IT Woman of the Year Nominee:

Barb Switzer

Senior Manager,
Global Crossing

Barb Switzer is a Senior Manager for Global Crossing working in the Global Information systems department. She has been with Global Crossing for 10 years. Prior to coming to Global Crossing, she held a technical position at Kodak. She originally started out as a Forestry Major and after a taking a course in TRS80, she fell in love with the industry and technology and there was no turning back. After receiving her AS from Paul Smiths College she went on to earn her BS in Computer Science from SUNY Technology and her MS in Computer Science from RIT.

Barb is responsible for three of Global Crossing's most critical business applications supporting both internal and external customers. Barb excels in her position as she understands the business processes in detail, while maintaining her technology skills. She is the only woman in IT at Global Crossing that can manage, play a technical lead architect role and if needed jump in and assist in coding all on the same major project. Barb has implemented two of Global Crossing's most strategic projects. She led the transformation of Global Crossing's Trouble Ticketing platform from single country/business unit application to a Global ticketing system supporting all regions and all business units, as well as extending the functionality to our external customer self service portal uCommand. Barb designed and implemented our B2B solution allowing customers, such as Paetec, to communicate directly with our back office applications.

Barb's style of mentoring/leadership revolves around educating her staff on the Life Development process which ensures a mature development style that can translate across technologies and business segments. She understands that everyone has unique skills and leads them to use their skills to the best of their ability. She mentors her team by offering challenging new opportunities whether this involves taking on systems support for new applications or providing cross training opportunities based on her team's interests. Over the past year, with maintaining current headcount, she has stepped up to take on two new applications in technologies that she and her team were not familiar with. Without any formal training, she and her team have successfully transitioned support without negatively impacting the business. Barb continuously hungers for new challenges and has yet to face a challenge she could not conquer. She is recognized by her team, peers and customers for having the leadership and motivation skills necessary to succeed in a fast paced technology environment. Barb will do whatever it takes to get a project in on time including working around the clock or assisting/mentoring another area on tasks or skills that they may be having difficulty with.

Barb is a member of the Honeoye Fish and Game Club of Honeoye, NY, she is a volunteer with her daughter at the Rochester Animal Shelter, Rochester, NY and is a teacher's aide for 2nd Grade Religious Education at Spiritus Christi Church, Rochester, NY.