A short definition with an example

Let’s assume Fletnix is a video streaming company with 1,000,000 subscribers. The data about the subscibers are stored locally in hard disks in the basement of their headquarters. Maintaining both hardware and updating the software of the servers becomes pain for the IT-department. It costs additional electricity. Well, what if the data can be moved to and stored in the cloud, so the cloud provider can take care of everything?

Furthermore, let’s assume Fletnix wants to suggest a movie to the subscriber based on their age, gender and ratings. What if there was a Data Analytics tool as a Service to extract and visualize the data from these 1 million subscribers?

The Definition

A Cloud Solution Architect (CSA) builds an architecture out of cloud services to solve particular business problems. This solution should provide value such as …

• continuity
• acceleration of processes
• cost reduction
• scalabality
• security
• data transparency and governance

What are the requirements to be a CSA?

Depending on the career stage and also personality, the skillset can vary. However, there is a fundamental skillset which a CSA should bring along.

Business & Technical Knowledge

First of all, a CSA needs to understand the business of the customer and his journey. Only then they are able to build an architecture that brings value. On the other hand, they can only design an architecture if they have technical knowledge about the cloud services. Both business and technical knowledge comes hand in hand in order to answer questions such as …

• Which options are the most cost-effective?
• How can obstacles be eliminated?
• How to integrate the architecture in existing IT-landscapes?

… and there is so much more to consider. It is essential to bring technological expertise, yet to have an eagle perspective on the business itself.

As it is with every other job, continuous learning is fundamental. It can be anything which helps to do the job - soft skills, technical trainings, presentation skills and so on. Regarding the technical part, the T-Shape skillset is most common. A CSA should have an in-depth expertise in one or two products. Also, it is required to have a broad knowledge of different products or areas to have a holistic view, enabling you to connect the dots.

With both business and technical knowledge, a further skill to develop is to be at least one step ahead of the customer. If you know what’s coming next in the pipeline, it’s so much easier to accelerate the process and anticipate upcoming risks. This will bring you and the customer forward and reduce errors along the way.

Communication Skills

Two major communication skills are required for a CSA.

  1. Mapping a feature of a technology as a solution to a business problem.
    If a customer explains a problem and asks what options you would suggest, it will not be sufficient to showcase how awesome a product is. At the end of the day, customers are not interested in the features of a technological product. They are interested in the value it brings to their business. So the technological expertise needs to be translated into business language.

  2. Consider the conversation partner for the right translation.
    Are you talking to DevOps-Engineers? Then have a detailed technical conversation, how to realize and scale the solution. Are you talking to Project Managers? Then on a high level explain the solution and focus on its value to the business. Filter and adjusts according to what the conversation partner wants and needs to hear. At the end of the day, it’s about facilitating technical discussions.

What are their key roles and responsibilities in their daily work?

Solution Expert

  1. Architecture Design Sessions
    An organization consists of several departments with ongoing business processes and applications, data analytics, security regulations and so on. Most of the time, a customer reaches out to cloud providers in order to seek advice and support to transform and improve the current IT-landscape with cloud services. The job of a Cloud Solution Architect is to listen to the customer and collect information of the status quo. Then they draft a solution plan, prepare an Architect Design Session and discuss the design with the customer. They consider several aspects such as …
  • Requirements and constraints
  • Implementation process
  • Potential blockers
  • Risks and quality

  1. Sharing best Practises
    Deliver the best solutions with your expertise to digitally transform their business. This includes presenting small demos and minimal viable products (MVP). These best practices optimize performance and minimize technical risks.

  2. Support with Pilots and Troubleshooting
    Guide through the implementation and occuring obstacles of the customer’s cloud journey. However, CSAs (being advisors in the first place) do not have to handle support cases and write code.

Trusted Advisor

At Microsoft, Cloud Solution Architects are part of the Customer Success Unit. Being part of this Unit means to support the customer in whatever success means to them.

  1. Building Relationships
    First of all, a CSA identifies who to build strong and impactful relationships with. Who are the technical decision makers? Who are the business stakeholders? Are partners involved? Again, it’s about facilitating technical discussions. This means a CSA is the bridge between both technical and business decision makers.

  2. Biased but open-minded Support
    It is in the best interest of the CSA to make the customer happy. Therefore the CSA needs to have a holistic view to bring the maximum value for the customer, even if it means to consider competitor services in their technical design. However, as an employee of Microsoft, they should encourage and demonstrate Microsoft’s value.

  3. Challenging decisions of customers & partners
    It’s a triangle relationship between a CSA, customer and a Microsoft partner. Microsoft Consulting or partners are responsible for the realization of the Cloud architecture. During the implementation process, the CSA challenges decisions of both customer and partner regarding technical approaches, cost impacts, business value and so on. They guide in case of any blockers. Furthermore, they are available for further support without being hands-on in the production implementation themselves.

Cloud Evangelist

  1. Training for customers and internal teams
    Whether handling customer workshops or leading a team in hackathons - as an Evangelist, a CSA showcases the value of cloud technologies to the people. Also internally within the team, ideas and strategies are shared and improved. They attend meetings about the latest technical updates of products and participate in discussions. Sharing is caring!

  2. External Presence
    Sharing knowledge and learnings in communities, conferences is an effective way to promote the cloud provider they work with.

How is success measured?

This one’s not easy to answer. Overall, it is important that the CSA aligns the customer’s cloud journey and business strategy.

The effectiveness can be measured with …

  1. Financial Metrics
    • Increase in consumption revenue
    • Reduction of total cost of ownership (to strengthen relationship with customer)

  2. Technology metrics
    • Reduction of IT-Overhead
    • Increase of product usage

  3. Customer metrics
    • Increase of trainings and workshops
    • Improved ability to seize new business opportunities


I have been employed at Microsoft for more than a year and this is my personal perception of this role. If you have anything to add or disagree, feel free to reach out! Anyway, I hope this article gives you insightful perspectives. Thank you for visiting this page :-)