0:16

Hey

0:21

, this is Paul Price , ceo

0:23

and founder of ISA . I'm

0:25

doing my favorite thing here

0:27

on the argument . I am interviewing

0:29

a real-life architects who do real

0:32

work and have real jobs and have to

0:34

deliver , just like you . The

0:36

argument is a series of podcasts

0:38

. It is also hosted by host

0:41

our chief architect podcast

0:44

, as well as women in architecture , and

0:46

we're adding editors and broadcasters

0:49

to the argument on a regular basis . But I am

0:51

pleased to be interviewing

0:53

today Stefano . I'm

0:56

saying do I get it right ? Bianchini ? Yes , is

0:59

it Bianchini ? It's Bianchini .

1:01

You said it properly . I'm impressed

1:04

. Good , I

1:07

bet you know I was in Italy through .

1:09

COVID ? Not that you could tell . The

1:11

only way you could tell that Italians

1:13

recognize COVID is that they noticed that

1:15

there weren't as many tourists . Everybody

1:19

was out at the beaches , hugging and

1:21

kissing on the cheek and eating , and

1:23

I was just like . I love this place . I'm home

1:25

Now

1:28

. Stefano is a program architect

1:30

for Suncore Group . Is that

1:32

correct ?

1:34

Yes , I finished my assignment there

1:36

.

1:37

Oh , okay , great , Great Well , and has been

1:39

a recent speaker . If you have not

1:41

caught the built conference

1:44

series , this is a free quarterly

1:46

conference that we've been running for three

1:48

to four , going on four years now . It

1:51

has some group , just amazing speakers . Stefano

1:54

, you presented on surviving

1:57

and thriving as a program architect

1:59

and

2:01

we really appreciate you doing that . So for those

2:03

of you , there'll be a link in the podcast

2:05

or a link in the YouTube

2:07

channel with Stefano's talk . That'll

2:09

be hosted there as well . But

2:11

, stefano , what the hell is a program

2:14

architect ? Tell us in your words what's

2:17

the key here ?

2:19

Yeah , I mean the program architect is really

2:22

the architect

2:24

that would implement a large program

2:27

into a large and complex organization

2:29

. So it's the link between

2:31

the strategy and the execution

2:33

of that strategy . And

2:36

several examples of when you

2:38

would require a program architect . For example

2:40

, if you're doing a merger and acquisition

2:42

integration that you would require a

2:44

program architect . This is because there are multiple

2:47

streams of work and you need someone

2:49

that is overseeing the multiple

2:51

streams of work and understands all the dependencies

2:54

between different streams and effectively

2:56

it's like managing the whole architecture

2:59

team to deliver

3:01

against this large transformation program

3:03

. Other example are ERP implementations

3:06

, digital transformation

3:08

or custom experience transformation

3:10

, where really you're looking at the

3:12

whole enterprise there .

3:16

Okay , so I'm clear now , because I'm

3:18

just a dumb software architect sometimes and

3:24

you know a program to

3:26

me isexe or a bash file of some

3:28

kind . So we're not talking about

3:30

a piece of software , we're talking about a

3:33

change program . So

3:36

that's pretty exciting . Now you mentioned

3:38

really big change programs

3:40

. We

3:42

really look at this in the notebook and

3:45

sort of core concepts , because this is going to

3:47

be quite confusing for

3:49

an HR person that has to

3:51

hire a program architect . Or

3:54

if you go to a conference and they say well , everybody

3:56

knows that a program architect is this . So

3:59

you're talking about a big change agent

4:01

. Now are there small change agents ? Does

4:03

this apply to a project ?

4:06

No , I mean the program . You're talking about

4:08

budgets that go 80

4:10

million plus , so you're

4:12

not looking at a 5 to 10 million piece of

4:14

work because you can call that a

4:16

project architect versus a program architect

4:18

. So a program architect is really multiple

4:21

streams of work impacting different business

4:23

units , for example , or just impacting

4:25

the whole enterprise and

4:27

the big budgets large , complex

4:30

organization and that's when you can

4:32

justify having a program architect overseeing

4:34

the whole transmission program .

4:36

So this would include . So one of my bigger

4:39

projects was about products programs

4:41

. I guess was a retail point

4:43

of sale for a major retail firm

4:45

, 250 to 350 million

4:47

dollar kind of thing , multiple streams

4:50

of work and I was the

4:52

chief architect for that transformation . Is

4:54

that a what the appropriate level

4:56

of scope for program ?

