
- Drove execution using RASCI models, governance cadences, and metrics-based tracking, resulting in a 15% improvement in project accountability and visibility.
- Managed automated solutions for data attributes creation; provided design and requirements to development teams, increasing data processing efficiency by 20%.
- Oversaw program roadmaps, project resources, and timelines, identifying design and requirements gaps, and implementing corrective actions for improved delivery.
- Executed projects:
- Project Cosworth (auto marketplace): Designed data attributes and provided multiple implementation options, enabling a 30% increase in marketplace data quality.
- Validated end-to-end data processing of Amazon data on Amazon websites, reducing data errors by 50%.
- Created data attributes for Hardlines products, accelerating new product onboarding and product searchability by 30%.
Technical Program Manager, CIO
IBM
New York, USA
07.2021 - 02.2022
- Managed large-scale operational programs supporting 1,000+ IBM digital properties, coordinating across Engineering, Product, Legal, and Compliance.
- Oversaw vendor delivery, contract governance, implementation planning, and workflow optimization, reducing vendor onboarding time by 22%.
- Implemented risk assessments, change management workflows, and issue resolution processes, ensuring uninterrupted program delivery and a 30% reduction in operational disruptions.
- Led cloud migration phases, coordinating with cross-functional teams and external vendors, resulting in a 25% faster migration timeline.
Product Owner, Finance & Operations
IBM
New York, USA
11.2019 - 07.2021
- Owned end-to-end delivery of finance and operations transformation programs, overseeing requirements gathering, prioritization, planning, and execution.
- Partnered with Finance, Legal, Engineering, Security, and Operations teams to deploy AI-enabled workflows across contract and financial systems, increasing automation rates by 22%.
- Directed financial data cleanup and validation, enabling seamless AI system integration and improving automated decision accuracy by 15%.
- Led risk management, stakeholder alignment, and cross-team dependency resolution, ensuring on-time delivery and a 98% stakeholder satisfaction rate.
Senior Consultant, Global Business Services
IBM
New York, USA
01.2015 - 11.2018
- Managed modernization programs for large public-sector clients, overseeing requirements discovery, workflow redesign, and delivery execution with a 95% project success rate.
- Facilitated collaboration among operations, policy, technology, legal, and vendor teams to align objectives and ensure successful program delivery.
- Implemented structured governance, change control, and performance tracking, improving delivery timelines by 28%, and enhancing project quality.
- Designed unified data and API architectures supporting secure, scalable financial and benefits transactions, reducing system downtime by 20%.
Education
MBA -
Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto
Bachelor of Computer Information Systems -
University of Northern Colorado
Skills
- Program & Portfolio Management
- Stakeholder Engagement
- Requirements Gathering & Validation
- Budget Management & Resource Planning
- Vendor Engagement & Contract Oversight
- Risk Management & Issue Resolution
- Performance Tracking & Executive Reporting
- Change Management & Governance
- Financial Data Cleanup & AI Readiness
- Cross-Functional Leadership & Influencing
- High-Agency Execution in Fast-Paced Environments
- Jira
- Confluence
- Asana
- Excel
- SQL
- AWS Analytics
- IBM Cloud
Certification
- SAFe Advanced Scrum Master
- SAFe Lean Portfolio Management
- LeanIX Certified Practitioner Level 2
Timeline
Senior Portfolio Manager, Data & AI, Enterprise Architecture
Bell
07.2024 - Current
Senior Program Manager, Search & Catalog
Amazon
02.2022 - 04.2023
Technical Program Manager, CIO
IBM
07.2021 - 02.2022
Product Owner, Finance & Operations
IBM
11.2019 - 07.2021
Senior Consultant, Global Business Services
IBM
01.2015 - 11.2018
MBA -
Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto
Bachelor of Computer Information Systems -
University of Northern Colorado