Summary
Scot is an expert level data architect with extensive database system analysis, design, and implementation experience. He is a frequent author and speaker on data architecture topics, a frequent trainer in data modeling techniques, and one of eight people (worldwide) certified to instruct and consult using Object-Role Modeling (ORM), a natural language-based data and business rule analysis and design technique. Scot is also the author of the Orthogonal Toolbox, a free add-on to Visio for Enterprise Architects (see project history for more details).

Scot is skilled in team leadership/mentoring/training, workshop facilitation, acting as a liaison between business users and technical staff, and coordination of offsite (e.g. offshore) development efforts regardless of the chosen development process (e.g. “waterfall”, “agile/extreme”, or other iterative techniques).

Scot has extensive experience in requirements gathering and business rules analysis using a variety of techniques and artifacts, conceptual/logical/physical database modeling in ORM/ER/UML, model validation/business rules traceability analysis, “as-is” vs. “to be” software modeling and gap analysis, and meta-modeling.

Scot has been an integral part of every phase (analysis, design, testing, implementation) of database projects using every common type of data store – transactional (OLTP), data warehouse (Kimball/Inmon), and Data Mart (OLAP).

Scot also has hands on database system construction experience to include stored procedure construction and testing, OLAP cube design and construction, persistence and business logic layer development, extraction/transformation/loading (ETL) design and implementation, report development, database system troubleshooting and performance tuning, database configuration and administration (e.g. DBA tasks), and application testing. Scot also has experience in object-oriented development techniques, user interface design and construction, and web/windows application development in a variety of languages.

In summary, Scot focuses on bridging the “business-technology gap” that seems to appear in many companies by simultaneously acting as a liaison between the two “worlds”, demonstrating/facilitating more formalized business functionality requests, building trust, focusing on delivering business value as quickly as possible, and developing/mentoring technical teams such that they are more aware of business needs and, often, the more advanced analysis/design/development techniques needed to meet those needs.


Project History
Orthogonal Software Corporation
President/Principal Consultant (2001 to Present)