4:57

What does that do ? Absolutely . So

4:59

. It's like I've seen the chief architect of that

5:02

program or you know

5:04

the head of architecture for that program

5:06

. You end up a team

5:08

of architects . There is not only application

5:10

architect , you have security architect , data

5:12

architect , you have infrastructure architect over

5:14

pouring into you for the To

5:16

deliver against a specific , you know , budget as

5:19

specific scope that is by

5:21

the enterprise . So it's you're impacting the whole

5:23

enterprise but you're playing against a

5:25

specific budget . You have some timelines .

5:28

So I'm gonna throw some terms out sheet out

5:30

there . Then , for those of our listeners who

5:32

do use the bit of buck as a kind of a

5:35

, just to get to my understanding things correctly

5:37

died right . There

5:39

is an article in the bit of buck called scope , in context

5:41

in one of the and it talks about some of

5:43

these different scoping terms we use

5:46

and then tie it back to the title . The

5:49

goal here is never to diminish , always to increase

5:51

understanding , always . Never to diminish a role

5:53

or a job or an understanding of ours , of our guests

5:55

, but to help our listeners kind of understand

5:58

. So in traditional

6:00

, in that article we look at things like

6:02

portfolio

6:04

of work , program work

6:07

and and project work . In the traditional

6:09

3p sort of change management

6:11

, project management thinking , we

6:13

also think in terms of product

6:16

capability , value stream kinds

6:19

of thinking and

6:21

I'm curious to in your aid from . From

6:23

your perspective it is the program

6:26

in the sense of this is a large enough grouping

6:29

of projects and streams of work then

6:31

that they have executive visibility , that

6:33

it has its own Effectively , it has

6:35

its own P&L

6:37

in a way . Right , you're really

6:39

judging , it's gonna make or break

6:41

us in some ways .

6:43

Yes , I mean definitely something . It's

6:45

similar to a portfolio level Because

6:48

there are a number . Initially , you'll

6:50

impact in different areas of the enterprise

6:53

. They're all in areas

6:55

of your , of your sack . Therefore

6:57

, I think you can compare with a portfolio

7:00

level delivery , but

7:03

the the point is that Usually

7:06

in a portfolio you would

7:08

have different projects and you have a project

7:10

accurate for each of those . It might not

7:12

be the penances , but not part of

7:14

the same bundle , if you want , in

7:17

the the program I key , that is

7:19

, I intended it's more that all these

7:21

projects are linked by a specific

7:23

budget and have a specific timelines . Therefore

7:26

, you need to sequence the work because

7:29

the penances between different , different

7:31

streams and you need to achieve

7:33

a specific date . So a good

7:35

example again is when you do a merger and acquisition

7:37

, so you either sever any

7:39

company or you acquire any company , there

7:42

are specific dates by which you need to

7:44

have completed integration and

7:47

and then becomes , you know

7:49

, a program , even if it's a portfolio

7:51

of initiatives . They have a Lot

7:54

of the benefits between each other and you need

7:56

to have an accurate . It looks at the different

7:58

, you know verticals , if you want , you know the age of system

8:00

, the finances and and you know I don't

8:03

we're gonna do specific , but you know the

8:05

past systems and middleware

8:07

and the workplace and all the different bits

8:09

and pieces that's made up

8:11

the enterprise , those need to be

8:13

either replicated across or uplifted , and

8:17

and that all has to be under

8:19

the umbrella of a program . And

8:21

you need , on top of that , a program , accurate

8:23

, that manages all these dependencies and has . Is

8:26

it right to keep in contact with my creative perspective

8:28

for the program ?

8:30

You know , this is a really interesting thing

8:32

that I've long been

8:34

curious about in a debate that I have

8:36

, quite realistically , on a regular basis

8:38

. So , and that is , you know

8:40

, it's sort of how

8:42

fly can it ? How fly , how

8:45

high can it cross , fly right

8:47

. So the question becomes what

8:49

do we tell so ? How many architects would

8:51

you have on a program

8:53

of that size ? Would you do ? You think

8:55

, if you had , literally , if you had no people

8:58

constraints , how would

9:02

you scope that ?

