The partner CTOs call when the platform has to actually work.

What I actually do

Most weeks I'm the principal architect on a live engagement — in the planning meetings, writing the ADRs, pairing with the senior engineers, saying the quiet thing out loud when the plan is wrong. Lately the work clusters in three places: modernizing .NET platforms and their integrations on Azure; building the orchestration layer that makes AI safe to put in production — MCP servers, multi-agent systems, governed workflows; and instrumenting delivery so leadership sees the truth in a dashboard instead of a Friday slide deck.

I keep the practice small on purpose. Senior judgment is hard to scale without diluting it, so I don't. The engagements are deeper, the work is direct, and the handoffs are real — your team owns what we built when I leave, not a black box.

Keep It Simple Standard

The working principle, in three words. The simplest architecture that solves the actual problem. The clearest plan that survives the politics. The smallest deliverable that proves the next step. Complexity should be earned, not assumed.

In practice: a 12-page architecture document beats a 120-page one if the 12 are the right ones. A migration in six staged releases beats a "big bang" in eighteen months. A multi-agent system with two trustworthy capabilities beats one with seven half-trustworthy ones. The shape of "simple" changes per engagement; the discipline doesn't.

What I've been near

Industries: media and broadcast, advertising technology, defense, retail and luxury, financial software, and enterprise operations. The tools that come up most: .NET on Azure — App Service, Functions, SQL; Microsoft Fabric and Power BI, including custom React visuals where the stock charts fall short; Entra ID and SharePoint for identity; and Claude, Azure OpenAI, and the Model Context Protocol for the AI work. The constants across all of it are careful sequencing, real observability, and documentation that outlives the engagement.

What I'm not

Not a body shop — engagements are sized to me and a small handpicked team where the work justifies it, not the other way around. Not a slide-deck firm — my deliverables are architecture, code, and shipped systems. Not a fit for everything — if the problem belongs with someone else, I'll tell you on the intro call.

How to engage

Three usual shapes. Architecture engagement — 8–16 weeks, senior architect on a modernization or AI project, transitioning to advisory once it's stable. AI pilot — 4–8 weeks, one orchestrated workflow into production with the patterns your team can extend. Advisory retainer — for clients where the engagement has wrapped but the architecture questions keep coming.

Start with a 30-minute intro. No deck, no scope — just a conversation about what you're trying to ship.