Dr. Majdi Najm, PMP

Dr. Majdi Najm works as Coordinator of the E-Business Program at the University of Missouri System and is responsible for promoting e-business research and education by providing access to and technical support of integrated e-business software solutions and educational material to the university community. He is also the Director of the E-Business University Competency Center, which provides hosting services of e-business software and educational material to other universities across the USA.

Dr. Najm developed an electronic book on Project Management that he has been using to offer several courses and workshops on Project Management to faculty, government agencies and industry in the United States and abroad. In his previous position with the Center for Technology Transfer at the University of Missouri-Rolla, he assisted businesses modernize their operations and was actively involved in the planning and the establishment of a teaching factory on advanced manufacturing technology. He taught courses on Project Management, Facilities Planning, Industrial Ecology, Computer Integrated Manufacturing, Computer-aided Design and Manufacturing, and Robotics. He is a licensed professional engineer in the State of Kansas and a certified Project Management Professional by the Project Management Institute. He received BS, ME, and DE degrees in Mechanical Engineering from Texas A&M University.

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Carol Elliott, PMP

Carol Elliott works in Information Services at Shelter Insurance Companies in Columbia, Missouri. Her work at Shelter focuses on Legacy and eCommerce systems integration and technical infrastructure enhancements. In the coming year, she hopes to develop a strategy for transforming data stored in relational and non-relational database platforms to XML as a method for data exchange. Carol has over 20 years experience in information technology and has been certified as a PMP® since June 2000.

Before joining Shelter Insurance, she held positions as Database Administrator and Manager of the DB2 and IMS Database Administration team at USAA in San Antonio, Texas, and was a member of the Alamo Chapter of PMI. Before USAA, Carol worked at Royal Insurance in Charlotte, North Carolina, and JCPenney Systems in Westerville, Ohio.

Carol, with fellow Chapter member Nathan Eatherton, brought PMI Mid-Missouri Chapter's Web site online in 2001, and has served on the Chapter's website committee since 2000. Carol has authored presentations for the Mid-Missouri Chapter PMI, International DB2 Users Group, and BMC Software Users Group.

Carol is a graduate of Washington University in St. Louis, Oberlin College, and Northern Illinois University. In addition to Project Management Professional® certification, she is an IBM Certified Solutions Expert in DB2 UDB for z/OS Database Administration.

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Lucy Watts, PMP
Sr. Project Manager - PMP Certified

Lucy has 19 years experience in information technology. She has 9 years in project management. Her experience has been in the development of large, complex application systems in both the private and public sector. She has experience in managing both application development and technical support on a variety of hardware/software architectures.

In 1984, Lucy started her career with Southwestern Bell Corporation. Her accomplishments while working for SBC included tuning databases and resolving database problems in procurement, personnel, and financial systems, writing and publishing procedures for setting up and controlling database security, and completing other database administrator tasks. Lucy lead a team in evaluating database management systems on the mainframe and Unix platforms. The results of this evaluation were used to set strategic database direction for the corporation. She was the lead DBA for the rewrite of the billing system. Her last accomplishment with SBC was the completion of a plan to build a data warehouse and putting a team together to complete the plan.

In 1994, Lucy left SBC and went into consulting. As a consultant she has been leading and managing teams at the State of Missouri. Her accomplishments at the State of Missouri include leading teams to successfully complete analysis, design, construction, and implementation of a transportation management system for the Missouri Department of Transportation, (TMS), and a system for managing financial assistance to needy families for the Missouri Department of Social Services (FAMIS). Lucy put together plans for the rewrite of an Inmate Tracking System and a plan for creating a data warehouse containing inmate information for the Missouri Department of Corrections. She lead a team to complete the analysis, design, and conceptual design for the Department of Natural Resources' Total Maximum Daily Load Project. She managed the development of the Missouri Justice Information System and wrote the policies and procedures for using this system. These last two projects involved working with OSCA, Department of Social Services' Division of Family Services and Division of Youth Services, Department of Mental Health, and Department of Health and Senior Services. Most recently Lucy managed a team of 10 consultants in completing the Justice Information Sharing Study for the Office of Information Technology and OSCA.

Lucy has a Bachelor of Science in Computers and Mathematics from Southeast Missouri State University, a Masters in Information Management from Washington University in St. Louis, is a certified project manager, and is certified in SEARCH's Justice Information Exchange Model (JIEM). She is a member of the Project Management Institute and the Mid-Missouri PMI Chapter, participates in NASCIO and SEARCH. In the past, Lucy actively participated in and served on committees for the Cool:Gen User Groups (local and national), GUIDE (IBM's User), and BMC's User Group.

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Frank Cox

Mr. Cox is a state certified project management specialist in the Missouri Department of Corrections, an organization of 12,000 employees that manage 90,000 offenders. He directly manages, facilitates, and advises on computer information system projects in the department's Information Systems Office.

