Get to Know the PowerSteering Team

Anne Donelan
Director of PowerSteering Professional Services

As an Upland PowerSteering customer, there is a very good chance that you know Anne. The Director of Professional Services for PowerSteering, Anne has been instrumental in helping our customers refine their strategy and how to configure Project Portfolio Management to support their project, resource and financial management goals. She has been with Upland for close to six years, and is dedicated to helping customers get the most value from the PowerSteering solution.

Get to know Anne a little better, and hear her advice for PowerSteering customers.

How long have you been with Upland? 

I started at Upland in 2013, so it’s been over 5 years, but I still feel like I just started since there is so much to learn about our customers, and how they are all using PowerSteering.

Do you have any certifications?

I spent many years in the field of New Product Development, so I used to have accreditation as a New Product Development Professional. It expired a couple years back and I didn’t renew since I’m no longer a practitioner in the field, and also because my experience has expanded to include other facets like Enterprise PPM, Continuous Improvement, IT PPM and so on.

What is your role at Upland?

My title is Director, PowerSteering Professional Services, which means I spend a lot of time on the phone and answering emails (laughter). On a more serious note, my vision is to help our clients get up and running with new implementations so they see quick time-to-value. I work with our customers to map their processes to the platform, and then seeing them through the implementation and go-live.  It is so interesting because the platform can be adapted to so many Project/Product Portfolio Management (PPM) methodologies or portfolio, so it’s really about finding the best fit to help them manage and grow their business.

What are you working on right now?

I have a few clients with a global footprint across multiple PPM portfolio types, so I am working with them to configure the system for their unique business requirements.  I am also in the process of defining two new “turnkey” PPM solutions for strategic Enterprise PMOs and IT PMOs. Over the years, the services team has found that some organizations want to launch these initiatives internally, but don’t necessarily have a PPM framework to support them. So, we’ve applied the learnings and best practices that we’ve developed from our experience with other clients, to build a foundation for PPM to get started in the right direction.

What do you do when you’re not helping customers?

I am an avid horseback rider, and have taken up Eventing. Eventing is a competitive sport that combines three disciplines of dressage, cross-country, and show jumping. It takes a lot of discipline and preparation, and I have to have a very close bond with my horse, Griffin, both mentally and physically, but I love it. I wish I could it more!

Any other pets?

Yes! I guess you could say I’m an animal lover: Griffin is my competition horse, but I actually have a couple others. I have 2 cats, and I also have a dog, Ridley. They’re all pretty well behaved, except Ridley can get very talkative, and sometimes when I’m on a call he’ll start barking a lot especially when he’s hungry.

What do you love most about your job?

I really love seeing our clients succeed in their PPM journey. Regardless where they start, there is so much pride when they finally get to that place that they set out to be, and being able to support them along the way is very validating.

If you could share one piece of advice to PowerSteering customers, what would you like them to know? 

Do not underestimate the importance of change management.  When you’re progressing along a PPM maturity curve, it’s so important to have the right people in the right roles, and to make sure everyone understands where they fit. Whether they are project leads, project managers or they are providing information to different stakeholders, it’s critical that everyone understands how they contribute to the process, to empower them to make the best possible decisions at every step.