In my experience, the software architects I've known were turkey farmed into their roles because the management structure couldn't figure out what to do with th

In my experience, the software architects I've known were turkey farmed into their roles because the management structure couldn't figure out what to do with them. Most were actually good at coding, not very process-y, and carried good opinions about software design. As developers, they were rightly recognized for their contributions and promoted for them. But as architects they became organizationally peers to management, and they invariably got sucked into internecine management politics, which neutralized their abilities. The irony of this is that I think all software engineers should carry these traits. Having software architects just stuffs this role into a handful of people instead of spreading it throughout the organization.