Koray Kukrer's Bio

Summary

I am an experienced IT leader with a 30-year career spanning both the Navy and the IT domain. My expertise encompasses Technology Innovation, Team Culture Transformation, High-Performance Team Building, DevOps/Agile Transitioning, and Systems Integration. I have a robust background in architecting and delivering high-demand solutions across datacenters and AWS cloud environments. My approach focuses on mobilizing high-performing teams to drive exceptional business outcomes and maximize performance.

Experience

sr. director, Obesrvability Engineering and Operations, the college board, reston, va 2021-2024

• Created and managed first Observability Engineering and Operations team structure in the organization to support Enterprise Applications Reliability and uptime goals. Guided exceptional teams across the Observability and System Reliability Engineering domains, including Enterprise Incident Management, Observability Engineering Capability Development, Observability Implementations, Observability Operations and Performance Engineering Platforms within cloud environments. My role encompassed overseeing complex systems deployed across AWS, SaaS, and regional offices. 

• Leveraged my deep Architect expertise in Cloud Engineering and cutting-edge technologies to maintain the highest standards of development practices. Drove transformative initiatives that enhance operational excellence and efficiency within cloud ecosystems by partnering Customer Facing Application development teams. 

sr. director, Software Development, the college board, reston, va 2017-2021

• Managed a development team of seven in the beginning and expanded the team to 38 engineers and leads, supporting five major cloud-based business products.

• Established a new DevOps team structure, consisting of six Feature DevOps teams (each with five to six Full Stack Engineers) and one Platform DevOps engineering team. This structure optimized the AWS Cloud infrastructure and accelerated innovation.

• Spearheaded the development of advanced AWS cloud technologies to streamline application development and reduce custom code creation.

• Directed the end-to-end development of a business application, taking it from concept to production release in just six months. This application was featured on Good Morning America.

• Cultivated a collaborative team culture through servant leadership, enhancing delivery efficiency and fostering team loyalty.

• Positioned teams to participate in high-impact projects, accelerating the development of prominent national business applications.

enterprise solutions architect, domain architect, infrastructure architect, the college board, reston, va 2003-2017

• Initiated new architectural development processes to align with leadership’s vision at The College Board, working closely with management and technology leads to implement these changes.

• Analyzed and defined ideal state architectural processes, leading the Architecture Community of Practice meetings to align solution architects with enterprise patterns.

• Developed and delivered the Assessment Redesign Customer Management Architecture to production.

• Led the development of OS platform technology and procedures for SAN storage services, including Hitachi HDS UPS-V and VM SAN units.

• Created an ITIL service master template for the organization’s first infrastructure service, overseeing the implementation phases.

• Presented a three-year plan to senior management for a dynamic AIX infrastructure to support high-demand databases, focusing on smart capacity allocation and rapid turnaround.

• Designed and implemented strategic and tactical plans for system operations, quality, and cost management.

• Reduced the server infrastructure footprint from 500+ to 320 servers, resulting in $4 million cost savings over five years and improved availability.

• Developed an organizational virtualization vision and strategy document, evaluating market-leading virtualization products.

• Created common architectural interfaces and patterns for real-time communication and enterprise file transfer, managing complex transfers related to SAT exams.

• Formulated server platform availability requirements and collaborated on a master server architecture roadmap, working with IT departments, senior management, and business units.

• Supported enterprise infrastructure capacity planning, including upgrades and growth, and established risk assessment and change control procedures.

• Engaged with end-users, clients, and senior management to define complex system and infrastructure requirements.

• Conducted platform evaluations, resulting in a performance workbench that facilitated objective comparisons and analysis of 25 platform configurations.

• Developed an OS provisioning evaluation matrix for the College Board, incorporating functional requirements for objective vendor comparisons.

• Integrated HP Business Continuity products and managed projects for HP Asset Center, Lawson, HP PPM, and LanDesk from design to implementation.

• Engineered the integration of Hitachi HDS USP-V SAN, Cisco MDS 900 FC switch, and QLogic 2620 with Oracle 10g and future 11g databases.

• Collaborated with the process improvement department to develop a toolset for enhancing CMMI levels, selecting and integrating Appian Process Manager architecture.

sr. systems engineer, systems engineering manager, cross media marketing corp., reston, va 2001-2003

• Managed three datacenter and two central office migration projects due to consolidation of the offices for cost savings

• Designed a new datacenter and managed the rebuilding of the production environment at the colocation datacenter.

• Designed the new Windows 2000 AD forest as business expanded due to acquisitions. Managed Active Directory, .NET, J2EE, JBoss, Apache, Resin, Oracle on Solaris / Linux environments on various Sun/Intel server platforms.

• Created two independent SAN FC fabrics and WWN based zones on the Brocade Fiber Switches and developed SAN based storage architecture. The FC network design created was adopted as a reference architecture by EMC for the SAN FC networks due to its flexibility and resiliency.

