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Instruction guide for FastTrack Recognized Solution Architect

Welcome to the FastTrack Recognized Solution Architect (FTRSA) nomination process. This guide explains how to submit your documentation, and it provides links to useful resources and templates. Refer to the table of contents at the top of the article for the relevant sections. Keep this document handy while you complete the nomination form.

Process overview

Complete the nomination form within the nomination period that spans October 15, 2024-February 3, 2025.

Once your eligibility is confirmed, solution architects from the relevant engineering teams evaluate candidates based on the quantity and quality of their submissions.

Successful candidates from the initial evaluation have the opportunity to interview with Microsoft's engineering teams. They're evaluated based on the following parameters:

  • Their technical and functional expertise.
  • Their familiarity with current products.
  • Their adherence to best practices.
  • The complexity in customer implementations.

The evaluation process takes 8-12 weeks. Microsoft notifies the candidates of the decision by email, along with next steps for the accepted candidates.

General instructions

Here are some tips for how to submit the information that we expect.

  • Gather consent from the customer and partner organizations you work with to share any related data.
  • Ensure that all files and folders that you submit to Microsoft are accessible to our team at Microsoft.

Submit evidence

Submit your evidence as a compressed folder or folders. Keep all documents and folders well-organized and properly labeled.

Important

Gather consent from the customer and partner organizations you work with to share any related data.

You must submit one folder with a name that follows this pattern: Last Name_First Name_Partner organization_Product nomination category. For example, Rodriguez_Hazel_AdatumCorporation_Dynamics365. The folder should contain subfolders with names that are based on the requirement category that you submit. For example, one subfolder has the name prerequisites, and another has the name business-contributions.

As part of the nomination process, you must submit documentation for the mandatory prerequisites.

  • For customer endorsements, ask your customer to email FastTrackRecognized team.
  • For proof of business contributions, add proof that you submitted one or more reference architecture articles to the Dynamics 365 guidance hub through the form at https://aka.ms/ReferenceArchitectureSubmit.

Template for customer endorsement

We suggest you create a template in Word that you then use to email the customers that you want to encourage to endorse you. Add the fasttrackrecognized@microsoft.com team as CC on the emails. The following snippet illustrates the format we suggest.

Hello <Customer>,  
My organization is nominating me for the Microsoft FastTrack Recognized Solution Architect designation, which is supported by the Microsoft Dynamics 365 product engineering teams. It's a designation to practicing enterprise solution architects who consistently exhibit deep architecture expertise and create high-quality solutions for their customers. 

Learn more at Dynamics 365 architects at https://aka.ms/dynamics365architects and Power Platform architects at https://aka.ms/powerplatformarchitects.  

Each candidate is assessed on their:  

* Depth of technical capability and current product knowledge. 
* Adherence to recommended best practices. 
* Degree of complexity associated with the customer implementation. 
* Quality of architecture design and fit for the customer's needs. 

As part of the nomination process, Microsoft requires candidates to submit customer feedback/endorsement, based on implementation project performance.  

In this mail, I have copied the Microsoft alias where all endorsements/feedback need to 
be submitted, fasttrackrecognized@microsoft.com. Can you please respond to this mail with your feedback?  
Thanks, 
<Name>

Please make sure that the endorsements are emailed to fasttrackrecognized@microsoft.com.

Example submission

Let's take Hazel Rodriguez as an example of a solution architect that nominates themselves for the FastTrack Recognized Solution Architect designation. On OneDrive, Hazel creates a folder, Rodriguez_Hazel_AdatumCorporation_Dynamics365, with two subfolders for prerequisites and business contributions as shown in the following image.

Screenshot of a folder structure with two subfolders, business-contributions and prerequisites.

Each subfolder contains proof of the nominee's evidence of prerequisites and business contributions. In our example, Hazel Rodriguez provides evidence for two customers as shown in the following image.

Screenshot of a folder structure with two subfolders, Customer 1 and Customer 2.

Finally, Hazel compresses the Rodriguez_Hazel_AdatumCorporation_Dynamics365 folder and all its contents into a compressed file, Rodriguez_Hazel_AdatumCorporation_Dynamics365.zip, that she can then send to Microsoft's FastTrackRecognized team.

Contact

If you have questions, contact the FastTrackRecognized@microsoft.com team by email. This is also the team to send your compressed folder to, and the team that you should ask your customer to send their endorsement to.