Mark Higdon

Background

About Mark Higdon

I am an Information Systems leader who helps organizations use technology to increase business value and customer satisfaction. I am strongly committed to the organization for which I work, its people and its mission. I am a strong proponent of servant leadership and work as hard for those who report to me as I do for those to whom I report. I believe when the team succeeds, it is important the team reap the benefits and, if the team fails, the leader takes the responsibility and works with the team to resolve the issues. I believe this environment provides the team the ability to try new things, to grow and achieve without the fear of retribution. I believe IS is a critical component which ties the organization together and connects the organization to its customers. Even when not directly interacting with the customer, IS serves the customers through the end-users and technical services. When technology does not perform well or it doesn’t provide the correct or timely information to the end-user, there is a direct impact to the customers. When the technology is working properly, neither the end-user nor the customer should give a second thought to the technology during their interaction. I believe it is fundamental that IS continually work towards achieving and maintaining a balance between customer expectations, operational needs and security requirements. When this balance is achieved, customers are happy, operations are streamlined, and the infrastructure is secure. I have helped organizations strive to achieve this balance by implementing industry standards such as ITIL methodologies and NIST Cyber Security Framework. Most of the organizations for which I worked, IS was a cost center. This experience helped me understand the importance of managing budgets properly and ways to cut costs through automation, standardization and simplification of IS infrastructures and processes. For example, in two previous positions, I have cut printing expenses by standardizing the equipment, providing a common interface for all users, and automating toner delivery so stockpiles of toner were not purchased and less effort was needed to manage the supplies for the copiers. In summary, I love people and I thoroughly enjoy implementing and managing technology. The first part of my career was spent learning how to implement and manage technology. The last 10+ years of my career, I have focused on bringing the human and technological aspect of business into alignment so organizations get the best out of both.