9:02

Yeah , yeah . So you will start maybe with

9:05

five architects just for the initial , you

9:07

know , business case phase or initial inception

9:09

phase of the program , but then you will

9:11

all the way up to maybe 20 or

9:13

30 architects , including all the different

9:15

disciplines . So you the infrastructure

9:18

, data and , and

9:21

you know , on top of the application

9:23

architects you would have cloud architects and

9:25

that becomes a large team that

9:28

might have different lines

9:30

of report but as

9:32

far as the program is

9:34

concerned , they all need to report to the program

9:36

architect , for the benefit of the

9:38

program in fact . So you have a kind

9:40

of a ?

9:41

have you found there is either a complexity

9:43

or financial relationship between that

9:46

number ? Because on my on the

9:48

one of the big programs it took 250

9:51

or so level programs I

9:54

had we had , if

9:56

you include the primary vendor

9:58

, the consult , the consultants and

10:01

the architects at the , at the organization

10:03

, the retail organization , I mean the grand total

10:06

was like 70 different architects

10:08

at different times but

10:11

a good 40 were there almost

10:13

all the way through those three years and

10:15

even then it felt a little tight . You know

10:17

like I kind of wish we had some junior architects

10:20

, so to speak , that you know were we

10:22

could do some of the filing in of the models

10:25

and the filing in of the documents in

10:27

some ways . Is that ? Does that feel

10:29

right to you ?

10:30

You know , I mean , I always have this number

10:32

in mind that is , three to

10:34

5% of the budget is for

10:36

architecture and so

10:39

if it's 200 mil , obviously that means

10:41

you know , 5% , 200 mil , let's cover

10:43

enough for the architects as a minimum , right

10:46

? So that's kind of a guideline

10:48

always used to see whether there is too much

10:50

architecture or not enough architecture . Obviously

10:52

big the VMs , they always have too many architects

10:54

.

10:56

You know , I'm glad to hear you say that , though I'm

10:58

so , I'm so relieved to hear you say that , because

11:00

we always hear this 1% number

11:02

which is so anemic and

11:04

so , like you , you floating

11:06

up there as the program architect , right , and

11:09

it's like there's nobody there to do the architect

11:11

. You know like , oh my God , what am I supposed to do

11:13

? You know I'm supposed to be in 20 meetings a day , but

11:15

you already have .

11:16

Arquities , but these are

11:19

application Arquities , they're not that Arquities

11:21

. Well , what's the difference ? You know , there's

11:23

different skillset . They don't get it

11:25

because they labelize it Arquities . You know

11:28

what I mean .

11:29

Well , let's , let's dive into that . Then you said

11:31

the word skill set . That's such a great word

11:33

. What does it take to be a great

11:35

program level , that level of program

11:37

or change agent program ? Architect ?

11:40

Yeah . So I think a good analogy

11:42

always uses that you

11:45

look at the pilot versus . You know every

11:47

pilot can drive a car , but everybody

11:49

can drive a car they can't drive . You know an airplane

11:51

, you know there can be a pilot right

11:53

. And the big difference is that when you're working

11:55

on a large program like that , there's

11:58

a lot of unknowns

12:00

and you

12:03

need to be comfortable with

12:05

not knowing all the details

12:07

. What you might have on a $8

12:10

million program , on a , you know

12:12

, $100 plus million dollars

12:14

, you don't have all the details . And it's a

12:16

new . It's a new world for the organization

12:19

as well . So you can expect to back and

12:21

wait for the business to give you requirements

12:23

because they don't know what their info

12:25

, they don't even know what requirements they give you . So so

12:28

you need to be comfortable in working in uncertainty

12:30

and leading the change without

12:33

having all the information , which means

12:35

that sometimes you get it right , sometimes you get it wrong

12:37

, which means you need to be prepared to

12:39

. You know , step up to the plate , give

12:42

the direction to the business , but also , at the same time

12:45

, review that direction is still valid

12:47

. So along the way , you might find

12:49

things . You might , the business might have more

12:51

clarity on what they want to do along the way . And

12:53

now you have to revisit some of the decisions or

12:56

maybe things that have been found

12:58

initially don't work anymore . So you need to go

13:00

back and look at decisions . So it requires

13:02

a combination of leadership

13:04

but , as well as you know , humility , because

13:06

you also need to be aware that things might

13:08

have changed and decision have been made six months

13:11

ago , now not bad anymore . You need to be prepared

13:13

to relook at those decisions . So

13:16

how do you program like that ? You

13:19

need to be involved

13:21

in large information programs and

13:23

see . You know the complexities

13:25

of managing a large information program

13:28

. There's no easy way to get there

13:30

.

