Software Technology Architect

 [ BY   GORDON TREDGOLD , FOUNDER AND CEO, LEADERSHIP PRINCIPLES ] Just because we're smart doesn't mean that we're not going to make dumb mistakes, mistakes that can hamper our career and hold us back. No matter how smart we are, we won't achieve your full potential until we stop making this seven stupid mistakes. 1.Thinking and Talking are NOT THE SAME as Doing. Planning and preparation are important ingredients in achieving success, but the most important thing of all is action. We cannot think your way to success no matter how smart you are. At some point, we need to roll your sleeves up and make it happen. 2. Waiting to be promoted before Doing the next level job. If we want to be a Leader, then we need to start leading . Leadership isn't a title or a position; it's about action, influence and the ability to drive results. Throughout my career, I have seen hundreds of smart people wait to be offered a leadership position before they start to lead. But that...

Nowadays, The Kids Movies in English have a lot for the elders to Learn.  I tried to recollect few that drew my attention. Example : [IRON MAN] “Jarvis, sometimes you got to Run before you can Walk.”  [KUNGFU PANDA - 1] There is No Secret Ingredient. To make something special, you just have to believe it’s special. [KUNGFU PANDA - 2] You got to let go of that stuff from the past. Because it just doesn’t matter.  The only thing that matters is What you choose to be now. [RATATOUILLE] Dad: Where are you going? Remy: Back to the restaurant. They'll fail without me. Dad:  Why do you care? Remy:  Because I'm a cook! I will keep adding the quotes, I like. Thanks.

If you only do what you can do, You will never be better than what you are. - Shifu: Kung fu Panda No Growth Learning and career progression is a big motivation to continue in a job. If you are one of such people and if the thought of stability without any growth scares you, it's time to quit. Under-Valued Even highly paid employees feel undervalued when there is lack of appreciation . If you are unappreciated and undervalued, it hampers your performance too. Quit before it's too late Under-Paid Don't sell yourself Cheap! They really start ill-treating you. If you feel that your compensation does not match with your skills and you know the industry benchmarks for your position are higher, it is time to look for better opportunities outside. Don't like your boss It's true that people join companies but they quit their bosses. Having a bad manager is extremely taxing and impedes productivity. You should not go through such stress and leave the job for go...

from Times of India - Agatha Christie There’s hardly a day that goes by without most of us using at least one Google tool,  be it search, YouTube, Maps, Translate, Gmail, Android, News or Analytics.  But Google is much more than just these commonly-used products. In fact, Google actually has a bunch of incredibly useful online tools that you might not even have heard of.  Let’s take a look… You can set a timer on Google (and get an alarm to sound when time is up) by looking up any amount of time on the website, followed by "timer." Google.com/sky - lets you explore the far reaches of the universe using images from NASA satellite, Sloan Digital Sky Survey and Hubble Telescope. Getting married? Google will help y ou plan your wedding , by g uiding you through breaking the news, locating a venue, making a website and more. Google nGrams is a fun tool that lets you search for words in 5.2 million books published between 1500 and 2008 so you can see how they'v...

Prepare for the below questions generally asked in the job interviews. Tell me a little about yourself Why are you looking (or why did you leave you last job)? Tell me what you know about this company. Why do you want to work at X Company? What relevant experience do you have? If your previous co-workers were here, what would they say about you? Have you done anything to further your experience? Where else have you applied? How are you when you're working under pressure? What motivates you to do a good job? What's your greatest strength? What's your biggest weakness? Let's talk about salary. What are you looking for? Are you good at working in a team? Tell me a suggestion you have made that was implemented. Has anything ever irritated you about people you've worked with? Is there anyone you just could not work with? Tell me about any issues you've had with a previous boss. Would you rather work for money or job satisfaction? Would you rath...

What do professionals really need to know? All working individuals and professionals need significant competency and skill in all of the following eight areas in order to be successful, and most are sorely lacking in several if not most of them. Research shows that most are lacking in at least three of these skills at the same time. 1. Communication Skill In order to be successful in your job and career, you must communicate powerfully and effectively with confidence and clarity. There's been  much written about introverts as leaders and managers, and how they can use their innate skills and gifts to succeed as leaders. Your  personality type and level of introversion/extroversion aside, if you can't communicate your ideas in an empowered, clear and engaging way, you  simply won't perform or progress as well as your counterparts who can communicate with ease and strength. 2. Building Relationships So many professionals don't get this one basic point until it...