  • CRM System Business Analysis, Staff Development & Mentoring
    Food Company, Business Analysis Mentor, Data Architect
    Led requirements gathering sessions used to form a high level conceptual model for a CRM system to support corporate sales and marketing efforts. Also brought on board to mentor staff developers, analysts, and designers in business analysis techniques to include use cases and ORM.
  • Legacy System Redesign
    State Government, Software Architect
    Analysis and requirements gathering of a legacy system for a large division of the state government as a pre-cursor to an approximately $50MM replacement effort. Activities included use case development, assisting in the development of a candidate enterprise architecture, and general analysis process mentoring.
  • Federal System Interface
    State Government, Data/Software Architect
    Analysis and requirements gathering of a federally mandated system interface for a large division of the state government to eliminate the loss of over $20MM in federal funding. Activities included requirements gathering facilitation and use case development, development of a candidate solution design, general analysis process mentoring, data analysis, and various other analysis/testing tasks in the resulting system.
  • Business Intelligence System
    Behavioral Health Insurance Company, Data Architect
    Analysis and design of extensions to an existing data warehouse/mart business intelligence platform. Work performed includes requirements gathering, design overview documentation, ETL specifications, dimensional modeling, conceptual/logical/physical data modeling, data analysis/troubleshooting, various implementation tasks, and general mentoring.
  • Consumer Web Application
    State Government, Data Architect
    Analysis, design, and construction of an online system for state residents to pay for licensing/registration fees. Work performed includes requirements gathering, writing of use cases and related analysis artifacts, database modeling, design, and construction, stored procedure construction/testing, ETL work, QA, and general data/software architecture consulting.
  • Consulting and Mentoring
    Loan Servicing Company, Data Architecture Mentor
    Consulting, data model validation, and general data architecture mentoring.
  • Legacy System Replacement
    Country Government, Data Architecture Subject Matter Expert
    Analysis and requirements gathering for the replacement of a legacy system that gathers human services-related data. New system will be geared towards improved workflow, metrics, and outcomes, better integration with state systems of record, and improved technical architecture.
  • Analytic Environment Design and Implementation
    Credit Card Company, Data Architect
    Analysis, design, and construction of an ad hoc analytic environment used primarily to determine the profitability of credit card accounts meeting various criteria. The overall architecture included a staging area for the import of disparate legacy file formats, an operational data store aimed at operational reporting, data cleansing and business rule enforcement, and a data mart structure intended for the bulk of the reporting needs upon periodic snapshots of account data. Later stages of the project will include an OLAP component as well as an interactive query environment where users can save account populations of interest to facilitate time-series analysis. Also providing data architecture mentoring, Object-Role Modeling training, and general software architecture guidance.
  • Retail OLAP Reporting Solution
    Retail Kiosk Company, Data Architect
    Analysis, design, and construction of a reporting solution for an interactive, online retail kiosk using kiosk-originated data as well as imported point of sale and inventory data from each retail customer. The company in question is a start-up and as such the work I am performing is subject to tight budget restrictions, aggressive timelines, and requires agility in order to quickly produce reporting functionality that helps drive the closure of product sales.
  • Web Service Solution Platform
    Marketing Services Company, Information Architect
    Business analysis, database design, and XML schema design for a web services solutions platform that delivers marketing services information to internal and external client applications. Duties included conceptual/logical/physical database modeling, business analysis verification, web service design coordination and review, XML schema design, authoring sample web service response/request XML document instances, and assisting the development and QA staff during the implementation phase of each component’s iteration. Also provided data architecture mentoring, Object-Role Modeling training, enterprise-wide RUP deployment assistance, and general software architecture guidance.
  • Enterprise Data Architecture Design and Planning
    Credit Card Company, Data Architect
    Analyzed mainframe SAS data access which included hundreds of SAS programs and just under a thousand input and output files and designed a data architecture strategy to replace that mainframe data access with a staging, operational, mart, and OLAP cube data store architecture. Provided detailed planning and execution steps for that architecture, interviewed staff candidates, made hiring recommendations, and mentored the recommended new hires. The proposed architecture is currently being implemented and I am providing occasional consulting mentoring, and model validation/review services throughout its implementation. Other duties (for other projects in the same department) included assistance in enterprise architecture planning, model review and validation, and data modeling best practice mentoring.
  • Corporate Initiative Consolidation
    Major Manufacturing Company, Data/Software Architect
    Consolidated 4 global corporate initiative databases that track cost-cutting/sales growth efforts. The business problems addressed were: provide a consolidated/accurate view of cost-cutting results when projects span more than one corporate initiative, eliminate redundancy across initiative efforts, integrate cost cutting estimates with corporate finance operational planning, and retain original functionality. Roles performed were business analyst/workshop lead, data architect, software architect, mentor, team lead, and developer. Tasks performed include: Object-Role Modeling of existing (as-is) systems, consolidating the as-is models into a Corporate Initiative Enterprise model, OLTP database design and implementation, persistence/business rules layer stored procedure construction and testing, user interface design, ETL coding, mentoring offshore developers, design and construction of the reporting data marts, OLAP cube construction, report analysis/design/construction, data synchronization with replicated lotus notes databases, ASP driven reports/report generators, and various troubleshooting/performance tuning tasks.
  • Orthogonal Toolbox v1.0 & 1.5
    Orthogonal Software Corporation, Designer/Developer
    Written entirely in C#, this add-on to Visio for Enterprise Architects (as shipped with Visual Studio .Net) extracts ORM\ER meta-data from the largely undocumented COM API into an XML import, provides browsing of model elements, and has ORM model bulk-import facilities. This add-on is used in a number of ways such as generating DDL scripts in Visio Professional, custom data meta-model reporting, custom data repository feeds, generating XML schemas, and as the import mechanism into NORMA, an open source ORM modeling tool currently available as a Community Technology Preview.
  • Six Sigma Project Tracking
    Major Manufacturing Company, Data/Software Architect
    Design and development of a global web-based application to track various process improvement projects that use the Six Sigma method. This system was a reengineering effort combined with many new features. Roles performed were business analyst/workshop lead, data architect, software architect, mentor, and developer. Architectural features include: a Microsoft SQL Server central operational data store (ODS), a Microsoft Analysis Server (OLAP) database with approximately 20 cubes for both static reporting and Ad-Hoc OLAP analysis, distributed Lotus Notes databases for document storage and distribution, synchronization between the Lotus Notes databases and the ODS, extraction/transformation/loading (ETL) for both initial system migration and ongoing reporting across the new and (other) legacy systems, a MDX-based report generator written in Excel/VBA, and business rules enforced via a stored procedure-based persistence layer. Code written included: virtually all ETL scripts, the SQL-based persistence layer, all MDX code, the Excel/VBA report generator, and all views/other data extraction layers. The analysis/databases design was performed using Object-Role Modeling.
  • Advanced Hierarchy Management
    Major Manufacturing Company, Data Architect
    Requirements analysis and design of a corporate web-based application for managing dynamically created hierarchies. Meta model features include: run time tree design and implementation, user-defined attributes of any scope and complexity, ad-hoc tree derivation, dynamic system interfacing, full temporal tracking (of both business and system dimensions), meta-model-defined data validation rules, meta-model-defined queries and extracts, and meta-model-defined linkages between trees. This system also had advanced effective dating and security capabilities. Also authored stored procedures for the entire data access and business rules layer.
  • Consulting and Mentoring
    CRM Value Added Reseller, Data Architecture Mentor
    Training, consulting, data model validation, and mentoring.
  • Consulting Services
    Major Manufacturing Company
    Used conceptual data modeling as an analysis bridge between use cases and UML design and implementation models. Determined and participated in end-user workshops, functional specifications, use cases, object diagrams, data models, concept documentation, and team level project management. Involved in the hiring decisions for the remaining members of the team (QA analysts, programmers, etc.). Acted as counsel to project management team on data architecture as well as other project matters. Member of project planning sub-team. Reviewed design and analysis artifacts – such as class diagrams, interaction diagrams, use cases, et al.