• Built and actively managed Netscreen VPN infrastructure for the enterprise network. This network consisted of four main regional offices with centralized management and provided remote access solutions to the remote users.

• Managed Extreme Networks' Black Diamond switches: created MAC and port based VLANs, rate shaped the ports with QOS profiles. Worked with ISPs to bring up Internet and WAN connectivity.  Configured Cisco Routers (2610, 3620). Rebuilt two master production 3DNS Servers which ran on BSD (F5 Networks).

sr. systems engineer, lifeminders inc., herndon, va 2000-2001

• Lead team in design of a $9 million Data Center for the Official Olympics Newsletter which provided the daily news for 30 million subscribers. This data center consisted of EMC Symmetrix 8730, Brocade Silkworm 2800 Switches, Windows 2000 with Active Directory implementation, F5 technologies BIG IP and 3DNS, Black Diamond switches, Net Screen 1000 Firewall, Dell Open Manage and HP Openview SE, MS SQL Server database servers, MS IIS 5, MSMQ, DFS and ADIC Scalar 1000. Switches, Net Screen 1000 Firewall, Dell Open Manage and HP Openview SE, MS SQL 2000 and 7.0 Database Servers, MS IIS 5, MSMQ, DFS and ADIC Scalar 1000.

• Implemented web monitoring system for all servers using Freshwater's SiteScope software and Dell OpenManage SNMP software.

• Developed system documentation to assist engineers with monitoring and troubleshooting of production systems.

• Responsible for the troubleshooting of the Symmetrix 8730 and two 3830, Brocade Switch and fiber network related problems. Engineering contact for all EMC related SAN systems and Brocade fiber channel networks.   Designed and developed SNMP monitoring system for the Brocade Switches via Dell OpenManage and HP Openview (NNM).

• Built all systems around a Windows 2000 Active directory that consisted of 300 servers and 200 workstations in 10 Windows 2000 domains.

senior systems engineer, watson wyatt worldwide, Bethesda, MD 1996-2000

• Built and maintained Netscape Enterprise Servers and Microsoft IIS Servers, which was serving 5000 employees.

• Developed plan to migrate Netscape Enterprise Servers to Microsoft IIS servers. During the migration acted as project lead for worldwide offices to provide a seamless transition.

• Collaborated with developers, consultants, and engineers to identify and resolve system specific problems.

• As the project lead, responsible for implementation of Excalibur technologies search engine for the company's intranet servers providing faster and more advanced search options.

• Developed the client extranet procedures and provided support to field consultants as a subject matter expert.

• Installed and administered Checkpoint Firewall system, user Internet share point with Microsoft Proxy 2.0

• Improved domain security raising the level from a 42% secure domain and to a 98% secure network according to Kane Security Analyst. Created two different domains to ensure the security. These domains were user domain and resource domain, which include PDC, BDCs and WINS servers.

sr. network administrator

• Performed LAN administrator and network management functions for the NT and worldwide NDS Novell networks, which had over 200 organization units.

• Implemented the remote-control software standard with PCAnywhere and maintained security and administration.

• Performed systems' security with auditing software and took counter actions. Provided latest user activity logs. Proposed new security solutions, maintained network security reliability.

• Responsible for all Microsoft NT NOS server installations and integration. Administered email system and maintaining the user database, which had over 500 mailboxes.

Lieutenant (J.G.), Weapon Systems Electronics Officer, Turkish Navy, 1989-1996

• Managed up to 120 military personnel consists of Naval Officers and Petty Officers.

• Performed evaluations and provided recommendations on the different computer systems to be used on the Naval surface ships.

• Project lead for the surface ships' weapon systems' computer integration to Turkish Navy Standards. 

• Lead engineer for Naval Weapon Systems' Computers and Electronics including guided missiles and CIWS. 

• Designed and completed a prototype of a Novell Network for the ship administration offices.

• Received three honorary recommendation letters including one from the highest-ranking Navy official, 4-star Admiral.

• Lead engineer for the Weapons and their computer systems.

• Computer technology consultant and advisor to high-ranking officers.

• Ideated, designed, and developed a new cellular phone system to decrease personal calls of the ship personel. 

Education

Naval Academy -- BS, Electronics Engineering (Control Systems), 1989

US Navy Norfolk Naval Base — Guided Missile and Phalanx CIWS Course, 1993

USN Damneck Fleet Combat TC — Knox Class Frigate F/C Computers, F/C Computer Officer Course, 1993

Naval Weapon Systems Electronics Training Center, Advanced Weapon Systems' Electronics, 1990

Marmara University — Deutsche Sprache Grundstufe eins und zwei, (German Language First and Second Levels) 1990

Certificates

TOGAF 8.0

• The Open Group, Oct 2010

Scrum Master

• Scrum Alliance, April 2017

ITIL

• ITIL, August 2008