If you want a job straight out of college, don’t knock on Kirk McDonald’s door.  McDonald, the president of a tech company in New York City, wrote a brutally honest op-ed in The Wall Street Journal called “Sorry, College Grads, I Probably Won’t Hire You.” He believes most college graduates don’t have the one skill that’s in high demand: computer programming.During your first few years in the real world, what else should you take time to learn? Here are 25 things every professional should know by age 25: 25. “Definitely” is not spelled “definately.”  Spell-check always. 24. You should read an entire apartment lease before you sign it.  23. An Excel PivotTable will change your life. Nothing is lesser. 22. A cover letter should add color and personality to your resume—not summarize it.  21. Everyone likes to receive praise, but the smartest young adults actively seek constructive criticism .  20. The days of a college syllabus are long gone . If you’re wait...

For any professional good/bad, IT/non-IT, he/she will start preparing for the interview only when thay start looking for a change. And probably he might not be able to recollect all the approach/steps he followed previously. I would always suggest them to document all the important things in their career. Off-course, preparing for the interviews is a important one to write a journal on. Few points from mine... At a regular interval say one year, go and try with few interviews to gain knowledge and confidence. Keep your resumes always updated for every major change say, learnt new technology, changed project/role, trainig attended, etc... or at some regular interval at-least. Stick to single unique and professional resume format. D on't have more than 3-4 pages. Update your latest professional resume on job sites like Naukri, Timesjobs, Monsterjobs, etc... Start preparing the basics in a day or two and start answering the calls & attending interviews. Please don't expect to ...

The below are only the points. Read the original article in [www.littletutorials.com]. Really awesome. In fact, the author of this article inspired me to restart my knowledge sharing activity and started writing few thing in the web. Sec-1:Set yourself up for success Define early on what success means for you, the team and the business Believe in the project: idea, architecture, time, team Understand the domain, the business requirements and the technical challenges Know your team: strengths, weaknesses, ambitions and personalities Have a plan as a result of a planning activity Be part in the design of everything Get your hands dirty and code8. Act as a communication proxy for your team Make sure everybody understands the big picture: their work has implications Fight for architecture and design consistency Know the status of everybody’s work and detect slippage Record technical debt if you need shortcuts but try to maintain architectural integrity; report the debt Use the process that...

One of my friend use to advice me to attend interviews every 6 - 9 months. I gave a try. I could see myself as a [Technology Lead] where I am lagging in the technical and other skills. To help my readers I am listing out few the areas where I came to know a TL has to update/upgrade. Protocols like SOAP, HTTP, TCP UML - Views (Process, Sequential, ...) UML - Diagrams (Collaboration, Communication, ...) Ajax - Internals, Architecture, Scenario, ... .NET tools - FxCop, NUnit, ... Profilers - CLR Profiler, ANTS, ... Estimation techniques Build Tools - MSBuild ASP.NET Performance Counters SOA concepts SDLC Process Unit Testing, Integration Testing, etc... EAI - BizTalk exposure Collaboration - MOSS concepts All the best!

I got a chance to search for the things that a software architect should be capable of and I came across the following link from O'Reilly. http://architect.97things.oreilly.com/wiki/index.php/97_Things_Every_Software_Architect_Should_Know_-_The_Book. It has many topics and I first looked into "Architects must be hands on". It really impressed me. Thanks a lot to the author of that topic. I liked few points that I enlisted below. - Architects should be bought into the team at the earliest part of the project. - Architects should not sit in an ivory tower dictating the way forward. - An architect is like an airline pilot, he might not look busy all of the time. - Architect should have responsibility for the delivery and quality of the projects. They gave clear picture on the roles of a software architect. There are two ultimate statements we can never miss. I copied them below. (1)The project manager (co-pilot) performs the day-to-day management tasks leaving the architect ...

Sometimes I search for the sites related to Software Architecture. I use to check the articles in the following sites. http://www.opengroup.org/togaf/ http://www.iasahome.org/web/home/home www.bredemeyer.com/whatis.htm www.handbookofsoftwarearchitecture.com www.softwarearchitectureportal.org http://www.codingthearchitecture.com http://softwarearchitecture.com/ http://www.sei.cmu.edu/architecture/ http://www.handbookofsoftwarearchitecture.com/index.jsp?page=Main

I use to check few tech sites regularly for every 15 days. Even though it does not matters in terms of developing my programming skills it created a kind of awareness and confidence in me. If I sit in a technical discussion, it would look like me reading a new news article on a new topic. But before me starting this kind of habit, I will be little uncomfortable and will hesitate to open my mouth. I wish to list out few of those site… MSDN – Magazine www.visualstudiomagazine.com www.ddj.com – It is Dr.Dobb’s site. www.windowsclient.net www.asp.net www.codeproject.com technet.microsoft.com www.virtualtechdays.com www.microsoftpdc.com   I don’t check all the sites at a single stretch. During a routine work, just spending 5-10 minutes in a day helps me to relax and gain some information.