InConcept
Partner & Principal Consultant (1998 - 2001)

  • Item Master System
    Major Manufacturing Company, Data Architect
    Requirements analysis support, data architecture, and software design role of a corporate item master system containing all items sold, purchased and inventoried. This system was a re-engineering effort of a legacy system
  • Goods/Services Database
    Major Manufacturing Company, Data Architect
    Requirements analysis support, architecture, and software design role of a master corporate product catalog of all items sold, purchased and inventoried. Supports localizable languages on attribution and supports many of the company’s eBusiness initiatives as a foundation repository.
  • Packaging System
    Major Manufacturing Company, Data Architect
    Requirements analysis support, data architecture, and software design role of a corporate product packaging information system that tracks various package configurations from the individually wrapped product (within boxes inside a case on a crate etc.) up to the pallet.
  • Training, Model Validation, and Mentoring
    International Pharmaceuticals Company, Data Architecture Mentor
    Training, consulting, data model validation, and mentoring services for a pharmaceutical sales system (services rendered at the client location in London, England).
  • Channel Partner Catalog System
    Major Manufacturing Company, Data Architect/Team Lead/Mentor
    Requirements analysis support, data architecture, and team lead/mentor role of a corporate channel partner catalog configuration system. This system stored customer-specific product attribution for use in their web sites, printed catalogs, and other sales materials.
  • Credit Rating and Product Data Warehouse
    Major Financial Services Company, Data Architect
    Transformation of a conceptual and logical data model into a physical data warehouse design used to score customer credit ratings, track product offerings, and customer use of said offerings.
  • Buyer Metrics: Procurement Data Warehouse
    (Civilian Agency for the) United States Navy, Data Architect
    Designed an operational data store that tracks financial, payment, vendor and procurement performance, and open requisitions. Also analyzed and proposed eventual data mart cubes, trained military and civilian personnel, assisted in data extract, transformation, and loading (ETL), advised the project leader on issues of design and documentation, advised and trained entire team on data modeling techniques and implementation, and advised on data quality assurance.