13:32

You know , we would almost talk about that as a kind of

13:34

when you think about discrete

13:36

competencies is

13:39

there . You know , this is

13:41

where I think the measurable qualities of this

13:43

get really interesting , because you've

13:45

really talked about the human dynamic side

13:47

of this and how strong and difficult

13:49

that is at that level . Right , the politics

13:52

, the not letting

13:54

your ego get in the way , the being able to get

13:56

rid of cognitive bias , the being

13:58

willing to what the

14:01

head of the chief architect forum calls

14:03

being the sort of chief technical psychologist

14:06

of the program . Right , tell

14:09

me your problems .

14:10

Exactly this

14:13

would be like that and it's all . How do we

14:15

say ? It's about being like Switzerland

14:17

. You know , you put up the facts . You're

14:20

not attached to solutions . You

14:22

just , you know , bring up the facts , no

14:24

emotions involved , and just

14:27

make sure that people are well , well what

14:29

decisions can be made and what are the impacts

14:32

of those decisions , and just guide

14:34

them through the change .

14:38

So this is a very powerful discussion

14:40

because these affect a lot of titles in

14:42

the world , and a lot of titles affect a lot of how

14:44

much people make and

14:47

how they get their bonuses , and then

14:49

they go to a different employer and it's a completely

14:51

different world . Now , if

14:53

you are this person , like you said , you

14:55

can't know all the details and you might be working with an

14:58

information architect one day and a business

15:00

architect the next day and a software architect the next day . What

15:03

are the ? How do you do that ? How

15:08

do you cross these specializations

15:11

and deal with these deep people , with these deep knowledge

15:13

areas of something like

15:16

you know , something difficult like information architecture

15:19

, and yet you're kind of in

15:21

between all of those ?

15:24

in some way . And then you need to have

15:26

a combination of all the skillset enough

15:29

to be able to talk to them

15:31

and understand what the issue is

15:33

. And you become like the translator

15:35

you translate from technical to

15:37

business language what that means . You

15:40

dumb it down for execs . So

15:44

it's about having a good technical background , but

15:47

it's really sitting down and it's standing with

15:49

the architect what the real issue is

15:51

, because you cannot tend to

15:53

go on and on forever . You're going to have to

15:55

deal down , yeah , but what is the business impact

15:57

of this ? Is this really going to be a problem If

15:59

I have to explain to an exec what

16:02

options are going to put forward ? And you always wanted

16:04

three options . You know what is the do

16:06

nothing . That's a strategic . We had all

16:08

the money in the world . And what is the pragmatic

16:10

option that would get us over the line ? And

16:12

having those conversations with you know technical

16:14

people , you need

16:17

to have that capability of extracting

16:19

the information that you need . So

16:21

once you're playing it back to the business or playing

16:23

back to senior executive , kind of nail

16:25

it down and really condensed passion

16:27

that they can understand and digest it . So

16:30

it's a complex skill if you want , and you know just

16:32

like architecture is like a black magic

16:34

. You know what I ?

16:35

mean , yeah Well , you know we're hoping

16:37

to take that magic away and turn it into

16:39

more of a science , but you know , let's see where

16:41

we go . I

16:44

always figure , if they can teach people to save lives

16:46

in an ER , they can teach people to be a freaking

16:48

architect , you know . Like come on . So

16:52

here's a question I have for you . Then how

16:55

do you avoid that imposter

16:59

syndrome , that imposter feeling ? How

17:01

do you avoid losing

17:03

your depth over

17:05

time while maintaining that

17:07

scope level ?

17:10

Well , I mean , obviously you know the college

17:12

changes all the time . There's no way you can

17:15

get up to speed all the time , so

17:17

you need to be letting

17:20

go of a bit of the detail and rely

17:22

on the people . So really gets down to

17:25

less technique of skills

17:27

but more human skills in terms of

17:29

communication skills and understand

17:31

talking . Sitting down

17:34

with the you know the technical person , admit

17:36

that you don't know anything and you're really

17:38

dumb and you want to understand what is going on

17:40

in an easy way . You can , you know , play back

17:42

to the business . So you have to be

17:44

a little bit of you know humility and

17:46

when you approach them that way , you're not trying

17:48

to show that

17:51

you are more powerful because you have a title

17:53

or you know more things . Then

17:55

they kind of open up and try to give

17:57

you you know the essence of

17:59

what the issue is , versus trying to you

18:01

know , cover you with some

18:03

terms of taking yourself that

18:05

you don't understand .

