Hi, I'm Steven Marecek, I've always had an interest in tech and learning how it can assist others and myself to achieve more. Currently, I've been exploring the Microsoft Azure platform and checking out all its potenials. For example, this website displaying my digital resume is actually running on the Azure platform! So cool!! I built this page as part of the Cloud Guru Azure Resume Challenge.
Senior Technical Support Engineer • May 2022 - July 2024
I joined the Talent Support pillar of the organization to work escalated cases sent to the development level for resolution
concerning the Onboarding application. Being the highest level of escalated support, the buck stopped with me to find a solution
for customer support cases after frontline and other levels couldn't resolve.
APIs were a standard for this role, so it got me to learn the ins-and-outs of Postman with methods like post and get,
collections and environments. It was challenging but a key new skill to learn as it was an essential tool for resolving
many cases. Used monitor apps like Kibana and Grafana for either preventing or used to assist with an active issue.
Worked hand-in-hand with Business Analyst members for escalated case management and future application development
projects, operating within the DevOps model which UKG adopted and trained us in. Held weekly meetings with frontline teams
to give troubleshooting tips with the goal of reducing case escalations and for quicker case resolutions.
Additional to solving client support cases, I worked with the Site Reliability Engineer (SRE) group who were responsible for server health
and maintenance duties. Allowed access to MongoDB, exposing me to a new document-oriented NoSQL database. Granted access to Linux servers,
working within a CLI interface and running commands/scripts in a terminal. Finally, this was my intro to the Google Cloud Platform (GCP),
which UKG used in conjunction with their own data center setup.
Major accomplishments:
- Assisted dev and SREs with rolling out an emergency software fix. Dealt with updating config files and restarting
services across server VMs. Trust from the group was super rewarding by helping clear this issue for our customers.
- Worked a special file management project on the backend for government regulations. PowerShell scripts were used on storage
servers to deal with both the file management tasks along with generating audits and reports.
Associate Technical Support Engineer • April 2020 - May 2022
After Ultimate Software merged with Kronos to form UKG, continued to work within TRT as a customer-facing team to provide
help with technical issues from a cloud-based perspective for our system, UKG Pro (FKA UltiPro), rising to the level of
Associate Technical Support Engineer, which was like a Cloud Technician level 2 for the team, achieving seniority with trust,
skills, and leadership such as helping onboard new members to our team, getting them up to speed with knowledge and skills as
soon as possible.
As the team grew in headcount so did our responsibilities. We not only had our current responsibilities of resolving backend
issues for our customers, we were now tasked to deal with the frontend too. This allowed us to focus more attention to what our
customers interacted with when using our system, so the need to understand their processes, data entry methods, and operations
were vital to find resolutions, or if we couldn't resolve, to better help our escalation team above us to supply them with quality
evidence for the issue at hand when it came to functional problems, with the goal to help them cut the time down to solve cases
with our appended research documentation.
By this time I was known as a subject matter expert for UKG's Talent applications: Recruiting and Onboarding. Team members
knew I was a primary for answering questions related to those applications. It was fun to work cases for those apps and was
pleased to share my knowledge with my team and help customers with their technical issues.
Major accomplishments:
- Recommended by my Team Lead and Manager, I was borrowed for about 3 months to our escalation team to help cut down their
queue's case count related to talent app incidents. This was amazing as I got extra training from our escalation team,
getting a peek behind the curtain on how they worked cases we escalated to them. It was an honor and privilege to assist and
collaborate with the escalation team during this special assignment.
Cloud Technician I • July 2017 - March 2020
The Technical Resolution Team included individuals who had a knack for bridging the gap between our customers'
business problems and complex technical solutions. Focused on driving overall resolution of customer-impacting technology
issues by both independently resolving technical issues and working with other groups outside of the team to drive overall
customer satisfaction. In addition to resolving technical issues, was responsible for acting as the communication liaison
between the customer and various departments within Ultimate Software to ensure customers' needs are satisfied.
I joined TRT as a Cloud Technician to troubleshoot technical problems related to the infrastructure for our cloud-based
HR management & payroll system, UltiPro. TRT was tier 3 support after frontline and tier 2 support groups couldn't resolve.
Involved with on-call rotation schedule for incidents after-hours. A spectrum of subjects to resolve like SSO and login issues,
locating bad data in a DB, inspecting backend services needing re-configuring. Lots to learn!
Increased knowledge with familiar services like MSSQL & IIS. Learned new tools such as Kibana, Proofpoint, Globalscape EFT, Fiddler,
and Wireshark.
