As an IT person, there are many career paths that you may take. One of these is becoming a software architect.
In simple terms, a software architect is someone with strong technical background and understanding who makes design choices and dictates technical standards.
There are no clear criteria that define this role, and the responsibilities that might be assigned to a software architect differ from company to company based on the need. However, some of the basic responsibilities of a software architect may include:
- designing software specific architectures based on the received requirements;
- choosing the tech stack for each component;
- making decisions based on the protocols used for how components should interact with each other;
- reviewing codes;
- writing project documentation;
- creating a unified development standard across a department or entire company.
Things are constantly evolving in the technology industry, so software architecture is largely a professional activity in which there are various specializations. Therefore, nowadays, there are more types of software architects, some of them being:
- system architects
- solution architects
- cloud architects
- application architects
- enterprise architects
These titles can differ as the boundaries are not that clear between each of them.
Let’s focus on the enterprise architect role, which can be seen as the highest in an organization, based on the area it covers.
Enterprise Architects – What Do They Do?
As an enterprise architect, your activity impacts the development of the entire company.
Unlike the other roles mentioned in this article, the range of communication for this role is not at the team or project level but rather across the entire organization. Plus the interaction with the systems is highly abstract.
At the same time, someone in this role will most likely not interact with the code because their responsibilities are to determine the needs of a range of business units and processes.
It is a role that requires strong communication and analytical skills to ensure that business units have the right tools to succeed.
An enterprise architect's role can be hard to obtain, especially because a person in this role needs to know about most software architect positions. Below are some certificates to help you make a good impression and validate or help you gain the knowledge needed for this position:
Cato Networks SASE Expert Certification
SASE (Secure Access Service Edge) is a new enterprise networking technology category that was introduced in 2019. This new architecture converges the functions of network and security point solutions into a unified, global cloud-native service.
A certificate for this architecture is provided by Cato Networks, which is the world’s first SASE platform through the SASE Expert Level 1 Certification. It covers all SASE essentials, making it a really good option for someone just getting started in this field. It takes about 3-5 hours to complete and is self-paced, so all you need is a weekend!
AWS Certified Solutions Architect
As an enterprise architect, you interact with the entire development process within your organization.
For example, your opinion might be most important when an organization decides which cloud provider to use to build its solutions. To be confident in your own opinion, you need to know the pros and cons of each service provider: how much they will impact the overall cost and how difficult or easy they are to use and integrate.
AWS is one such cloud provider, one might say the global leader in cloud computing. Their range of solutions is wide, as they cover most of the needs that an organization may have, but to become competent in all of them requires practice.
They offer the AWS Certified Solution Architect certificate to validate the knowledge of how to architect and deploy secure and robust applications on AWS technologies. This certificate is not for the basic level and requires at least six months of experience. While this isn’t mandatory, it is a recommendation that you should consider.
ITIL Master Certification
Another certificate that you can consider is the Axelos ITIL Master certification.
ITIL is a popular IT management framework used by enterprise architects to help manage service processes. A certificate about the same to validate your knowledge in this tool can be a key asset to your resume. This certificate is provided by Axelos which is a global provider of certification and quality assessment systems in a wide range of software development areas.
ITIL Master is the highest ITIL certification that can be acquired and to be eligible for it participants must obtain ITIL Expert certification.
Red Hat Certified Architect
Red Hat Enterprise Linux is the world’s leading platform for Linux. Therefore knowledge of it and a certificate to validate this knowledge can be a great asset in acquiring the position of an enterprise architect.
The certificate they offer is Red Hat Certified Architect, which includes the Red Hat Certified Engineer (RHCE), Red Hat Certified Enterprise Microservices Developer (RHCEMD), and Red Hat Certified JBoss Developer (RHCJD), which is the highest certification tier.
As this certificate is the highest certification provided by Red Hat, the path to obtaining it is pretty tricky. You need to have at least five additional certifications chosen from the system administrator and developer path.
There are in total about 20 exams that you can give to qualify for the Red Hat Certified Architect.
Because each exam is valid for three years, you need to complete five exams in the 3-year-period to complete this certificate.
Conclusion
Like any other position related to software architecture, the job of an enterprise architect involves a lot of work, experience in various technologies, and soft skills. These skills are often too difficult and complex to show in an interview. That’s why certificates can give you a helping hand as they are an official and documented way to show your skills.
A certificate will always be a plus as certificates confirm skills. If the recruiter sees two identical summaries, then his choice will be up to the candidate, who has a certificate confirming his abilities.