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Richard Fisher
Verified Expert in Engineering
Solution Architect and Developer
Irving, TX, United States
Toptal member since September 21, 2020
Richard is a seasoned technology leader experienced in enterprise financial and B2B/B2C web development, customer relationship and call center solutions, and manufacturing applications. Richard is adept at modeling and optimizing business processes, architectural standards, and mission-critical environments and building high-performing teams in heavily regulated environments.
Portfolio
Experience
- Team Leadership - 15 years
- Data Modeling - 15 years
- IT Project Management - 10 years
- Solution Architecture - 10 years
- Software Design - 10 years
- Project Management - 10 years
- Agile - 10 years
- Enterprise Application Architecture - 3 years
Availability
Preferred Environment
Business Process Modeling, Data Modeling, Web App Deployment, Software Development, Solution Architecture, Enterprise Architecture, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google Cloud
The most amazing...
...thing I've done was plan and architect the rewrite and migration of over 30 legacy apps.
Work Experience
Technical Lead
Major Materials Manufacturer (Managed Delivery)
- Managed and led a team to re-engineer and translate a legacy materials manufacturing modeling application to a modern web and service-based language and architecture in AWS.
- Performed deep analysis of the legacy system to determine the most appropriate target architecture and the fastest, lowest risk, iterative approach.
- Pioneered an innovative approach to automated translation and black-box testing to ensure maximum consistency of old and new systems.
- Presented black-box testing methodology to company staff as part of a brown bag session.
- Documented system integration data structures to facilitate future service development.
Principal Enterprise Architect
Elevance Health
- Led a year-long project to ensure Google Cloud complies with enterprise InfoSec standards and frameworks (HIPAA, PCI-DSS, SOC2, SOX). There were over 200 detailed requirements, including architecture, infrastructure, development, and operations.
- Championed and led the effort to move several software projects to open source. Worked with different enterprise stakeholders to implement governance, technical review, and approval processes.
- Evaluated, recommended, and architected technologies to address organizational needs, identify and mitigate risk, and allow seamless delivery.
- Participated in organizational strategy meetings to define a roadmap for the overall product suite, including timeline, features, and technical feasibility.
- Used Python 3 to analyze population healthcare trends. Helped identify storage strategies to improve the performance of data analysis when manipulating extremely large datasets.
- Helped define core features and data architecture for a partnership with Google to allow integration of Elevance data with Google Search in a secure, compliant way.
- Defined the Identity Access Management pattern used across the company, using OAuth and integrating with the enterprise Active Directory. Built a TypeScript POC to demonstrate command-line authentication.
- Helped architect an AI application development sandbox, a controlled environment allowing partners to build and test AI applications using proprietary data and common services in a secure, compliant way.
- Assisted in architecting an application development and hosting environment that allowed internal and external partner developers to build applications using a common set of data, security, integration, and utility services in a secure, compliant way.
Development Manager | Enterprise Architect
Anthem
- Managed an Agile development team to create a public website with associated back-end services using React, Node.js, and GraphQL, with a Postgres database. Interviewed and hired new team members, including QA, developers, and project managers.
- Architected the web portal and its integration with multiple additional back-end systems and SaaS services, such as Salesforce, Strapi (open-source CMS), Geofencing, etc. Evaluated and selected software tools and vendors for use on the website.
- Liaisoned the business to help identify and prioritize different business goals and map them to IT capabilities. Negotiated the conflicts arising from Waterfall's business practices and an Agile development team.
- Performed the detailed back-end analysis and design to ensure accurate implementation of business requirements. Implemented consistent governance to ensure appropriate reviews and approvals, compatible with a Fortune 30 company.
- Liaisoned with an enterprise governance organization, which included enterprise architecture, data governance, and legal, to socialize and obtain approvals for preferred software solutions. Ensured compliance and managed risk for the platform.
Enterprise Solution Architect
Southwest Airlines
- Architected and presented an overall solution roadmap to executive leadership for a new product offering. The budget was over $44 million, and the business impact was projected to be over $1 billion.
- Defined high-level functional specifications, app and infrastructure strategy, and non-functional requirements for a major product initiative. Presented and received management approval for a product, with functional and non-functional validation.
- Presented and received approval for application modifications, non-functional requirements, and testing approaches for multiple projects to reduce technical debt and enhance product offerings.
- Defined reference architectures that will be used as patterns and best practices for future development. Particularly active in the cloud batch process reference architecture.
