Architecture design and modelling skills for IT Architects

The IT Architect roles requires a significant amount of technical knowledge. This lecture describes what is the foundation of this knowledge and what is the best way to achieve it.

This lecture describes what is the technical knowledge considered prerequisite for the IT Architect role.

This lecture provides examples of technical knowledge required for Application or Solution Architects.

This lecture provides the description of the T-Shape personality and why it is important for the IT Architect.

This is an example of T-Shape Professional concept applied to an Application or Solution Architect.

The focus of this lecture is on how does the T-Shape personality concept apply to the business and technology domains.

This lecture discusses about how does the depth of knowledge for an IT Architect compare with the knowledge for the other IT roles such as developers, analysts, etc.

This lecture discusses the important topic of the "minimal depth" of knowledge required for an IT Architect in order to be successful in his/her job.

This lecture provides the definition of the architecture design skills and what is their scope for each of the IT Architect types.

This lecture provides more information about the foundation for the architecture design, including what are the key terms.

This lecture describes the main concepts of the architecture design and how they relate to each other.

This lecture provides you examples of the architecture design skills for different types of IT Architecture such as:

• Enterprise architecture

• Solution architecture

• Infrastructure architecture

This lecture provides a couple of examples of typical diagrams produced by Infrastructure Architects.

This lecture provides an example of a typical diagram produced by Business Architects together with an introduction to the basic concepts used by a Business Architect.

This lecture expands on the example from the previous lecture and provides an example of a typical diagram produced by an Application Architect to show how the application services (or APIs) automate/realize/implement the  business functions.

This lecture provides the introduction to the architecture modelling skills including a description of the foundation for the various architecture modelling languages.

This lecture describes the modelling languages most suited for business architecture.

This lecture provides the description of the main modeling language (EML) used by IT Architects such as Application, Solution or Technology Architects.

This lecture walks you through an example of an sequence diagram, explores www.uml-diagrams.org, a web site that contains tens of examples of UML diagram and discusses about the UML tools that you can use to create the diagram.s

This lecture provides the description of Entity Relationship diagram (ERD) as the main modelling language used by Data Architects.

This lecture walks you through an example of an ERD diagram.

This lecture provides information about Archimate - modeling language use primarily by the Enterprise Architect

This lecture walks you through some examples of Archimate diagrams.

This lecture provides guidelines on how to choose the most appropriate modeling language based on the type of IT Architect and the diagrams/documentation you need to produce.

This lecture focuses on the techniques to create the architecture design.

This lecture provides guidance on how to document the architecture including what views to select, how to document risks, structure and dynamic behavior, risks, etc.

This lecture applies the breadth vs. depth concept to the architecture design skills, architecture frameworks and modelling languages.

This lecture provides the description of the industry knowledge concept.

This lecture discusses in detail how does the industry knowledge concept apply to the IT Architects.

This lecture provides some examples of industry knowledge required for various IT Architects.

This lecture provides information on how the industry knowledge can be classified.

This lecture provides more information on how to use the industry knowledge to be a successful IT Architect.

This lecture provides the description of the business knowledge concept.

This lecture discusses how can the the student obtain business specific knowledge to become an IT Architect.

This lecture provides some examples of business specific knowledge required for various IT Architects.

This lecture describes what are the next steps recommended in order to become an IT Architect.

“Become IT Architect” program has multiple courses that will help you on the path of becoming an IT Architect:

1. "Introduction to IT Architect roles” course will provide the students a complete understanding about what are the various IT architect roles and how they relate to other IT roles, what are the benefits of being an IT architect and what are the next steps on your journey to become an IT Architect. The journey of becoming an IT Architect starts with this course as this is the first course from "Become IT Architect" program.

2. “Architecture design, modelling and technical skills for an IT Architects” course will provide the students a complete understanding of what are the general technical, architecture design and modelling skills and competencies required to become a successful IT Architect. This role involves continually learning new skills and competencies throughout one’s career arc but in order to provide guidance to the IT practitioners who would like to move into an IT Architect role we need to explore in detail the technical skills and competencies.

