Gerben Wierda

Current

• IT Lead Architect APG Investments at APG

Past

• IT Lead Architect at Council for the Judiciary
• Department Head Digital Technology at Netherlands Forensic Institute
• Scientific Staff Member at Advisory Council for Science & Technology Policy

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Education

• RSM Erasmus
• Rijksuniversiteit Groningen

Recommended

2 people have recommended Gerben

Connections

51 connections

Industry

Information Technology and Services

Gerben Wierda’s Summary

I have decent skills in recognizing good IT, recognizing what is attainable and what not in IT, and what is needed to make it attainable, including organizational and governance bottlenecks.

My goal is to improve the IT-performance of the organization I work for. I have a strong technical background, which means I am generally actually able to understand the technical issues presented to me and which require a decision.

Good IT in an organization requires good project management (e.g. Prince2, though in most cases the advantages are in the essentials and not in the bureaucracy it can create), a good user organization and good architecture and design. In my experience, the latter is the most difficult to achieve and is a major reason why so many large IT-projects fail. Large IT is hideously difficult. No amount of project management and user involvement can fix a lack of design and engineering skills (as more hospital management also not by definition improves a situation with lacking medical skills). In situations where I have been able to influence these conditions I have been able to deliver on time and within budget complex and reliable systems with satisfied users.

Gerben Wierda’s Specialties:

IT Policy, IT Architecture.

Gerben Wierda’s Experience

• IT Lead Architect APG Investments

  APG

  (Non-Profit; 51-200 employees; Human Resources industry)

  October 2007 — Present (2 years 2 months)

  IT Lead Architect for the Investment Management subsidiary of APG. APG Investments manages over 200 billion euro investments for various pension funds and insurers.
  
  APG was seperated legally on March 1, 2008 from its now 100% shareholder: ABP where I started working in 2007.

• IT Lead Architect

  Council for the Judiciary

  (Government Agency; 5001-10,000 employees; Judiciary industry)

  February 2004 — September 2007 (3 years 8 months)

  The Judiciary in the Netherlands is 9000 people (all courts except the Supreme Court). The Council for the judiciary is a head office of sorts (the courts are legally independent) as it distributes the funds and sets certain policy area's nation-wide. See http://www.rechtspraak.nl/information+in+english
  
  I am responsible for IT Architecture as Lead Architect.

• Department Head Digital Technology

  Netherlands Forensic Institute

  (Government Agency; 201-500 employees; Law Enforcement industry)

  December 1999 — May 2002 (2 years 6 months)

  As head of the digital department I was responsible for the day-to-day management of the department (25fte electronics and IT-specialists) who did case work for law enforcement and the courts and R&D (50%). I was able to significantly improve the actual concrete results of the department in terms of R&D en Engineering output (i.e. hard- and softwaresystems now in use in law enforcement and the intelligence community).
  
  The department works in a complex context that includes the judiciary, the law enforcement and the intelligence community.

• Scientific Staff Member

  Advisory Council for Science & Technology Policy

  (Government Agency; 11-50 employees; Government Administration industry)

  April 1994 — December 1999 (5 years 9 months)

  The Advicsory Council for Science and Technology Policy is the highest advisory body for the Dutch government on science & technology. It is funded by the Science & Education Ministry and the Economic Affairs Ministry. It advises the Cabinet. It consists of Industry & Science officials with R&D affiliation (think people at board level who are responsible for R&D). The work is prepared by a bureau of approximately 8 staff members, of which I was one.
  
  My main subjects have been: Space, Large Technological Institutions (and what to do with them), EU Frameworks, Impact of IT-developments on Scientific Information dissimination (background study, published in 1995).

Gerben Wierda’s Education

• RSM Erasmus

  MBA , Management , January 2003 — February 2005

  Good grades.

  Activities and Societies:

  Managed Class Gift for Tsunami Victims via IUCN (www.iucn.org)

• Rijksuniversiteit Groningen

  M.Sc. , Physics, Computer Science , 1979 — 1988

  Major: Experimental Physics (nuclear physics)
  Minor: Computer Science

  Activities and Societies:

  Member and vice chairman of University Council
  Member of Physics Faculty Council
  Member of Physics Education Commission
  Member of Physical Sciences Science Commission
  Member of University finance committee
  Editor and Editor-in-chief of multi-faculty magazine "Puls"

Additional Information

Gerben Wierda’s Interests:

Analytic Philosophy and practical use thereof (Wittgenstein, Dreyfus), Popular Science (Gould), History, Science & Technology.

Gerben Wierda’s Honors:

MacTeX TWG-Award 2007
Co-winner Apple Design Award 2002 "Best Use of Open Source Technology"
Best Paper - 2001 NLUUG Fall Conference "Unix on the desktop"
Runner-Up 2002 of E-Debat, Dutch national e-mail debating contest
Winner 2000 of E-Debat, Dutch national e-mail debating contest

Gerben Wierda’s Contact Settings

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