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Why many IT Architects increasingly prefer the ‘Principal Engineer’ title? Looking back over the past few years, I have observed a noticeable erosion in the perceived value of 'Architect' title (not necessarily role) across many organisations. Once regarded as an aspirational role for many engineers (including myself) and a cornerstone for translating business ambitions into robust technological solutions, the traditional IT architect title has increasingly been overshadowed

[Originally publishes in 2013] Building and maintaining a mature architecting capability is not cheap, especially in large global organisations. Typically, with a program/project portfolio in the hundreds, it is impossible to assign good architects to cover the entire portfolio. Even merely trying to achieve an effective architecture governance, well integrated with the broader IT governance processes, is in itself challenging and often impossible for a portfolio of that size

Architecting is the combination of people (regardless of their team names or job titles), methods, information and supporting tools that allow an organization to consistently produce IT products with a fit-for-purpose architecture, cost effectively

Architectural thinking accelerates flow and improves quality of architectural decisions. However, it has nothing to do with a particular style of architecture, or architectural framework/process, and is certainly not about any particular technology.

Believe it or not, many people in IT and business are still struggling with the concept of Enterprise Architecture, and the actual value it provides to the organisation. The theory is clear, less so how it translates into real value in practice. The need for well articulated and clear Requirements, however, is well understood. And people generally understand that designing and implementing IT Systems to satisfy requirements generates value to the firm. Rather than EA and Arch