From May 1974 to September 1994, Frank served in the Active Component of the U.S. Army. As an airborne infantryman in the mid to late 1970's, he participated in rapid deployments to sensitive hotspots overseas, in a period marked by increasing terrorism throughout Central and Southern Europe. In the 1980's as a uniformed journalist and photojournalist he reported on military activities and programs in Europe, the Mediterranean, and Central and South America. In 1990, Frank was selected as the military journalist of the year. As a Master Sergeant, he was an academy instructor. He completed his Army career as First Sergeant of the Department of Defense Information School.

Frank has two undergraduate degrees, both earned in the military, and a master of science degree in information and communication sciences, which he completed after retiring from the Army. From 1994 to 1997 he worked as a state university technology labs manager, as an adjunct assistant professor on a graduate faculty, and as an associate in an applied research institute. He has designed information and communication science curricula and has taught advanced courses and labs in organizational communication, local and wide area data networking, and telecommunications at the local and inter-exchange levels. As a researcher, he has consulted to the American Automobile Association on Frame Relay networking in Indiana, and to McDonald's Corporation on network security and disaster recovery.

In his current position Frank has managed the planning, scheduling, execution, and performance of human resource and finance system migration and integration projects, and he has advised on an interface project for a statewide profit center. He has also tracked a point-of-sale system rollout covering 25 adult institutions, and he has designed and applied a custom earned value management system to track and correct contractor performance. Frank analyzes and reports on state data center service item usage and cost, and also on a running portfolio of outsourced application development projects that average more than 900 hours and $100,000 per month.

After normal working hours during the last four years he also has helped advance the PMI Mid-Missouri Chapter by contributing as a founder, board member, and presenter.

Frank is married and has a daughter and two sons. He enjoys spending as much free time as possible with his family.

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Mitch Callis, PMP

Mitch works as an Infrastructure Project Manager for Hewlett Packard, where he has been employed since April 1996. His current areas of responsibility include voice, data, satellite, wireless LAN and all other IT infrastructure for production and sales offices for an area starting in the southern mid United States. In addition to this he developed, Implemented, and maintains the organizations web site. Currently Mitch is in involved with the development of an internal project management web site that will document each process and its order in the overall project process.

Prior to joining Hewlett Packard Mitch worked for Digital Sound Corporation as Project Manager for Installations, where he developed the "Order to Install" process and implemented project management processes for equipment sales and upgrades.

Mitch has 24 years of experience in the IT community the last 14 in project management.

Mitch spends much of his spare time with his 2 sons helping coach their soccer & Lacrosse teams and teaching 4th grade Sunday School.

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Ron Parker, PMP

Mr. Ron Parker, PMP, works as an Infrastructure Project Manager for Hewlett-Packard Company. His current areas of responsibility include voice, data, satellite, wireless LAN and all other infrastructure for production and sales offices in the mid-west and Tennessee. He is also currently working with other Team Members to move their Project Management processes to a web-based application. An additional assignment is mentoring fellow team members towards obtaining PMP Certification.

Prior to working at Hewlett-Packard, Ron worked as a Consultant-Project Manager for Sprint and American Century Investments in Kansas City. Projects during this period encompassed the implementation of wireless LAN, wireless Voice and VOIP. Ron has worked in IT for 28 years and has 18 years of Project Management experience.

Ron obtained his Bachelors and MBA degrees while working in the Data Networking and Telecommunications departments at the University of Missouri-Columbia. He served as Chairman and Vice-Chairman of the UM System Staff Advisory Council as well as President and Vice-President of the MBA Student Association at Columbia College. He currently serves as President of the Mid-Missouri PMI Chapter.

Ron spends much of his spare time with his wife and son teaching, learning and enjoying the sport of Soccer.

Contact Information:

Ron Parker
5840 E. Sing Drive
Columbia, MO 65202-6873
Home: (573) 474-5822
Work: (404) 774-3423
Cell: (573) 489-1009
Email: ronnie.parker@hp.com

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Faye Zumwalt, PMP

Faye works as Application Development Manager for the Department of Health and Senior Services, responsible for four units within Office of Information Systems including Integrated Applications, Non-Integrated Applications, Development Support Unit, and Data Exchange Unit. She has an AAS degree in Computers and Data Processing, a BS in Management with Emphasis on MIS Management, and a MS of Public Administration. She is a certified Project Management Professional. Her career spans more than 25 years; of that time, 22 years have been spent in IT and over 12 years in project management. Most of her career has been dedicated to supporting the State of Missouri, either as a state employee or a consultant to the State.

Faye has served the PMI Mid-Missouri Chapter as a founder, VP of Programs and Professional Development, VP of Administration, President, and is currently serving as Past President and Advisor.

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