Biography

Mark Katsouros received his Bachelors of Science in Computer Science from the University of Maryland at College Park (UMCP), completed post-graduate studies in electrical engineering and telecommunications at UMCP, and advanced Computer and Information Science at University of Maryland Global Campus, and worked at UMCP in various IT development, research, and management capacities for over 20 years. He next served in a five-year stint as the Director of Telecommunication & Network Services for The University of Iowa, and then in a 10-year stint as the Director of Network Planning, Service Design, and Voice & Video for The Pennsylvania State University. Mark is now the Director of IT Support Services, and Interim Director of IT Infrastructure, for Duquesne University, where he is responsible for all front-facing IT services:

•  Service Management Office (IT Service Management processes, roles, artifacts, and overall portfolio)
•  Service Desk (physical/walk-up and virtual)
•  Computer Store (consumer and departments)
•  Learning Labs (digital classrooms) and Collaboration Commons
•  Technical Services (deskside support and endpoint operations)
•  Endpoint Engineering (enterprise configuration and mobility management)
•  IT Communications
•  IT Training
•  IT Administrative Office

Mark is also responsible for all IT "back-office" infrastructure/underpinnings:
•  Data centers (cloud and on-prem)
•  Systems Administration (servers and systems, virtual and physical—VMware, Windows, Linux, M365, etc.)
•  Operations, Storage Systems and Recovery
•  Secure Integrated Infrastructure (DDI, DTN, FW, logging, etc.)
•  Networking (enterprise and research, engineering and operations)
•  Telecommunications (VoIP, mobility, collaboration platforms, etc.)

His extremely diverse background includes database systems, large-scale software design and development, networking, telecommunications, computer-telephony integration, interactive voice response, voice over IP, unified communications, emergency communications management, ITIL/ITSM, project management, strategic planning, customer support (including white-glove), and broad IT leadership. In addition to winning UMCP's prestigious Graduate Studies and Research "Inventor of the Year" Award, he has also licensed various software applications, which he designed and developed, to both Avaya Communications and Cabletron Systems. Mark was also selected by the (Bill) Clinton Administration to design, develop, and implement public opinion polling software for the White House, which was utilized during President Clinton's first State of the Union Address and beyond.

Additionally, Mark is a regular speaker at various information technology conferences, and has served as Chief Technology Officer and Interim Chief Executive Officer for a Maryland dot-com startup specializing in patent-pending search technology that promised to improve the results of search requests in library, database, intranet, and Internet searches through complex, rules-based, phonetic transcription. He is presently involved in a Pennsylvania dot-com startup focusing on community development, commerce, and social responsibility. Mark is always hungry for victory--for himself, his team, his institution, and his customers--and he'll run through walls to achieve it.