18:09

Well , I always found , I always found that

18:11

if I brag about my architects

18:14

, my other architects , they're

18:16

more than they do , that , in

18:18

fact , sometimes they're just , you know it's like

18:20

. Now I want to just talk about

18:22

how , you know , bradley Cooper

18:25

did this data architecture . It's

18:27

absolutely brilliant it's , you know , it

18:29

really hits on all the key elements

18:31

of our you know , our relational

18:33

data , our

18:35

non-relational data . We've got unstructured

18:38

data in there . We've been able to use

18:40

Metabubble , you know , and really really

18:42

play up that person that you're

18:45

almost like a megaphone for their excellence

18:47

, right in a way , which

18:50

then , of course , like you talked about

18:52

already , humility , but

18:54

at the same time and this , I think , is a

18:57

struggle , I know it's a struggle for me on

19:02

a regular basis which is , as you

19:04

get a certain amount of

19:07

you know away from the technology

19:09

, I

19:11

am still convinced that

19:14

there is a certain point you stop being

19:16

an architect anymore because you can't hold

19:18

your own in a regular

19:20

level solution , a regular

19:23

level architect engagement anymore

19:25

, and so you're not credible . There's

19:28

a certain amount of time that a I don't know

19:30

an accountant stops

19:32

being an accountant or a doctor stops being a doctor

19:34

, right , where they're just not a doctor

19:36

anymore and you don't want them to operate on you

19:38

, right ? So what do

19:40

you think about that ? How do you navigate

19:43

that channel ? Do you just get enough by osmosis

19:45

, is it ?

19:47

I think once you've seen

19:49

a lot of , you know at the end of the day there's always going to be new

19:51

technology around the corner . Yeah , that's

19:53

the thing . But I think

19:56

once you've seen a

19:59

lot of new technologies coming through , at

20:01

the end of the day the options

20:03

are always the same . It might be one

20:06

technology versus another technology , but

20:08

at the end of the day you know the complexity

20:10

of putting in a new technology versus using existing

20:13

one . When

20:15

you want to boil it down to a senior exec , that's

20:18

more than enough , I mean .

20:21

All right , do you get challenged

20:23

in , though ? Because a

20:25

lot of what you said was this is about decisions

20:27

. There

20:33

are some really important decisions

20:35

and , quite frankly , some of them are so

20:37

nuanced technically that

20:40

you really don't want

20:42

an idiot making them . I

20:45

mean , there's decisions about airplane aerodynamics

20:47

that I don't want an executive of Boeing

20:50

to make .

20:52

There's different levels of decision .

20:53

If you're talking about this , I didn't mean to

20:56

use Boeing there . Oops

20:59

, sorry guys , anyway

21:06

, so I'm sorry .

21:08

What level of decision we're talking about ? Obviously

21:11

the low level detail . You want to really

21:13

work with the

21:15

designers or the engineering teams to make

21:17

those kind of decisions . You need to involve an

21:19

anxiety for that . But what I'm talking

21:21

about at this moment the program level stuff is

21:24

that when you are impacting multiple streams

21:26

of work , then the decisions

21:28

are that level where

21:31

you might want to go tactical

21:33

on some solutions

21:35

versus going more strategic . It really gets

21:37

down the day how much

21:40

money versus how much risk you're willing

21:42

to cope with . There's

21:44

technical decisions

21:46

behind that , but this is more

21:49

like direction kind of decision where

21:51

the senior executive

21:53

needs to lead the way

21:55

in terms of where he wants to go . I'm

21:57

not talking about low level decisions where obviously you wouldn't

22:00

get a senior executive . Even sometimes they kind of want

22:02

to do that . Unfortunately

22:04

, when they do that , then it's like six

22:06

weeks of running around trying to

22:08

turn that around , because

22:11

they kind of make up the mind that

22:13

that's the way to go and because they've done it

22:15

before or someone on the airplane

22:17

told them that that's the way to do it , and

22:19

then now you slowly have to go

22:22

around and try to combine , get

22:24

his people on board with

22:26

this . Maybe not the right way of doing it and slowly

22:28

get these people to talk to , to the person . So

22:31

they slowly maybe

22:33

they also a bit of ego , because they said

22:35

that in a big forum from other executives

22:37

and now , slowly , you have to

22:39

go back . It can not

22:42

look bad . They change the decision

22:44

but slowly influence the

22:47

facts in a way that now turns out that maybe

22:49

there's a better option as opposed to

22:51

what they initially thought .

