Leadership and Management in Software Architecture

Software architecture, in education and practice, is primarily concerned with technical issues associated with the quality of software architecture and design. However, as project size increases, leadership, management skills, and the organizational context of the architect become more important, to the point where the non-technical duties of the project architect can "make or break" a project. The workshop on Leadership and Management in Software Architecture that took place at ICSE 2008 was focused on understanding these non-technical duties and the type of support an architect should expect from an organization.

Attendees at the workshop, in addition to the organizers, were Shareeful Islam, Technical University of Munich, Marcelo Cataldo, Bosch Corporate Research, M. Ali Babar, Lero , Charalampos Kyriakou, GGSB, Tuna Capin, Asalan, Inc, Leonid Volkov, SKB Kontur, Qaises Saied, AERO Pakistan, Takahide Matsutsuka, Fujitsu Laboratories of Europe, Oliver Creighton, Siemens Corporate Technology, Hans Ros, Siemens Corporate Research, Ana Ivanovic, Philips Research, Ibrahim Armac, RWTH Aachen University. The presented papers at the workshop are available at [2].

The activities of the workshop consisted of two extended discussions. One centered on the skills that an architect should have, and the second centered on the responsibilities of the organization to make architecture a key aspect of the development process.