Dave Hendricksen

Senior Architect for Thomson Reuters, Author, and Mentor

Dave Hendricksen

Dave is a senior architect for Thomson Reuters and has worked for Thomson Reuters for over 20 years where his focus is on architecting and delivering enterprise hybrid big data systems.

Dave has written two books with Addison-Wesley, and is currently working on a third:


  • 12 Essential Skills for Software Architects – this book focuses on the soft skills needed by software architects, and has also been translated to Chinese.

  • 12 More Essential Skills for Software Architects – this book focuses on the day to day technical skills needed by software architects.

  • (In Progress) Enterprise Big Data – this book focuses on how to architect and build enterprise big data systems.


    • Dave is also the head coach for the Eagan High School FIRST Robotics program with over 150 students and over 60 mentors. Dave also likes to build things like trebuchets, go carts, and rain barrel watering systems.

Presentations

Enterprise Big Data

Wednesday, 1:30 PM EST

This session will focus on architecting enterprise big data systems. This will include developing a big data architectural perspective, looking at key big data capabilities, how to deal with governance, and other aspects of big data in an enterprise environment including cloud.

Come to this session if you want to learn about architecting and delivering enterprise big data systems.

Big Data by Example

Wednesday, 3:15 PM EST

This session will focus on big data tools. It will take a broad high level look at big data technologies such as Kafka, HBase, HDFS, Spark, Hive, and variety of others. It will also include discussions of AWS big data technologies.

Come to this session if you want to learn more about big data technologies.

Essential Skills for Software Architects

Thursday, 1:30 PM EST

This session will focus on the essential skills that are needed by software architects on a daily basis from ideation to product delivery. For many architects, it’s not the technology related areas that give you problems, but people related areas.

Come to this session if you want to learn some tricks and tips for how to raise your game as an architect.

Books

12 More Essential Skills for Software Architects

by Dave Hendricksen

12 More Essential Skills for Software Architects

  • Master The Crucial Technical Skills Every Software Architect Needs!

     

    To succeed as a software architect, you must master both technical skills and soft skills. Dave Hendricksen illuminated the soft skills in his highly-regarded 12 Essential Skills for Software Architects. Now, in 12 More Essential Skills for Software Architects he turns to the technical side.

     

    Drawing on his decades of experience, Hendricksen organizes technical skills into three areas.

     

    PROJECT SKILLS: driving projects from ideation through delivery
    TECHNOLOGY SKILLS: building, buying, and/or leveraging the right technologies
    VISIONARY SKILLS: realizing an architectural vision that improves long-term competitiveness

     

    He helps you develop and sharpen these key technical skills: from conceptualizing solutions to developing platforms and governance, and from selecting technology innovations to infusing architectures with an entrepreneurial spirit.

     

    This guide reveals the technical skills you need and provides a coherent framework and practical methodology for mastering them.

     

    Taken together, Hendricksen’s two books offer the most complete, practical pathway to excellence in software architecture. They’ll guide you through every step of your architecture career—from getting the right position to thriving once you have it.

     

    Essential Architect Skills

     

    Visionary Skills
    Entrepreneurial Execution
    Technology Innovation
    Strategic Roadmapping

     

    Technology Skills
    Governance
    Platform Development
    Know-how
    Architectural Perspective

     

    Project Skills
    Estimation
    Partnership
    Discovery
    Management
    Conceptualization

     

    Dave Hendricksen is a big data architect for Thomson Reuters, where he works closely with the firm’s new product development teams to create innovative legal products for large-scale online platforms such as Westlaw.com. Hendricksen presented “Designing and Building Large-Scale Systems in an Agile World” at Carnegie Mellon University’s influential Software Engineering Institute. 


12 Essential Skills for Software Architects

by Dave Hendricksen

12 Essential Skills for Software Architects
  • Master the Crucial Non -Technical Skills Every Software Architect Needs!

     

    Thousands of software professionals have the necessary technical qualifications to become architects, but far fewer have the crucial non-technical skills needed to get hired and succeed in this role. In today’s agile environments, these “soft” skills have grown even more crucial to success as an architect. For many developers, however, these skills don’t come naturally–and they’re rarely addressed in formal training. Now, long-time software architect Dave Hendricksen helps you fill this gap, supercharge your organizational impact, and quickly move to the next level in your career.

     

    In 12 Essential Skills for Software Architects, Hendricksen begins by pinpointing the specific relationship, personal, and business skills that successful architects rely upon. Next, he presents proven methods for systematically developing and sharpening every one of these skills, from negotiation and leadership to pragmatism and vision.

     

    From start to finish, this book’s practical insights can help you get the architect position you want–and thrive once you have it!

     

    The soft skills you need…

    …and a coherent framework and practical methodology for mastering them!

     

    Relationship skills

    Leadership, politics, gracious behavior, communication, negotiation

     

    Personal skills

    Context switching, transparency, passion

     

    Business skills

    Pragmatism, vision, business knowledge, innovation