3. "Soft skills for IT architects and IT practitioners” course will provide the students a complete understanding of what are the soft (also called performance) skills and competencies required to become a successful IT architect or IT practitioner (any IT role such as Developer, Systems Analyst, Infrastructure specialist, Project Manager, Business Systems Analyst, Dev or Tech Lead, etc.). These roles involve continually learning new skills and competencies throughout one’s career. Technical skills are important for each of these roles but in order to achieve the full potential and be successful at the IT architect or IT practitioner job, you need to explore in detail and master the soft skills that would make the difference between struggling in your day to day job and being able to successfully lead project teams, communicate the architecture solution, design, project plan, test plan, use analysis and problem solving to solve design or architectural problems, facilitate discussions to achieve consensus, manage changes and “sell” your work to the stakeholders.

4. “IT Architecture specific knowledge” course provides the students a complete understanding of what is the architecture specific knowledge including the IT architecture frameworks and methodologies specific to different types of architecture and architecture modeling languages that are necessary to allow you to build and document architectural designs at the application, infrastructure, business, or entire enterprise level. Such knowledge comprises various architecture patterns, frameworks, and methodologies, as well as modeling languages that enable you to visually describe the models you create, and the tools that implement those languages.

5. “Documents produced by an IT Architect" course will provide the students a complete understanding of various deliverables/documents produced by the various IT Architect roles, the input documents used for these deliverables, key activities, architectural thinking and how architects should extract information and use it to create the architecture documentation and guide the implementation. The course discusses in detail the following architecture documents:

· Architecture Document/Blueprint

· Architecture Decision Document

· Request for proposal/ Request for information

· Architecture Proof of Concept

· Implementation strategy/migration

· Roadmaps (such as: Business Technology Roadmap)

6. Career path courses:

i. “Career path - How to become a Business Architect “course will provide the students the guidance to become Business Architects. The assumption is that the IT practitioners have an Business/Systems Analyst background and already possess the knowledge from the courses indicated as prerequisites. We will talk briefly about the various ways to pursue an architecture career and then focus on the architectural specific knowledge.

ii. “Career path - How to become an Enterprise Architect” course will provide the students the guidance to become Enterprise Architects. The assumption is that the IT practitioners already possess the knowledge from the courses indicated as prerequisites. We will talk briefly about the various ways to pursue an architecture career and then focus on the architectural specific knowledge.

iii. “Career path - How to become an Application Architect” course will provide the students the guidance to become Application Architects. The assumption is that the IT practitioners have a software developer background and already possess the knowledge from the courses indicated as prerequisites. We will talk briefly about the various ways to pursue an architecture career and then focus on the architectural specific knowledge.

iv. “Career path - How to become a Data Architect” course will provide the students the guidance to become Data Architects. The assumption is that the IT practitioners have a database administrator background and already possess the knowledge from the courses indicated as prerequisites. We will talk briefly about the various ways to pursue an architecture career and then focus on the architectural specific knowledge.

v. “Career path - How to become an Infrastructure Architect“ course will provide the students the guidance to become Infrastructure Architects. The assumption is that the IT practitioners have an infrastructure specialist/system administrator background and already possess the knowledge from the courses indicated as prerequisites. We will talk briefly about the various ways to pursue an architecture career and then focus on the architectural specific knowledge.

7. “How to get a job as an IT Architect" course will provide the students all the guidance required for them to make a career change to any of the IT Architect roles (please refer to the prerequisites below). The assumption is that the student has a clear understanding of what are the different IT Architect roles, responsibilities, skills and competencies required, architecture specific knowledge and typical deliverables.
This course gives you all the information you need to complete the final step and finally get the job and recognition you so much desire, exploring different paths that you can follow depending on the specifics of the role and your current situation.

8. " How to establish or improve the IT architecture practice" course will provide the students all the information they need about the benefits of having an IT architecture practice, how to successfully establish an architecture practice, what kind of architecture roles the company might need and how to hire the best IT architects for the market. The course will discuss each of the types of IT architecture explaining why you need them and how you can start or improve your specific architecture practice. In case you do have such a practice this course will go into details about what to look for each of the architecture roles, how to interview the candidates and what kind of questions would most definitely differentiate between the candidates that have the knowledge and experience required for the job.