Cara McLauchlin
Operations Professional
Berkley,MI
Summary
Executive Leadership • Operational Excellence • Financial Performance • Team Motivation
Results-focused operations leader with 15+ years of experience in operations management, ERP implementation, project leadership, and global team development. Proven success in driving efficiency, revenue growth, and financial performance across organizations up to $123M in revenue. Adept in strategic planning, business transformation, process optimization, and cross-functional leadership. Recognized for leading enterprise-scale ERP rollouts, building high-performance teams, and delivering measurable results in international and multi-unit environments..
Expert in building leadership teams and defining strategic goals and KPIs. Problem solver, strong communicator, fosters cross-functional collaboration. Experienced in strategic planning, budgeting and forecasting, business re-engineering, sales operations, logistics, and ERP systems. Applies industry benchmarks to redefine SOPs and drive productivity.
Overview
20
20
years of professional experience
Work History
Business Consultant
Hawaii Fluid Art
07.2024 - Current
- Art Studio offering classes and one on one instruction.
- Advised leadership team on launch strategy, operational structure, and market positioning for a new art franchise.
- Developed 15 scalable business processes, including class design, scheduling systems, and pricing models, to support consistent growth across locations.
- Created monthly marketing strategies and customer engagement initiatives that increased brand awareness and early enrollment.
- Designed enrichment program offerings tailored for schools, community groups, and private events, expanding revenue streams.
- Guided hiring, training, and team development practices to align staff performance with franchise standards.
- Provided ongoing analysis of performance metrics and customer feedback to refine operations and improve profitability.
Senior IT Project Manager
Corrigan Oil
05.2023 - 07.2024
- Environmental Services Firm with multiple business units located in the Mid-West.
- Hired to implement a global ERP solution across all 8 companies.
- Responsible for Writing Standard Operating Procedures
- Designed Training decks and lead onboarding and ongoing classes
- Tested the ERP system
- Developed Specs / Statements of work for system enhancements
- Lead weekly project team meetings
- Presented monthly progress and findings to senior leadership
Vice President of Project Management, Optimization, and Training
Escalent
01.2021 - 02.2023
- Market research and consulting firm with operations in NA, Asia, and LATAM.
- Multiple promotions to global project management oversight of 15 project managers in India delivering up to 150 market and customer analytics and product research projects per year for the organization. Expanded role from pharmacy clients to global clientele across all industries. Mentored project managers, trained teams, managed high-profile projects.
- Revised outdated training methods, coached new project managers, and re-aligned responsibilities with skills to significantly improve onboarding success, with 80% of PM team successfully passing through probation period.
- Authored process manual for new off-shore project management team, developed KPIs for new team members, and introduced new, more effective procedures for annual and semi-annual reviews.
Senior Director of Research Operations
Escalent
01.2016 - 01.2021
- Led team of 30 research managers and analysts in delivering up to 200 concurrent market research projects per year for international corporate clients within $17M industry group. Resourced all projects, identified contract growth and billing opportunities, engaged other departments in project delivery.
- Hired, coached, and promoted top-performing team of analysts and research managers and implemented new annual employee engagement and performance survey that identified and eliminated obstacles to employee success.
- Led successful pilot programs within industry group that were later rolled out to rest of organization, and outsourced talent development and training of research associates.
- Updated training materials for new hire onboarding, onboarded over 50 new analysts, project managers, and client managers, and personally coached analysts and project managers to realign capabilities with responsibilities.
Senior Operations Project Director / Lead Research Manager
Escalent
01.2008 - 01.2016
- Managed team of 4 research managers in delivery of multiple concurrent research projects for healthcare, pharmaceutical, financial services, energy, and technology clients, with focus on international research. Oversaw full project cycle from proposal development to execution to analysis and reporting as well as ISO compliance.
- Managed multiple, concurrent, international research projects with global research teams, maintaining consistent delivery of all project milestones from proposal development through delivery, analysis, and reporting.
- Mentored teams to enhance skills and performance, maintained full ISO compliancy among all team members and implemented process improvements to further improve team performance and delivery quality.
- Authored new SOP manual for project management within 2 months teams to provide company’s first standardized, comprehensive project operations manual, with document serving as model for corporate quality and ISO manual.
Senior Operations Director
Entertainment Publications
08.2005 - 01.2008
- Publishing Firm
- Directed operations and team management across four business verticals: Fundraising, Retail, Custom, and Community Groups, driving performance and process alignment across departments.
- Authored and delivered a comprehensive process manual for the Fundraising division, increasing training consistency and adoption rates by 80% and reducing onboarding time by 3 weeks.
- Oversaw the implementation and optimization of PeopleSoft ERP, improving order fulfillment accuracy to 99%, reducing client billing errors and streamlining logistics processes.
- Served as Logistics and Operations Lead for new product rollout; designed and integrated a system overlay that shortened order entry and fulfillment cycle times by 2 and ½ weeks and accelerated cash collections by 10 business days.
Education
Bachelor of Arts -
McMaster University
Hamilton, Ontario, CanadaSkills
- Operations Management
- Training
- Strategic Planning
- Process Improvement
- Business Re-Engineering
- Budgeting & Forecasting
- Team Building & Leadership
- Productivity Enhancement
- Employee Engagement
- KPIs
- ERP Implementation
- SOP Development
- Logistics
- Sales Management
- Project Management
- Stakeholder Relations
- P&L Management
Accomplishments
- Boosted financial performance of 200+ products annually across $17M division, improving profit margin by 1% over budget.
- Consistently exceeded operational targets while leading $123M division, including strategy execution, performance coaching, and process optimization.
- Reduced turnover and raised engagement 20% across all 12 KPIs for healthcare team in transition by implementing employee engagement survey to reveal obstacles to performance.
- Led ERP implementations, liaising with IT and HQ departments as well as 400 field sales reps to implement People Soft, Mavenlink, and later NetSuite platforms.
- Developed and launched new product line in 5 months that generated $6M in new revenue in first year, designing, testing, and training team in use of system overlay for order entry auditing.
Global Operations Executive
- Executive Leadership
- Operational Excellence
- Financial Performance
- Team Motivation
Languages
English
Native or Bilingual
Timeline
Business Consultant
Hawaii Fluid Art
07.2024 - Current
Senior IT Project Manager
Corrigan Oil
05.2023 - 07.2024
Vice President of Project Management, Optimization, and Training
Escalent
01.2021 - 02.2023
Senior Director of Research Operations
Escalent
01.2016 - 01.2021
Senior Operations Project Director / Lead Research Manager
Escalent
01.2008 - 01.2016
Senior Operations Director
Entertainment Publications
08.2005 - 01.2008
Bachelor of Arts -
McMaster University