17Steering a Global SI + ISVs — One Architecture, One Plan, On-Schedule Delivery
Led a global SI and ISV delivery under one architecture — rollout kept on schedule
Role: Technical Lead / Partner Manager
Executive summary
Managed and integrated partners and ISVs across enterprise delivery—onboarding them to Azure reference patterns and acting as a quality gate; the flagship was an insurance data-platform rollout where I owned architecture while a global systems integrator built the ETL under it.
- Microsoft Fabric
- Microsoft Purview
- Azure
- SharePoint / Teams
Large implementations depend on partners or ISVs delivering specialized work on Azure, and their execution drifts without architectural anchoring. In the flagship case—an insurance data-platform rollout—a global systems integrator owned the ETL build while I owned the overall solution architecture, with delivery quality and timeline riding on two external teams producing one coherent result.
- Identify the right partner resources for a project (consulting partner for a pilot, ISV plug-in such as data quality).
- Onboard partners with context, architecture guidelines and Azure best practices so contributions fit.
- Coordinate throughout: joint calls, unblocking partners on Azure, ensuring security/performance standards.
- Evaluate partner output and provide feedback as a Microsoft-side quality gate.
On the insurance rollout I split ownership explicitly: the SI built the ETL, I held the architecture, and a joint weekly triage call plus a shared SharePoint for designs and code kept both sides working from the same blueprint. When the SI hit issues integrating with Purview, I facilitated a working session with the engineering team behind the failing integration to resolve it directly—getting the two sides in one room rather than trading tickets. I have also integrated ISVs—e.g., a market-data feed API into a Fabric solution—maintaining a single unified project plan and frequent stakeholder updates with the same quality gate: no partner component reaches the customer environment without meeting the security/performance bar first.
The insurance rollout kept its timeline with the SI''s ETL delivered to the architecture spec, and once unblocked, partner progress resumed against the shared plan. Customers experienced a "one team" delivery rather than a Microsoft/partner seam. The integrated ISV market-data feed went in without a separate integration track, and leverage of partner slots let the account carry concurrent projects that would not otherwise have fit—and built a recurring network of trusted partners for future work.
Managing partners is leadership through influence rather than direct control—and the Purview unblock taught me the specific move — when a partner is stuck, the fastest fix I've seen is pulling their engineers and ours into one working session instead of shipping tickets. Clear communication of objectives and architecture keeps everyone building to the same design. Respecting partner expertise and supporting their success multiplies impact.