The Politics of Design

Are you confident in your architecture?   Does that confidence appear as arrogance to your co-workers?  Is it arrogance?  How do you know?

There is a certain degree of confidence that must come with your job.  In architecture, you're expected to provide some guidance.  Architects are guides.  If you were following a guide through the rain-forests of the Amazon, and he appeared to be mixed-up, second-guessing himself or otherwise unsure, would you still follow him?  Or, would you ask for a refund from the eco-tourism people?

Commitment is a part of it.  There is a possession shift when you are committed.  You start speaking in terms of "my project" instead of "the project" or "your project".  As you internalize an effort, and make it part of yourself, your posture changes and language you use becomes more directing and less about weighing options.  When your guide believes that his well-being is connected to which fork you choose in the trail, he'll be more adamant about the decision.

There are times when you are unsure.  During the early phases of a project, you have some basic signposts.  You have some ideas and concepts strung together.  You think they will play out, but there are doubts.  Still, if you want to predict the future, you want to provide strong, clear direction.  Even if your guide doesn't know the end destination, he still knows that it is better to follow animal trails and stick close to rivers.  So, experience plays a role.

But, is it arrogance?

Almost everything you do as an architect is "selling".   Through your influence, you are selling executive management on architectural strategies and developers on architectural approaches.  You are convincing project managers that your approach is the right one, and business managers that the solution will meet his requirements.  All the fancy design artifacts serve the design need, but for many stakeholders, they are simply marketing collateral.

Sales is a numbers game.  A percentage of the people are going to buy what you are peddling, so reaching out to more folks is the key to increasing your sales.  Every sales presentation has a limited amount of time, and it's tough to touch all of the folks, so you need a strategy.  What's your approach?  When you leave an architectural presentation, how do you make sure that the largest number of people are bought in? 

Conflict is a natural part of our lives and is a useful tool in finding the best possible solution in the shortest amount of time. Knowing when and where to wield this tool takes some practice as well as awareness of the impact on those around you.

Sometimes, conflict is treated like a game of skill or strategy. Much like a chess match, contestants end up in a mental game of wits trying to outmaneuver their competition. Others take on a gladiator-esque approach, sparring to see who has the stronger personality or will.

Conflict is a very useful tool but might be abused as much as it is used properly. Here are some coaching points to keep in mind to quickly get to an agreed to solution.

The health industry tells me that I should eat more fish to increase my intake of omega-3 fatty acids (whatever those are).  The environmental people tell me that factory fish farms are horrible polluters.  The Discovery Channel tells me that the natural fisheries are over-fished and some species are dangerously close to being wiped-out.  Or... maybe it's the other way around.  I don't know.  As a consumer of this information, it seems to me that I'm getting contradictory advice.  Should I eat fish or no?  Farm-raised or not?  The answers are not simple.  There are different angles to consider, and none of these sources give you the a complete picture.

As an IT department, we are giving our business partners advice from a variety of sources.  The line developers advise the business users.  The project managers do, too.  The business analyst, the architect, the department managers all talk to the business partners and all try to provide helpful advice.  Are your business partners getting consistent messages that considers all facets of the situation or are they confused by what seem to be contradictory information from different groups?  I bet you know the answer...

If you've been serving as an architect in your organization for very long, you are probably being asked a dozen times a week to predict the future.  "When can we expect better performance from these queries?"  "How many times will we re-use that component over the next 2-3 years?"  "What will be the strategic direction of that application platform in 2010?"

With all the technology tools that we have at our disposal -- the software packages, the industry best practices, the arsenal of fully-baked design patterns -- there are still days when I sit in my office chair and wish for the two tools that I really need: a crystal ball and a lucky rabbit's foot.  How in the world can we be expected to accurately predict the direction of our organization, the challenges that we will face, and the methods we'll use to overcome them?  As architect's are we supposed to be clairvoyant?  Are we supposed to be able to repeatedly and accurately predict the future?   We are not only expected to do this, we actually can do it.