Social Media Strategist at Land O'Lakes
Greater Minneapolis-St. Paul Area
- Current
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- Social Media Strategist at Land O'Lakes
- Founder, Social Media Breakfast - Twin Cities at Social Media Breakfast
- Columnist, Social Media Explorer at Personal Branding Magazine
- President/Owner at Avatar Consultants
- Blogger, Author, Speaker, Social Media Strategist at RickMahn.com
- Past
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- Protegrity DESA Consultant at Accenture at Best Buy
- Windows Deployment Engineer at Allianz Life
- Sr. Technologies Analyst at Michael Foods, Inc.
- Technology Analyst at Hayden & Associates
- Technology Consultant at Contract (Self-employed)
- Server Administrator at Hammel, Green & Abrahamson
- Telecommunications Specialist at Collisys
- Education
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- High School
- Northwestern Electronics Institute
- University of Wisconsin-River Falls
- Recommended
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16 people have recommended Rick - Connections
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437
connections
- Industry
- Information Technology and Services
- Websites
Rick Mahn’s Summary
With 20 years of professional experience in the Information Technology and Communications industries, Rick has learned the art of Personal Brand through his own career. Now a writer as well as an IT Infrastructure Architect, Rick is bringing New Media concepts to traditional IT consulting. Currently Rick owns his own technology consulting firm, Avatar Consultants, where he works with small and large sized businesses to prepare infrastructure for continuous growth. A self-described technology evangelist, Rick also writes about Personal Branding, Corporate Blogging, and Mobile Lifestyle on a number of websites. Recognized as a thought leader in Personal Branding, Rick has been featured in Fast Company & The Wall Street Journal, and is a regular columnist for Personal Branding Magazine.
Rick Mahn’s Specialties:
Social Media Entrepreneur, Online Community Developer & Evangelist, Personal Branding Specialist, Blog Consulting, Project & Team Leadership, IT Project Management, Windows IT Architecture & Systems Design, Disaster Recovery & Business Continuity Planning & Execution, Systems & Operations Management, Non Production Environment (Test Lab) Management, Remote Access Technologies, Mobile Communication Technologies, Automated Client Provisioning, Systems & Software Implementation Planning & Execution
Rick Mahn’s Experience
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Social Media Strategist
Land O'Lakes
(Privately Held; Food Production industry)
March 2009 — Present (9 months)
Formulate and execute social media and collaboration strategies both internal and externally for the company. Support existing and future marketing campaigns through social media community development and engagement for our customers and the consumer directly.
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Founder, Social Media Breakfast - Twin Cities
Social Media Breakfast
(Internet industry)
January 2008 — Present (1 year 11 months)
After conferring with founder Bryan Person, I started the Minneapolis & St. Paul chapter of Social Media Breakfast. I currently organize and host the event, orchestrating facilities, sponsors, speakers, and businesses.
With a large and growing audience in the Twin Cities, the event has gained attention from print and video media as well as businesses and non-profit organizations.
We strive to provide useful content for all social media practitioners, inviting local and national guest & speakers. Hosting this event has been one of the most fun and rewarding experiences of my professional life. -
Columnist, Social Media Explorer
Personal Branding Magazine
(Publishing industry)
June 2007 — Present (2 years 6 months)
I cover the "Social Media Exploration" beat for Personal Branding Magazine. Where common and new uses of social media and social networking are explored for use by individuals for personal branding. There are many networks, tools, techniques, and people to learn from and leverage for building a personal brand - I'm there to help the reader find what works best for their brand.
As such, I explore many new and sometimes unreleased social networking and media tools. Always investigating where it will bring value to both the individual and their network of people who are going to be invited to use it. -
President/Owner
Avatar Consultants
(Privately Held; Myself Only; Internet industry)
April 2007 — Present (2 years 8 months)
As an independent consultant, I specialize in designing and implementing the infrastructure components required for today’s Information Technology needs. Focusing on business requirements to identify the best solution for an organization regardless of its size, and with attention on the value it brings to the business.
With experience in remote access, disaster recovery, business continuity planning, research & development environment management, systems & operations management, and complete end-to-end client side management, I provide proven solutions to these common problems facing every business.