22:54

Well , so let's talk then about

22:56

that . How did you get , how did you

22:58

first start building that credibility

23:01

with sort of the non-technical

23:03

audience , with your business stakeholders , with

23:05

executives , etc . How did you start to generate

23:08

, develop those skills and develop

23:10

that part of your career ?

23:12

Well , obviously it's a lot about sitting

23:15

down with them , understanding where they're

23:17

coming from and understanding the business

23:20

. Obviously , you need to be credible in understanding the

23:22

business . If you speak the language

23:24

, you're not credible . On

23:26

the other hand , it's also showing that you

23:28

are there to effectively representing

23:31

technology to help them . You're

23:33

not there to try to build your

23:35

toys . Sometimes

23:38

they look at you as here you go , they're coming

23:40

with their shiny toys and want to implement all this

23:42

little technology because they want to play

23:44

with it . So it's really having the business

23:46

acumen and showing that you

23:49

are effectively a

23:51

business executive on

23:53

technology side and you're representing technology

23:56

and you're at that

23:58

level . So they understand

24:00

that if they want to follow what you're saying

24:02

, then there could be some help

24:04

with the enterprise . You're making

24:06

good for the enterprise . But if there are

24:08

some business drivers that at that point

24:10

in time lead you other

24:13

way , which is usually

24:15

less cost effective but

24:17

more tactical solutions

24:19

, then you really need to sit down and have all

24:21

these risks that they need to be aware

24:24

of and make sure

24:26

that the people that are going to wear the risk are

24:28

also involved in that decision so you don't

24:30

come across as the techie

24:32

coming in with the technologies and want to implement

24:35

their tools . So

24:37

it takes a little bit of time . You

24:40

need to pick your battles because obviously sometimes

24:43

you have to let go some

24:46

things to build that report . But

24:48

then that allows you to

24:50

have the conversation and build up that report when

24:53

there's actually stuff on high stakes

24:56

, on some decisions where you

24:58

really don't want to let them go .

25:02

So what you're saying then is you dive into their language , you

25:06

understand what they value , you then learn

25:08

to communicate what

25:11

impacts on those value

25:13

elements that you

25:15

have from decisions , technical or non-technical

25:18

, that are being made as a part of that program , and

25:22

then you communicate those high level points , giving

25:25

kind of clear demarcation between options . Correct

25:28

that's right . Yes , yes , great

25:31

point . Okay , how

25:33

much of that does it take before they just start believing

25:35

you ? If

25:38

I don't want to know , just tell me what to

25:40

do .

25:41

They never believe you because they always see you

25:43

as an accurate , so you wouldn't

25:46

get when they start julking about

25:48

you being an accurate , you're doing something

25:50

right .

25:51

Okay , okay , so it's the British

25:53

way . As soon as they start making fun of you then

25:55

they like you .

25:56

Okay , okay , I get it now .

26:01

Okay . So what I

26:03

mean do you ? Where

26:06

do you see this role emerging

26:09

in relation to the other roles

26:11

of architect in kind of like

26:13

you know , especially as you go from group to group

26:15

or assignments with Simon or whatnot , you see a lot

26:17

of different titles out there , at

26:21

least 100 plus titles . I've seen

26:23

the numbers as high as 140 , something

26:25

different architect titles out there

26:27

. How do you navigate that jungle of

26:29

you know , just with architects

26:31

much less ? How would you describe your

26:33

roles with the other big

26:36

, important stakeholders in

26:38

these programs ?

26:40

Yes , so how do I see the program

26:42

accurate in relation to the other roles

26:44

?

26:45

Yeah .

