WARD S. CASWELL 335 Brookline Street, Needham, MA 02492 (617) 304-2689 | wardcaswell@gmail.com
SUMMARY Senior executive specialized in managing complex situations to discover and leverage competitive strategies. Proven ability to engineer solutions in small and Fortune 500 companies using strong problem solving abilities and leadership skills to inspire staff for flawless execution. Strategy Development Innovative System and Process Design Contract Negotiation Excellence in Execution Project Governance Efficiency Gains EXPERIENCE
COLLIERS INTERNATIONAL	Boston, MA
Chief Research Officer - Global	January 2008 – Present
Oversaw Research in decentralized partner organization with 293 offices in 61 countries, $2 billion in revenue and 11,000 professionals. Led 250 research staff creating and executing global strategic plan built with input from all constituents. Reduced costs 61% while adding capabilities by consolidating contracts, reducing staff, improving communications, updating systems, clarifying roles and streamlining processes. Developed new econometric forecasting tools and a training regimen for research field staff to produce their own forecasts rather than using outside economists. Sponsored global system developments and governance including CRM, statistical and property databases for improved reliability, perception and usefulness. Member of Global Sustainability Council and corporate social responsibility teams. Upgraded mapping, demographic and site selection capabilities moving to a for-fee model for improved scalability, accountability and extended product offerings. Established uniform processes for data collection, assimilation, aggregation, analysis, and distribution. Defined and scheduled the interaction with marketing, brokerage, management, and press, resulting in more timely and efficient communications. Results increased media prominence for Colliers and enhancing company image as thought leader. Provided press interviews, pod casts and presentations. Authored articles and publications extending Colliers’ marketing reach and appeal. http://www.caswell.org/articles.asp Implemented governance over all initiatives tracking and reporting progress to stakeholders.
CB RICHARD ELLIS	Boston, MA
Vice President, U.S. Director of Research	January 2003 – December 2007
Directed U.S. Research for the world’s largest commercial real estate services firm. Managed over 200 staff with $26 million annual budget. Oversaw production of global, national and local publications and development of enhanced capabilities. Coordinated global research activities. Successfully integrated the largest commercial real estate research departments in the acquisitions of Insignia/ESG, Trammell Crow, and others with better than desired synergies, consistent processes, systems, and outputs in all markets with savings of over 50%. Engineered the industry dominant national database of every commercial property in the U.S. with synchronized updates from data vendors including CoStar. Worked directly with Google, designed features of Google Earth to create tools that dramatically enhanced the way CBRE professionals interact with their clients. Crafted the largest non-government implementation of Google Earth exposing 110 Terabytes of proprietary and licensed data. Elected to the Executive Board of the Open Standards Consortium for Real Estate (OSCRE). Led creation of commercial information exchange and real property unique identifier standards with the U.S. Department of Defense and other leaders for industry efficiencies in data sharing. Secured the largest national CoStar agreement to ensure scalable solutions for data flows, coverage for all staff and substantial savings. Negotiated 65% savings in $1.5 million demographic contract with expanded data coverage. Improved the timeliness of national publications from 50, to three days after quarter end, which resulted in significant gains in press and marketing traction. Revamped report distribution resulting in the ability to block competitors while improving the marketing information derived from tracking user activity, creating a stream of qualified leads. Consistently managed six departments under budget and exceeded all objectives. Created a Retail Site Selection Group using cutting edge tools to win national retail clients and introduce a new revenue-generating department. Founded a lower cost data quality department and created software and processes to audit company data using domestic off-site, on-call, low-wage workers.
TORTO WHEATON RESEARCH A CB RICHARD ELLIS COMPANY	Boston, MA
Vice President, Manager of Research Systems	February 1998 – January 2003
Torto Wheaton Research is the premier commercial real estate forecasting firm. Managed all products, data flows, and software development. Re-engineered and automated processes to improve frequency of product release, time to market, quality of analysis and breadth of coverage thus raising revenues. Migrated disparate reports to integrated web based applications resulting in fewer errors, earlier delivery, better coverage, and easier navigation and e-commerce. Developed new products both in-house and in partnerships with outside firms.
THE OMNIA GROUP INC.	Tampa, FL
MIS Director and Vice-President of Sales and Operations
Responsibilities included operations, sales, marketing, IT and planning for an international management consulting and behavioral profiling firm.
WSC, INC.	Tampa, FL
President
Founded a software company with international clients in banking, food service, manufacturing, broadcasting, and other industries. Eight employees produced custom and shrink-wrap software products, still being sold and used today.
SYNON CORPORATION and ISC SYSTEMS CORPORATION	Framingham, MA
Programmer/Analyst, Associate Software Engineer
EDUCATION AND LICENSES M.I.T. Center for Real Estate - Coursework in Real Estate, Finance, and Derivatives Tufts University - B.S. Electrical Engineering Choate Rosemary Hall - Honors in Math and History MA Licensed Real Estate Broker OSCRE Advisory Council – Founding Member