- Defined requirements and patterns to integrate with Amadeus GDS ticketing platform.
- Specified and designed APIs to expose new or enhanced software capabilities and allow integration from other components. Ensured that existing APIs were utilized in a sustainable and correct manner.
Enterprise Solution Architect
Airbus
- Analyzed and designed complex, transformational, enterprise-wide systems, including requirements, application and infrastructure, non-functional requirements, security, support, governance, and operational requirements.
- Led the architectural process to develop a POC for an intranet app for rapid report and dashboard creation using data from subsidiaries and divisions. This highly successful system was eventually industrialized and extended to other business units.
- Analyzed and evaluated hands-free, voice-controlled smart glasses as a POC for use in Airbus's component repair shop to allow part inspection. The hands-free SAP client resulted in a 43% reduction in part inspection time.
- Defined the standards and templates for solution architectures in the North American region. The standards were based on French standards but customized to reflect the different needs of our development teams.
- Built the solution architecture to implement SAP in Airbus Americas' Canadian helicopter warehousing and repair operations.
Director of OEM Technology Delivery (Product Management)
ABIA, Inc. (now Re-vive)
- Helped launch a startup BI company and develop new business, including product and professional services.
- Defined the OEM white-labeling strategy for managed service provider (MSP) clients and modeled client business processes, detailed requirements (user stories, tasks, acceptance criteria), and architectural and application design recommendations.
- Strategized regarding competitors' strengths and weaknesses, as well as best approaches to marketing ABIA's strengths relative to the competition.
Chief Architect | CTO | IT Director
Careington International
- Analyzed the existing system to build comprehensive data, applications, and infrastructure documentation. Defined a transformation roadmap to migrate the business from a monolithic service-based application to a microservice architecture.
- Directed the effort to successfully increase PCI-DSS compliance from Merchant Level 4 to PCI Service Provider Level 1 compliance on a highly accelerated schedule (less than a year).
- Designed the necessary infrastructure improvements necessary to speed delivery and improve system availability by 80% (99.5% to 99.9%), including support of increased call center hours.
- Rearchitected a database to provide a single source of truth. Architected a data environment to include a production transactional database, passive failover database, separate reporting database, and non-prod databases for testing purposes.
- Managed relationships with vendors and offshore development teams, including ASP.NET development, testing, and reporting. Managed the evaluation, design, and contract negotiation for a new web hosting environment.
- Built an IT-specific project management team (PMO) to improve accountability, schedule, and budget performance. The project management model was based on Agile development with the eventual goal of implementing DevOps.
- Designed and implemented a disciplined, structured software development lifecycle (SDLC) using Microsoft .NET and ALM tools (Microsoft TFS, Visual Studio).
Solution Architect
American Airlines
- Planned and architected the rewrite and migration of 30+ legacy apps (ASP, ASP.NET, SQL Server). Re-architected apps and new web services, upgraded SQL Server 2008 to 2012, and integrated with back-end systems (SAP, T&A, and operational systems).
- Analyzed COTS learning management systems with respect to AA's business and technical requirements. Included multiple competing business units in analysis. The system was critical for compliance, including mission-critical FAA/DOT qualifications.
- Architected an app to manage medical-related processes using Documentum, reducing paper processed by approximately 300,000 pages/year, streamlining processes, and eliminating 1.5 FTE positions. Designed security and HIPAA compliance features.
- Promoted design and code reviews within our department to ensure adherence to enterprise standards and the architecture as designed.
- Championed the integration of DevOps, including continuous integration using Jenkins, Maven, and Ant, and automated testing using NUnit.
- Participated in an enterprise-wide architectural review board that reviewed architecture that spanned multiple business units. Evaluated non-functional requirements and recommended alternatives to improve them.
- Served as an internal subject matter expert in the Agile methodology and the architectural standards, policies, and best practices for architecture in the transition from a Waterfall methodology.
Experience
Service Provider Level 1 PCI Compliance
Project Tasks:
• Implemented a formal SDLC based on NIST secure software engineering standards.
• Designed and implemented strictly segregated production and non-production environments, including the generation of sanitized databases for development and testing purposes. This required the redesign of both the company LAN and the external hosting environments to strictly enforce segregation.
• Managed multiple external consultants and vendors in order to accelerate the effort.
• Managed the risks associated with company-wide infrastructure work.
• Identified and mitigated multiple application vulnerabilities.
• Extensively documented the necessary HR and disaster recovery (DR) policies and procedures.