26:46

Yeah , how are you seeing this ? It's

26:50

not a BAU role , obviously . It's

26:53

a temporary role that gets set up as

26:55

together with the big program that

26:57

gets allocated big budget . So

26:59

it's a temporary function . Therefore

27:02

it needs to interact with all the existing

27:05

, you know , architecture team that looks after

27:07

you know , the BAU , if you want . So you need to interact

27:09

with the enterprise . I kid is you need to

27:11

domain I kid is . Draw

27:13

from the existing pool of social I kid

27:15

is , which will be allocated to your program . Draw

27:18

from the existing pool of infrastructure

27:20

and data and security I kid

27:22

is present in the organization and

27:24

by human you might end up having more

27:26

I kid is just to fulfill the need , more

27:29

I kids and more they

27:32

have working large programs . So they are know

27:34

how to deal with large programs versus usually

27:37

be your kids might have done like more

27:39

BAU projects or maybe smaller projects

27:42

. So you end up , you know , getting subcontractors

27:44

on your team . But

27:46

then you obviously need to engage with the

27:48

enterprise . I kid it because a

27:51

large piece of work you want

27:53

to try to do as much as possible

27:56

of what's on target state and

27:59

therefore we need to align with the enterprise . I kid

28:01

is you need to work with business I kid is because

28:03

there's new processes , they need to be defined

28:05

and how the business , business operating models

28:08

that need to be defined , and

28:10

doing I kid is as well . So this

28:13

is a temporary role to

28:15

achieve a specific outcome of a large program

28:18

and it needs to interact with all the

28:20

existing you know I

28:22

kid rules on the organization

28:24

already and obviously I'm talking about

28:26

large organization which have a quite a mature

28:28

I kid should practice in place . Right

28:32

, it's kind of less pretty much the context

28:34

.

28:36

Okay , well , you know , these

28:38

things go fast . I've got 25 or other

28:40

things I want to talk to you about . Okay

28:43

, well , I , unfortunately I

28:45

don't , I can't ask you 24 more

28:48

things . So I'm going to say

28:50

let's end this with a

28:52

quick . What are your top three

28:54

things that architects should be focused

28:57

on for the coming 12 months

28:59

?

29:00

12 months .

29:01

Okay , so I'm not going to say artificial intelligence

29:04

, oh

29:07

, please don't , I'm not going to say that

29:09

I'm

29:11

going to say how you can take all your experience and

29:13

somehow make it apply to

29:15

an artificial intelligence . Yeah

29:18

, it's an AI system . Okay , we got that one .

29:22

All right , next 12 months , what should be an accurate

29:24

be looking at ? Well

29:27

, I think it's I . I

29:30

like the idea to work

29:32

on the soft skills a lot , so

29:34

that's a big thing for me and

29:39

I think that's a good thing for me Because

29:41

it's an accurate . You're the middle where , if you want to

29:43

the company , you have to talk with different people

29:45

. So

29:48

commission skills is always a good thing

29:50

that I guess should be messing

29:53

in . That's number one . Number

29:55

two is understanding more about the business , so develop a

29:57

business acumen . And

30:02

the third one is knowing what's happening in the market . And

30:09

I'm not talking about technology

30:11

or really talking about the market

30:13

, reading the news , because that shows that you are on top of what's

30:16

the environment and the context around you and

30:20

you really be like really , really with your business execs

30:22

, instead of just talking about the latest technology , which

30:24

you know everybody can read . I think you show that you have a business

30:26

acumen , you're aware what's happening in

30:28

the market , so

30:33

you're not asking for a stupid amount of money when you know that

30:36

the market is not going well , you know . These are

30:38

things that I would recommend Arquitis

30:43

to look into in the next 12 months . It's

30:48

the human and what the market is

30:50

doing Wonderful Well . Thank you so much , stefano .

30:53

No problem at all . My pleasure and

30:58

for those of you who enjoyed this

31:00

podcast , you will enjoy a lot more is talk at the

31:03

build conference . You

31:06

can find that on the ISO

31:08

website or as part of

31:10

our mighty networks , or link

31:12

to it from the build website . They

31:15

should be up in the next week or so . So

31:18

there , so thank you

31:20

so much . And thank you , guys for

31:22

the next effort , joining the latest installment of the argument

31:24

. The

31:27

next installment will be the kickoff

31:29

session from the chief architect . The chief

31:31

architect leaders this

31:35

will be Grant Eckert and

31:38

Brian Chambers , I believe in this case

31:40

will be edit will be publishing their first

31:42

chief architect broadcast on the argument . So

31:45

for those of you waiting for the next episode , that one will be

31:47

uploaded to the next few days . So thank you again , stefano

31:49

, and we'll catch you next time . Thank

31:55

you both .