Strategic Advantage, Inc.
(A mental health research company owned by Charter Medical Corporation/Magellan Health Services)
Programmer/Database Analyst/Database Administrator (1995 to 1998)

  • Decision Care™
    Designed and implemented a database system to track the contents of and patient answers to several mental health-related questionnaires. Design included an input database containing raw scanned questionnaire data, a data scrubbing and analysis staging area, and an operational data store.
  • InfiniFax™
    Designed and implemented the data layer of a fax-back questionnaire system that scored patient results and provided feedback to the doctor/questionnaire administrator within five minutes. The automatically faxed report included patient’s answers, the patient’s score along 9 key symptoms, a meta-data generated diagnosis explanation paragraph, and a bar chart.
  • SA-45™
    Assisted in the creation of a web-based questionnaire delivery and reporting system.
  • Report Generation Engine
    Designed and implemented a GUI report generation API using embedded graphing controls.
  • Res-Q™
    Designed, implemented, configured (hardware), and supported a kiosk-style questionnaire delivery and reporting system. Patients would answer the questionnaires using a touch screen terminal. System also included various multimedia elements and secured administration interfaces/reporting.
  • General Duties
    Database implementation, maintenance, administration, and troubleshooting. Install, upgrade and maintain data server software and hardware. Manage data security, backups, and disaster-recovery. Network integration of database systems such as replication, interfaces, etc. Occasional LAN administration. Manage database optimization and performance tuning.

    Data modeling and database design, system design and legacy system integration. Design production and testing procedures, software troubleshooting, beta testing and debugging with some customer service. Writing of database and Internet/Intranet applications. Writing internal applications, frameworks, and utilities

    Management of database staff and consultants, evaluate vendors, software support and training, technical expert in project design to both technical and non-technical audiences. Research into emerging trends, security issues, and optimization.

Languages and Tools Experience
Visual Studio.NET (VB.Net, ASP.Net, C#), (Microsoft and Sybase) Transact-SQL, MDX, Microsoft Visual Basic (VB)/ Visual Basic for Applications (VBA)/VB Script/Microsoft Excel Macro Language/Word Basic/Basic, Active Server Pages (ASP), Oracle PL/SQL, ISO standard SQL, HTML, XML/XSD/XSLT, Pascal, Microsoft Access, FoxPro, Authorware, Visio Solutions Development, JavaScript

Rational Rose, Requisite Pro, Visio for Enterprise Architects and Technical, NORMA, ER/Win, Visual SourceSafe, VisioModeler, InfoModeler, Power Designer, Oracle Designer, Visual Studio.Net Enterprise Architect, SharePoint, Dot Net Nuke

Systems and Database Experience
Windows 3.x/95/98/ME/2000/XP/Vista, Microsoft Windows NT 3.x/4.x (Workstation and Server), Microsoft Windows 2002/2003 Server, Microsoft SQL Server 6.5-7.x/2000/2005, Microsoft (OLAP) Analysis Server, Sybase 10/11/12/ASE/IQ, Oracle 7.x-10.x, MS-DOS 3.x - 6.x, Novell 3.1x, various UNIX flavors

