TRANG STEVENS
Cox Automotive
Dawsonville,MI
20
years of professional experience
Strategic Chief of Staff with over 29 years of experience enhancing leadership operations and driving cross-functional execution in complex organizations. Currently supports the Office of the CIO at Cox Automotive, overseeing governance, fiscal planning, and business reviews that align leadership teams. Cultivates high-retention cultures and spearheads initiatives like an AI-enabled process transformation program, navigating both strategic vision and detailed execution.
Work History
Senior Director, Engineering Operations
5 Years 2 Months- Engineering Operations is focused on improving/operationalizing processes, tooling, data-driven practices, enterprise initiatives, labor strategies, knowledge management, and AI transformation
- Lead cross-organizational strategic initiatives from ambiguity to measurable outcomes — personally built and staffed a six-team process-transformation program, including hands-on AI-enabled tooling, that delivered 260+ demos and 1,000+ commits in six months.
- Leverage Engineering and workforce metrics (headcount, hiring pipeline, budget-to-actuals) to identify improvement areas for delivery teams and inform executive decision-making
- Owned weekly executive reporting process, synthesizing input from four functions into a leadership-ready narrative and developing content for executive and team-sharing reviews.
- Own the weekly executive reporting process, synthesizing input from four functions into a single leadership-ready narrative and developing the content used for executive and team-sharing reviews.
- Hired and now manage a high performing, high retention team, building a culture of growth and engagement through weekly 1:1’s, quarterly check-ins and year-end reviews
- Partnered across finance, HR, and core business functions to drive cross-functional alignment, remove barriers, and accelerate decision-making before escalation.
- Partner across Finance, HR, and core business functions as the connective tissue driving cross-functional alignment, removing barriers and accelerating decision-making before issues require escalation.
- Redesigned mass hiring process and supported workforce planning and organizational design discussions, improving interview mechanics and reducing offer-cycle lag time.
- Manage enterprise vendor relationships and sensitive contract matters with discretion, negotiating SOW, staff augmentation, and performance agreements.
Director of Project & Portfolio Management / Chief of Staff
6 Years 11 Months- Served as Chief of Staff to VP, enhancing leadership communications and team culture while implementing upstream digital platforms for OEM inventory and vehicle sales management, contributing to improved operational efficiency.
- Facilitated weekly staff meetings, quarterly Town Halls, and executive reporting sessions to maintain strategic alignment among leadership.
- Managed a $26M global delivery engagement (Flex, Actuos, and MBDo platforms) across five countries and time zones, building resourcing and budget trade-off models in continuous partnership with Finance.
- Functioned as the primary conduit between executive direction and project delivery, identifying risks and misaligned priorities before they impacted delivery.
- Served as the primary conduit between executive direction and project delivery, surfacing risks and misaligned priorities before they became delivery problems.
- Reported quarterly delivery metrics (Defect Arrival/Kill Rate, Attrition, Cycle Time, Throughput, Predictability, Deployment Frequency, Change Fail %, MTTR) to guide executive decision-making, ensuring alignment with strategic objectives.
Program Manager, One View of the Customer (OVC) / Manager, Business Integration / Product Development Manager
6 Years 6 Months- Progressed through increasing program and people-leadership responsibility, leading a $10M customer MDM initiative (one of Manheim’s top 8 strategic priorities), a 12-member cross-functional delivery team, and the Manheim.com application portfolio.
- Led a $10M IT initiative building Manheim’s customer MDM foundation, managing Project Managers, BAs, an MDM Architect, and ETL/QA staff, and providing ongoing program updates to Executive leadership.
- Hired, trained, and led 12-member business integration team, fostering collaborative culture and setting individual development goals for team members.
- Managed Manheim.com application suite (PowerSearch, Simulcast, Pre & Post Sales, MyAccount), overseeing project accounting, planning, and communication with stakeholders.
- Served on enterprise change advisory board, establishing structured governance for all production-impacting technology changes.
Senior Project Manager, Toyota Portal
1 Year 6 Months- Launched Toyota Portal in two months, delivering seven production releases while coordinating development, QA, BA, sales, and UI teams.
- Led cross-functional teams to deliver complex software projects on time and within budget.
- Developed project plans, timelines, and resource allocation strategies to optimize efficiency.
- Facilitated stakeholder meetings to align project objectives with business goals and expectations.
Education
Bachelor of Arts - Psychology
Skills
Executive effectiveness
Business operations strategy
Team culture development
Executive communications strategy
Cross-functional collaboration
Workforce planning strategy
Strategic initiative leadership
Performance metrics
Cross-functional leadership
Organizational culture
Team leadership
Team development
Operational strategy
Operational efficiency
Agile project management
Portfolio management
Stakeholder engagement
Governance frameworks
Talent development
Operational strategy
Budget management
Transformation leadership
Vendor management
Accomplishments
Redesigned and implemented the mass hiring process end to end, cutting time from first HR screen to offer submittal from 6-8 weeks down to under 4 weeks resulting in a 40%+ reduction in time to offer.
Timeline
Senior Director, Engineering Operations
Cox Automotive
06.2021 - CurrentRead More
Director of Project & Portfolio Management / Chief of Staff
Cox Automotive – Manheim/RMS Automotive
07.2014 - 06.2021Read More
Program Manager, One View of the Customer (OVC) / Manager, Business Integration / Product Development Manager
Cox Automotive – Manheim
01.2008 - 07.2014Read More
Senior Project Manager, Toyota Portal
TEKsystems (Manheim Technologies at Cox Automotive)
07.2006 - 01.2008Read More
University of New Hampshire
Bachelor of Arts from Psychology
Read More