FTI Global

Mike Grayson - Founder

Prior to founding FTI, Mike served as an Executive Manager for several advanced technology companies. He has always been a "hands-on" manager directly involved with engineering and development teams and has served as senior Software Architect on hundreds of projects and understands technology from an engineering perspective.

He founded FTI in November of 1989 and strongly believes in the importance of understanding business processes and being wise in the way that technology is applied. Mike is a big fan and student of Peter Drucker, "the father or modern management" and is actively involved in the Drucker Society and Drucker Institute.

The Playbook Method

Mike developed the Playbook Method to help businesses, managers and teams become more effective. This method has been implemented by The Department of Homeland Security, CDC, Fortune 500 companies and around the world in such places as China, Great Britain and the Netherlands. It is described in his book, "The Ultimate Business Playbook". You can download a free eBook version here.

Background Prior to FTI

E-Systems	Responsible for the production of technology used by the CIA and DoD for intelligence gathering. Delivered systems for the U2, SR71 and other airborne platforms. Managed the development efforts for Mystic Star, the communication system for Air Force One and the Airborne Command Post. Managed implementation of largest Oracle (SQL) implementation at the time and introduced the concept of distributed computing using Microsoft operating systems, which had not been previously accomplished.
General Manager Synergetics	Responsible for the manufacture and test of mobile Computerized Axial Tomography (CAT) scanners. This was considered a new and experimental technology at the time. Worked closely with Searle, Syntex and GE engineers in developing the first FDA approved mobile CAT Scanner – the GE 8800 series.
Plant Manager Microdyne Corp.	General Manager of Microdyne Corporation, a satellite communications manufacturing company. Responsible for all areas of operation including the manufacture and test of wave guides, tuned cavities, spectrum display units, high frequency receivers, etc. Learned a lot about sophisticated communication equipment design.
U.S. Army	Entered Warrant Officer Flight Training as a helicopter pilot. Trained in Communications and SDB (a variety of skills). Part of 2-4 man team that ran missions for MACV with the Vietnamese in the Iron Triangle. Awarded Bronze Star and Army Commendation medals

Corporate History

2004 - 2009	Mortgage Technology. Applied the Playbook Method to the Mortgage Industry and wrote about industry specific workflow issues in "The Ultimate Business Playbook". Have provided Consulting services to National Mortgage Operations on how to implement the Methodology within their companies. Every branch or region that has implemented the Methodology has seen a dramatic increase in the volume of loans they were able to process and superior customer service - without hiring new people. Designed LoanTrac, a state-of-the-art SaaS loan tracking and communication system for Retail and Wholesale operations. It is designed to automate the communication and workflow between the borrower, broker, account executive, underwriter and loan officer as the loan travels through the process. Expertise in DoD Security and distributed processing are built into the design. LoanTrac shortens loan processing time by sending alerts and keeping the entire team on target and has sent out well over a million alerts for many thousands of loans. The Playbook Method and LoanTrac are proven systems.
2005 - 2007	Emergency Management. A special version of SoftCare Medical was created created to help with the Katrina Disaster Relief. This system, now known as SoftCare ER, is being implemented in the Homeland Security Fusion Center in McKinney. It is an "off-the-shelf" solutions for governments and provides a carefully designed workflow that can be used by Public Health officials on a day-to-day basis.
2004	HealthCare. Developed a state of the art system that linked thousands of patients across the country to various health care providers. This system provided offline synchronization of patient charts and data as well as real time access.
2003	Government Purchasing/Contracts. Developed an automated contract administration and accounting system that integrated RFP's, proposal review and award, contract management and vendor submission of invoices in real time for a local government. Provides a 360 degree view of every contract and significantly reduces contract management effort. One of the first systems to tie all the associated functions into one package for both vendors and government employees.
2002	Advanced Marketing Systems. Designed highly successful new concepts in marketing for national Fortune 500 companies. The Pipeline Process and Profile are the cornerstones of the new technology and have been implemented with incredible results for the Health Care, Financial and other industries.
2000	Rapid Application Development (RAD). Develop new Rapid Application Development (RAD) methodology that exceeded the results of traditional development. New training techniques for programmers produced a higher quality product. This system has given numerous customers a clear competitive advantage. Software has been developed using the RAD methodology for companies like Pizza Hut, Forbes, Raytheon, JCPenney, Santa Clara County, State of California and many other Fortune 500 companies and government agencies.
2000	DoD Industrial Security. Designed software code named ISIS for Defense Contractors that tracked the movement of classified materials and personnel, including laser guided weapons systems.
1999	Expert Based Systems. Designed a database driven expert system that can be applied to numerous industries. This system is capable of reproducing skills and knowledge in a complex system of branching logic necessary to guide an inexperienced person through a series of decision processing nodes. This system was implemented by Raytheon for Federal Acquisition Regulation compliance. It is currently being applied to psychological profiling for attention deficit disorder ADHD. and 11 other major categories of personality profile.
1997	Network Security Award Winner. Designed Protocop network security software in collaboration with Joe Head, Senior Vice President of ODS Networks. Competed against IBM Tivoli and HP Openview at Networld Interop in April of 1997 and won Best of Show and Best Network Management Software. This was the first time a relational database had been used to analyze network security. Protocop was used by the F.B.I., U.S. Army, Internal Revenue Service, EDS and others for network security assessment and intrusion detection.
1994	Network/Server AntiVirus. Collaborated with the chief engineer at McAfee antivirus on the deployment and implementation of server based anti-virus technology. Did the first testing and re-engineering of this software on a 2,000 user network. This was the first network based anti-virus implementation in the country and was recognized by Computerworld in May of 1994.
1993	National Recognition for Cross-Platform Integration. Designed and implemented a system for Mobil Oil that shared a common database to specially designed applications running on UNIX, Macintosh, Windows and DOS. The system was implemented world wide and was the largest known cross-platform integration at that time. Was recognized by Info World and Microsoft for this achievement in December of 1993.
1989	Founded Figtree Technologies Incorporated (FTI Global) as an systems engineering and design company.