Publications

  • Publisher of ObjectRoleModeling.com (an ORM related portal/web log)
  • "A Visual Studio Enterprise Architect ORM Primer for Experienced VisioModeler Users”, the Journal of Conceptual Modeling, (August, 2001)
  • “A Review of Information Modeling and Relational Databases: From Conceptual Analysis to Logical Design”, the Journal of Conceptual Modeling, (April, 2001)
  • “Conceptual Data Modeling in an Object-Oriented Process”, the Journal of Conceptual Modeling, (February/April, 2001)
  • “Perspective and Abstraction”, The Data Administration Newsletter, (December, 2000)
  • “Arguments against the Use of ORM (and their Rebuttals)”, the Journal of Conceptual Modeling, (June 2000)
  • “Case Study: Delaying the ‘Entity or Attribute’ Decision”, the Journal of Conceptual Modeling, (April 2000)
  • “An Argument for the Use of ER Modeling”, the Journal of Conceptual Modeling, (August 1999)
  • “Data Schema Normalization”, the Journal of Conceptual Modeling, (June 1999)
  • “Building a Better Data Model”, The Data Administration Newsletter, (December, 1998)
  • “Normalization and ORM”, the Journal of Conceptual Modeling, (August 1998)
  • “Common Model Fragments: People and Organizations”, the Journal of Conceptual Modeling, (April/May 1998)
  • “FoxPro In Cyberspace”, FoxPro Advisor (April, 1997)
  • “Introduction to Client-Server Programming in Visual FoxPro”, VFUG Newsletter (October, 1996)
  • Compiled the “VFUG Visual FoxPro Frequently Asked Questions”
  • Numerous (over 10) newsletter articles for the VFUG Newsletter
  • Numerous (over 30) articles for the Journal of Conceptual Modeling
  • Full publication list available upon request

Speaking Engagements

  • Presented “Conceptual Data Modeling in an Object Oriented Process” at the 2001 DAMA International Symposium in Anaheim California
  • Presented “Conceptual Data Modeling in an Object Oriented Process” at Data Management Association, National Capital Region, Washington, D.C.
  • Guest lecturer for various college courses
  • Seminar/Training Instructor (local, national, and international) in Object-Role Modeling

Professional Memberships

  • Member, Data Management Association (DAMA), MN chapter
  • Member, Minnesota High Tech Association (MHTA)
  • Member, American Electronics Association (AEA)
  • Member, Twin Cities .Net User Group
  • Member, Object Technology User Group (OTUG)
  • Former Editor, Journal of Conceptual Modeling (JCM)
  • Former Officer, Virtual FoxPro Users Group (VFUG)
  • Active member (past and/or present) of the Visual FoxPro, Microsoft SQL Server, data modeling, and ORM (Internet) communities.
  • Member, DNRC

Accreditations

  • Certified Object-Role Modeling Consultant (1 of 8 worldwide)
  • Visio Object-Role Modeling Expert
  • Certified Object-Role Modeling Trainer, Train-the-Trainer
  • Certified Visio Trainer, Train-the-Trainer
  • 1996 Universal Thread Visual FoxPro Most Valuable Professional (MVP)

Education
1991-1997 Bachelor of Science, Electrical Engineering University of Minnesota, Institute of Technology

Studies focused on system analysis and design, logic design, computer programming, sequential logic, and computer hardware design, construction, analysis, and implementation.

References
References are available upon request.

 




PRIMARY SKILLS

Business Problem Analysis

Database System Architecture & Design

Data Modeling

Software Development and Methodology Mentoring

TECHNIQUES

Object-Role Modeling (ORM)

Entity-Relationship (ER) Modeling

Unified Modeling Language (UML)

Rational Unified Process (RUP)

"Agile" Techniques (e.g. OpenUP)

ANALYSIS/DESIGN TOOLS

Rational Rose/ Requisite Pro

Visio for Enterprise Architects

ER/Win

Power Designer

NORMA

DATABASE PLATFORMS

MS SQL Server

MS Analysis Server (OLAP)

Sybase SQL Server

Oracle

LANGUAGES

SQL/MDX

VB/VBA/VB.Net

ASP/ASP.Net

XML

C#