How often we see people who do not have much idea about the technology or a product or have hands on, get into positions of decision while the actual role is played by someone else? How do you Balance “Position” and “Role” of an Architect?
Before going further, Read more about Becoming an Architect – A Career Roadmap
Have you ever noticed in a team or organization, there are one set of people who are busy doing their work required for day to day activities of a project while some a focusing to showcasing their skills in such a way that would in most cases be exaggeration of their work ,while former lack skills to represent their work (innovative work in most cases) while the latter group of people exaggerate even a minor achievements.
While the one group get the “Role” they want to play, and others get the “Position” they aspire.
Let’s deep dive into the Position vs Role dilemma and understand how you can aspire tp achieve a balance of Position and Role
Understand “Position” and “Role”
In an organization, there are 2 types of people, one who have positions and other who play the role without the position, while position depends on your ability to maintain a right image (in some cases the perception) irrespective of results,
The people who prefer the “Role” solely focuses on “What is Right and Needed” irrespective of how it may impact his/her position. How this is indirectly making organizations to Lets deep dive into both before deciding which one to focus on
How does Position vs Role impact the Organization?
The one with skills and knowledge, how this impact the organization. This difference in position and the role is important to understand and learn for you to plan accordingly whether you want to focus on getting to a particular position or perform the role.
And again, not all are built with skills to play the position while not all can play the role. Each require a set of skills that are unique to them, and you can focus
Playing the Role – Skills needed to build
In order to the “Role” you need to have the skills of Envision, planning, execution of the solution.
Envisioning solution
This involves building skill to think through a solution and provide logical, block representation of your solution. You will focus on learning skills such as OOAD, Design Thinking, DDD, BDD and other frameworks helping to build complex solutions to solve a problem.
Planning the solution
Once envision, you will also need to build skills required to plan the implementation of the solution. Skills include learning planning processes such as Agile, Scrum, Waterfall and other approach with their Pros/Cons.
Execution of the solution
You will also need to learn skills, tools and processes required to execute the solution. This is to ensure the execution is in line to the original envisioned solution,
Playing the Position – Skills needed to build
You will be able to play the position of an architect, the skills required are entirely different:
Collaboration
One of the key skills you need to learn, when playing the position is the collaboration. Collaborating with other architects playing the role of architect to ensure the right solution is being designed.
Decision Making
Ability to decide when there is competing ideas or solution is next one you need to have.
Articulation
another skill you need to focus on is the ability to articulate the design, plan and execution of the solution to various stakeholders. The stakeholders will have their own motives and point of view that you need to understand and articulate how the solution provides the same.
Conclusion
Should you focus on Position, Role – How can you balance both so that organizations can get better ROI by allowing technical teams to play the role and position.
