Michael Schwarzer · Business & Technology

How I work

Complex and difficult assignments

I get up to speed quickly on complex assignments and technical environments. The task may be a new system, a difficult-to-find fault, or a situation in which previous attempts have failed to produce a solution.

The first priority is to establish what is actually happening and where the cause lies.

Not every assignment starts with a clear specification. Sometimes there is an organically grown system, incomplete documentation, contradictory information, and several people who each see the problem differently. In those cases, my work starts with investigation.

Systems and their relationships

I look at systems at different levels. I am interested in technical details as well as interfaces, dependencies, and the way a system interacts with other systems and business processes.

Depending on the assignment, this can extend from software and infrastructure into production or organisational structures.

A technical problem does not necessarily have a purely technical solution. What matters is recognising the relevant relationships.

Different roles

The role I take depends on the assignment. It may involve a detailed technical issue, systems analysis, architecture, integration, project work, or technical leadership for a limited period.

I do not need to remain an architect simply because an assignment requires architecture. Nor do I need to remain in a leadership role simply because technical leadership is needed for a few months.

The assignment determines the role.

Changing existing systems

Before changing an existing system, I want to understand how it actually works and how its components interact.

Only then is it possible to make a sound decision about what should be retained, replaced, integrated, or modernised.

Architecture is therefore often the result of the investigation rather than its starting point.

Some examples

Siemens Nixdorf

Systems following a corporate merger

Following the merger of Siemens and Nixdorf, different processes, data, and organisations suddenly became part of the same company. In the eastern region of Germany, one of my responsibilities was the independent consolidation of the two TIS and PERLE systems.

I also analysed operational, productivity, and service data, prepared decision-making information for technical service, and contributed to the reorganisation of support. At the time, I managed around 25 employees across six locations.

Mechanical engineering

Where IT meets production

As IT Systems Coordinator at a mechanical engineering company with around 150 employees, conventional IT, ERP, production systems, and machinery all formed part of the same systems landscape.

This included two in-house data centres, APplus, a connected site in Italy, production and logistics systems, vertical carousel storage systems, component placement automation, lathes, and machine controls. My responsibilities also included network segmentation, security, external IT providers, Microsoft 365, mobile devices, budgets and procurement, and the assessment of alternatives to the existing ERP system.

The interesting question was not whether something belonged to “IT” or “production”, but what it depended on and what else would be affected by a change.

iP4.tv

International software development

At iP4.tv, I worked on an embedded platform for set-top boxes. Development and coordination were distributed across China, Greece, the UK, and Germany, with customers in locations including Dubai, Australia, China, and Russia.

Alongside software development, the work included systems analysis, technical planning, requirements, customer-specific adaptations, integration, testing, and delivery.

Production

When production should preferably keep running

For a platform serving around 5,000 concurrent viewers at peak times, I later also became responsible for production operations. The infrastructure was migrated from Prague to Amsterdam with an interruption of approximately two seconds.

What interests me about migrations like this is less the move itself than the question of which dependencies need to be understood in advance and which steps must be prepared so that the actual transition becomes as uneventful as possible.

Today

My own systems

Today, among other things, I develop my own software, services, and tools according to the principles of Biocodie: small, autonomous, clearly bounded systems with defined responsibilities, interfaces, and rules.

One current example is the OpenBookRegister, an open, federated infrastructure for book and publication data with APIs, data models, decentralised identification mechanisms, and interfaces for retail and point-of-sale systems.

I also operate and develop my own Unix, Linux, and OpenBSD infrastructure.

Business & Technology

I have built and managed companies, developed products, led projects, written software, operated systems, managed staff, planned budgets, prepared contracts, and worked with customers, suppliers, and external service providers.

I therefore consider technical decisions in their business context as well. A technically elegant solution is not automatically a good solution. It has to fit the company, its existing systems, its people, costs and risks, and the direction in which the organisation intends to develop.

Conversely, business decisions often cannot be made sensibly without understanding their technical dependencies.

My professional development programme as a Digital Manager (wvib) systematically extended this company-wide perspective across strategy and business models, product development, production, procurement and logistics, marketing and sales, organisation, human resources, IT, information security, and the relevant legal framework.

Working together

Depending on the assignment, I take on roles in systems analysis, technical discovery, systems and integration architecture, technical project management, or technical leadership for a limited period.

I am particularly interested in complex analysis, integration, modernisation, and troubleshooting assignments where technical and business relationships first need to be understood and a reliable basis for decisions established.

I work on a project and freelance basis. Remote work is possible, as are on-site assignments and project-related travel. International projects are welcome.

What matters is a clear area of responsibility and sufficient access to the systems, information, and people relevant to the analysis and subsequent decisions.

Systems AnalysisTechnical DiscoverySystems ArchitectureIntegrationTechnical LeadershipProject ManagementLegacy ModernizationTroubleshooting

What else I work on

Alongside project work, I develop my own software and explore operating systems, AI and its capabilities and limitations, as well as publications and knowledge transfer.

I also develop my own concepts for organic and systems-oriented software development and explore complex systems and social coexistence.

The results include software, technical articles, books, concepts, and occasionally things for which there is not yet a particularly useful category.