Additionally, I supply project management skills, team building, coaching & mentoring, and 18 years of IT experience to bring projects to successful conclusion. -
Blogger, Author, Speaker, Social Media Strategist
RickMahn.com
(Internet industry)
December 2004 — Present (5 years )
Rick is a 20 year Information Technology professional who has learned the art of Personal Brand through his own career. Now a writer as well as an IT Infrastructure Architect, Rick is bringing New Media ideas to traditional IT consulting. Currently Rick owns his own technology consulting firm, Avatar Consultants, where he works with small to medium sized businesses to prepare infrastructure for continuous growth. A self-described technology evangelist, Rick also writes about Personal Branding, Corporate Blogging, and mobile lifestyle on several websites.
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Protegrity DESA Consultant
Accenture at Best Buy
(Public Company; BBY; Retail industry)
June 2008 — March 2009 (10 months)
Managing the implementation of Protegrity's Defiance Enterprise Security Administrator database encryption environment. Utilizing a self-contained encryption key hierarchy, I implemented and manage the environment including key management, development of sustainable maintenance practices, disaster recovery preparation, and full documentation for the environment.
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Windows Deployment Engineer
Allianz Life
(Public Company; AZ; Insurance industry)
October 2007 — June 2008 (9 months)
I consulted for Allianz to transition their Windows deployment solution from a departing employee to IBM Global Services.
The solution was made up of Systems Management Server 2003 R2 SP3, MS SMS Operating System Deployment Feature Pack, Windows Deployment Services, and MS Business Desktop Deployment. This solution delivered manual and automated deployment of a single Windows XP SP2 image that supported 14 hardware platforms (desktop and laptop), one specialized Tablet PC image, and one customized image for ClearCube blade systems.
Duties included custom coding (VB Script), maintenance of the XP implementation, engineering a Windows Vista image to utilize the existing architecture, engineering of a manual process for use in disaster recovery situations for client system build-outs. Additional tasks included documenting all aspects of the environment in order to transition the position to IBM Global Services, training of IBM Global Services personnel and transition of duties. -
Sr. Technologies Analyst
Michael Foods, Inc.
(Privately Held; 1001-5000 employees; Food Production industry)
August 2000 — April 2007 (6 years 9 months)
As the Sr. Client Technologies Analyst for Michael Foods (a $1.3b U.S. food company), I perform visionary IT duties, looking at emerging and future technologies, planning how they would be integrated into the enterprise. In the exercise of this effort I plan and implement technology that requires an understanding of IT from the physical network layer all the way to the customer (end user) expectations of an application and everything in between. I utilize Project Management & Leadership skills to successfully implement these technologies in a progressive team environment that strives for continuous improvement through cross training, coaching and mentoring.
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Technology Analyst
Hayden & Associates
(Privately Held; 201-500 employees; Information Technology and Services industry)
March 1998 — July 2000 (2 years 5 months)
Placed at Michael Foods, Inc. for an initial 3 month contract, my duties where for Novell NetWare administration, and management of their Kohler Mix Specialties facility network in White Bear Lake, MN. As you can tell from the above entries, that initial contract has turned into a nearly decade long commitment to Michael Foods. Additional duties at this time were for client support, onsite network support, implementation of training facilities onsite, and engineering the Novell Directory Services implementation for the entire organization.
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Technology Consultant
Contract (Self-employed)
(Self-Employed; Myself Only; Information Technology and Services industry)
1992 — 1997 (5 years )
As an independent consultant, I provided server administration for Novell and Windows NT, client image creation for Windows 3.x, 95, 98, and NT, worked on directory services implementations (Novell Directory Services). Systems management using ManageWise and Systems Management Server, systems backup, and messaging systems using Novell GroupWise and Microsoft Mail among many projects additional projects. During this time I worked with Professional Computer Services in Eden Prairie, LANWorks, Inc. and Syslan on several contract services.
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Server Administrator
Hammel, Green & Abrahamson
(Privately Held; 201-500 employees; Architecture & Planning industry)
1990 — 1992 (2 years )
Administration of Novell server environment, and Ethernet network. Also, maintained user base consisting of Windows and Macintosh clients.
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Telecommunications Specialist
Collisys
(Privately Held; 51-200 employees; Telecommunications industry)
1988 — 1989 (1 year )
Install and configure telecommunications and data systems physical infrastructure, including fiber optic, broadband, and UTP.
Additional Information
Rick Mahn’s Websites:
Rick Mahn’s Interests:
Social Media & Networking, Personal Branding, Technology, Snowmobiling, Mobile Technology, Camping/Canoeing
Rick Mahn’s Contact Settings
Interested In:
- career opportunities
- consulting offers
- new ventures
- job inquiries
- expertise requests
- business deals
- reference requests
- getting back in touch