Ultimate Software allowed me to jump from an on-premise to a cloud-based system. Eye opening to learn all what's
done on the backend for a SaaS system to operate. Got my hands dirty with many new tools to resolve server-side issues,
got acquainted with the Salesforce and JIRA platforms for support tickets and KBs, and aided a globally used enterprise system.
It felt like entering the major leagues!
Major accomplishments:
- Built the foundation for TRT's knowledge base using OneNote as the platform where the team still referenced and added to after 6+ years.
- Given special access to a new tool for the team to use. Learned it and then presented material and trained the team for it.
- Received positive reviews from clients for the assistance I provided resolving their support cases.
Lead Systems Technician • June 2005 - July 2017
Provided technical support for our digital voice recorder management system, PUMA (Portable Universal Management Application),
which housed audio files from our digital audio recorder officers wore on their belt during public interactions. Responsible
for the technical portion of the install and upgrade procedures. Involved during the design phase and beta tested the PUMA
application. Wrote guides/manuals and provided training for the sales and service teams. 24-hour support for our medical
transcription system, Promed. Shared IT duties at the main office. Had done some intro level programming projects.
Backend was built on SQL Server, knowledge for DB tasks such as backups, restores, queries, scripts, views, and stored
procedures were needed. Utilized IIS via Windows Server for file storage. Frontend a Windows application where knowledge
dealing with workstations in a secure environment.
Being my first job out of college it got me familiar with technical support for external customers and improved my
communication skills as I was involved with pre-sales meetings, onsite for installs/upgrades, and dealt with support
issues via phone/email. A lot of customer interactions!
Major accomplishments:
- Arrived at VIP Inc when beta phase for PUMA ended and departed VIP when PUMA had become the number 1 selling system our company sold.
- Streamlined install/upgrade experiences to cut the time for implementation, contributing to a positive customer experience.
- Built an automated service that pulled video files when bodycams were on a docking station and synced the date/time to the
bodycams keeping them synced. Service was used for a joint venture between VIP and another company for a collaborative project
to sell devices and software.
- Kept a positive customer experience as this led to contract renewals and references for our system. Did this by giving the
best support experience I could deliver, because aside from sales reps, I was second as a contact for the product.
City of Buena Park • June 2007 - November 2007
My time with Buena Park was within the Computer Services Unit of the Police Department. CSU performs maintenance for the
Computer-Aided Dispatch (CAD) system, Records Management (RMS), Optical Imaging (OTG), Mobile Data Computers (MDC), Live-Scan
fingerprinting, desktop computers, and many other computer-related systems. The CSU is also an essential part of the Technology
Task Force (TTF) responsible for the research, implementation and support of all technology employed within the department. With
this, CSU not only acted as the IT group for the PD, helping out with regular help desk tasks for an office environment, but
also an asset for technology for the PD. CSU is tasked with the gathering of intelligence from crime statistics found in the
police department's systems. Specific procedures must be followed to accurately extract these statistics, which provide the
basis for allocation of resources, examination of crime trends, and an informational "report card" for how effective the
department is performing.
This is where I got genuine experience with IT help desk responsibilities, helping internal customers rather than external.
This is also where I cut my teeth professionally with web design, putting my skills to use for developing their website.
As a side note, with the PD being a government agency with access to many federal systems, I had to pass a background check to
get Department of Justice level type clearance, which was needed for the job and which I received.
Major accomplishments:
- Revamping the police department's entire website with the noteworthy request to reorganize the contents of the homepage so all
crucial information related to the department, along with data the public frequently asks for, could easily be seen with at a
glance rather than being buried deep in the website. Feedback was positive on the changes made to the site along with the redesign.
A-Z Bus Sales, Inc. • October 2001 - June 2005
Worked in the inventory warehouse for the parts department of the dealership. Top responsibilities included shipping, receiving,
and stock; made sure outgoing goods were picked and packed correctly; checked if incoming goods were shipped properly, and did the
necessary paperwork for it; counted, maintained, and stocked inventory; shipped packages using the UPS shipping application. This
was my first job and one I kept while I was enrolled in college, earning my Bachelor of Science in Computer Information Systems.
Interpersonal skills and collaborating in a team environment for the workforce were abilities that were constructed during this time.
Major accomplishments:
- A positive impact was when I saved the company thousands of dollars by making newer software work with their
existing workstations, eliminating the fear there was for purchasing, setting up, and training with new computers for the parts department.
This was not part of my job responsibilities but since this was related to my career interests and college degree I was working towards at
the time to achieve, I wanted to help the company by sharing my knowledge on the subject. In the end, it had a beneficial effect.
- Employee of the Month award.