Neglected Architecture

Being a software architect is hard. Besides the obvious difficulties with technical issues, architects often face difficult team situations, or struggle with their managers for influence, and their architecture work may become ignored. Let's face it: Having to deal with a software architect is hard, too. Sometimes their architecture work is insufficient, or there are good reasons to ignore it. Sometimes the "architect" is not really the architect, and other developers or managers are answering the tough questions, or worse: nobody does. This paper helps architects and other project participants find out what is going on in the project with respect to the architect and the architecture, and helps to identify possible underlying causes for problems. A variety of counter measures are available, some of which should be applicable even in the most difficult situations. This submission is part of a larger effort to collect problem identifications and resolutions for the daily work of a software architect. Previous work in the form of diagnoses and therapies has been published at various EuroPLoP and VikingPLoP conferences.