Cloud-based Visual Management Dashboard Pilot and Industrialization
COBOL to Visual Basic Conversion
My responsibilities included an analysis of business logic, integration of file formats, transformation of the existing code structure, and the eventual migration of code to VB.NET.
Education
Master's Degree in Business Administration (MBA)
University of Texas at Dallas - Richardson, TX, United States
Master of Science Degree in Systems Engineering and Management
University of Texas at Dallas - Richardson, TX, United States
Bachelor of Science Degree in Computer Science
University of Texas at Dallas - Richardson, TX, United States
Certifications
Certified Disciplined Agilist (CDA)
Project Management Institute (PMI)
Project Management Professional (PMP)
Project Management Institute (PMI)
Professional Scrum Master I (PSM-I)
Scrum.org
Skills
Libraries/APIs
Node.js, React, Google Cloud API
Tools
TFS, Microsoft Visio, ChatGPT, Jira, HoloLens, Auth0, GCP Security
Languages
Visual Basic 6 (VB6), Fortran, C#, VB.NET, Python 3, Python, COBOL, JavaScript, Java, GraphQL, TypeScript, CSS, CSS4, HTML, HTML4, HTML5, C++, Visual Basic
Frameworks
ActiveX, .NET, Next.js
Paradigms
Requirements Analysis, Agile, Scrum, Database Design, COM+, App Development, KISS, DRY, Fundamental Design Principles, Management, Non-functional Testing, Application Lifecycle Management (ALM), Application Architecture, Enterprise Application Architecture, B2B, API Architecture, Microservices, Microservices Architecture, Continuous Integration (CI), Continuous Delivery (CD), DevOps, Mobile Development, Enterprise Application Integration (EAI), Automation, HIPAA Compliance, B2C
Platforms
Windows, CA SiteMinder, Jakarta EE, Android, Alteryx, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Docker, Google Cloud Platform (GCP)
Industry Expertise
Project Management, Healthcare, Lean Six Sigma
Storage
SQL Server 2012, Database Architecture, SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS), PostgreSQL, Database Security, Database Modeling, SQL Server 2010, Amazon S3 (AWS S3), Google Cloud
Other
IT Project Management, Software Design, Solution Architecture, User Requirements, Requirements & Specifications, Data Modeling, System Requirements, Software Development, Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC), Team Leadership, Business Rules, Architecture, COM, DCOM, Legacy Software, Legacy Code, Technical Leadership, Thought Leadership, Enterprise SaaS, Software Architecture, Software System Architecture Development, APIs, Technical Analysis, API Integration, Development, Code Review, Source Code Review, Back-end Development, Design Principles, Technical Diagrams, Technical Documentation, White Papers, Systems Engineering, Risk Models, Scope Management, Scrum Master, Product Management, Business Requirements, IIS 7, Web Services, Regulatory Compliance, Requirements, IIS, Web App Deployment, Business Process Modeling, COTS, Governance, Enterprise Architecture, Team Management, IT Governance, Business Transformation, Digital Transformation, Cost Estimation, Project Scoping, Lean Project Management, Project Scheduling, Writing & Editing, Offshore Team Management, Offshore Development, Advisory, Lean IT, IT Systems Engineering, CTO, Technical Product Management, Technical Program Management, Agile Leadership, Leadership, Full-stack, Software QA, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), eCommerce, User Interface (UI), User Experience (UX), PMO Development, Web Development, Cloud, Roadmaps, Product Roadmaps, OpenAI, Architectural Design, Architectural Patterns, Architectural Modeling, SaaS, SaaS Product Management, SaaS Design, Software as a Service (SaaS), Separation of Concerns (SoC), COBOL Batch, Delivery Management, Engineering Management, Privacy, Data Privacy, Security, AWS DevOps, Startups, Certified ScrumMaster (CSM), IT Infrastructure, PCI DSS, Operations, Vendor Management, Infrastructure Architecture, Security Architecture, Technical Reference Models (TRM), Active Directory Synchronization, Tableau Server, SAP, Estimations, Project Budget Management, Finance, Enterprise, Authorization, Single Sign-on (SSO), Open Source, Compliance, PCI Compliance, Business to Consumer (B2C), Technical Architecture, OpenAI GPT-3 API, OpenAI GPT-4 API, Large Language Models (LLMs), Cloud Architecture, AWS Cloud Architecture, Cloud Patterns, Artificial Intelligence (AI)
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