Puget Sound Chapter

Chapter News

Upcoming Events

Past Events

 The Puget Sound Chapter Event, Januar 17th 2013

January 17th 2013, the Seattle IASA Chapter & Microsoft Corp. handled a Focus Group (similar to a private debate), discussing about the .NET Platform, its current situation in the market, perceptions and future directions. 

It was a very fruitful discussion and Microsoft also gathered very interesting feedback coming from different points of view, as we had architects who actually work with .NET but other architects work with competing technologies, like Java, Lamp, etc. 

The points we covered were related to the following topics: 

- Your perception of .NET in the market. 
- First thoughts and what terms do you relate .NET with? 
- What topics are you missing in .NET? 
- What are your pain-points when using .NET? 
- What do you like the most about the .NET platform? 
- What would you like to have in .NET for the future? 
- Future directions of .NET explained by Microsoft. 

As .NET Product Manager at Microsoft, I really want to thank you for this fruitful discussion during more than 2 hours during the evening, where we touched many of the most important topics but from different POV and perspectives, which is why it really was beneficial for all of the attendees.

The Puget Sound Chapter Event 2012, February 15th, 2012

The Puget Sound event on February 15th, 2012 was an evening to remember as magnificent wine, coffee and food flowed as freely as the conversations and information at Starbucks HQ for another Puget Sound IASA event. Travis Clayton, the Puget Chapter President, started the evening with Puget Chapter News. Abe Hong, VP of Global Technology at Starbucks graced the main stage with sheer energy as he shared about the technology that exists behind the scenes at Starbucks.  Information about their point of sale system to their infrastructure and cloud solution were all touched upon.

Following Abe's engaging presentation, we were inspired by Miha Kralj, Worldwide Technology Director for Architecture at Microsoft.  Miha led an enthusiastic eye opening conversation on the importance of licensing and accreditation of IT Architects.  The rigorous process to become CITA-P certified was talked about in detail.  The conversation ending with Miha's proposal that In the future we will hold an event with a mock CITA-P board so potential candidates can see firsthand what lies ahead and why CITA-P is something that all Professional IT Architects should strive for as it is far from a rubber stamp designation.

Agenda:    5:00-5:30 pm - Registration, Networking, and Coffee Tasting by Starbucks
                 5:35-6:00 pm - 'Puget Sound Chapter News' - Travis Clayton, PS Chpater President
                 6:00-6:30 pm - 'Licensing and Accredidation of IT Architects: Would you trust an unlicensed doctor or lawyer? How about an unlicensed architect?'- Miha Kralj, Worldwide Director for Architecture at Microsoft
                 7:00-8:00 pm - "Technology Innovation at Starbucks" - Abe Hong, VP of Global Technology at Starbucks

 The Puget Sound Chapter Event

The second Puget Sound Iasa event was an unforgettable evening of great wine, amazing sausage and free flowing conversation amongst Architects and Developers.  Topics ranged from cloud computing and acceptable uptime, to SharePoint and the science of usability and everything in between. Blue Rooster the sponsor of our event rolled out the red carpet and created a very welcoming environment for all of our guests.

 The Puget Sound Chapter Inaugural Event, June 15th 2011

The Puget Sound chapter Inaugural Event June 15th 2011 featured top architects from cloud industry leading organizations like Norm Judah, CITA-P and CTO of Worldwide Services at Microsoft; Pat Cimprich, Chief Architect Infrastructure Solutions at Avanade; Miriam Grace, Enterprise Systems Architect and member of the Boeing Technical Excellence Fellowship; Scott Whitmire, Enterprise Architect at T-Mobile, Ulrich Homann, Chief Architect for Microsoft worldwide enterprise and Wally Danielson Enterprise Architect at Starbucks Coffee Company discuss topics like: Cloud as a key technology for the business, primary applications of PaaS/IaaS/SaaS, challenges of cloud deployments and much more.

Leadership

	Travis Clayton - Chapter President Travis Clayton is an IT Executive with over 15 years of proven leadership, industry, business and architecture experience. As Strategy & Architecture Director at Microsoft, Clayton is responsible for developing and driving large IT transformations and strategic, technical initiatives for Microsoft’s largest enterprise customers. Prior to joining Microsoft in 2008, Clayton held several positions at partners, SIs and ISVs. Clayton founded and led a successful Microsoft Certified Partner where he established and retained relationships with enterprise customers in the financial services, gaming, hospitality, home building and healthcare industries. Prior to that, as CTO of an ISV, Clayton drove technical strategy, developed technical talent and was instrumental in expanding the business globally. Previously, Clayton held positions as an Enterprise Architect in financial services, independent consultant and lead developer at Sage and SalesLogix. Clayton is passionate about developing people and fostering technical communities. Clayton holds multiple certifications including IASA Foundation, ITIL v3, SharePoint 2007 and 2010 MCITP and MCPD as well as a B.S in Computer Science.
	Tom Thomas - Chapter Vice President Tom Thomas has been a professional IT architect with over 15 years experience conceptualizing, designing, building, deploying and maintaining customer focused enterprise data driven applications and systems. Experience working directly with Government, Financial, Real Estate, Hospitality and Retail segments. Expertise in Software Architecture, Information Architecture, project management, team building, database design, SOA, agile development, collaborative development environments, data driven applications, UI/UX design and rapid prototyping. Specialties include: online voting systems, bridging the gap between technical and non-technical stakeholders, cross department initiatives, extracting requirements, simple elegant solutions to complex problems, managing teams and projects for success under tight constraints. Knowledge and experience designing and implementing products and services for both Public and Private sector customers. Thomas is passionate about continuing education and mentoring those with an interest in IT Architecture.
	Ramesh Ganesh - Chapter Board Member Ramesh is the Director of IT enterprise architecture at Starbucks Coffee Company, Seattle. Prior to Starbucks, Ramesh had worked at Nike (1996-98) and MCI. Ramesh is accomplished Senior IT Architecture leader with outstanding record of achievements in retail and distributions business. He is an innovative, results-oriented management professional with over 20 years of visible experience providing leading edge technological solutions. Extensive qualification in all aspects of architecture, development and implementation of enterprise-level ERP/EAI/Custom applications and Infrastructure environments. Ramesh recently completed Executive MBA from the USC Marshall School of Business and has a Bachelor's Degree in Mathematics and Masters in Computer Science from the National Institute of Technology, India