[gardenhedge]

I think your feelings are valid.

Solution architects get credit because they have responsibility and ownership of the solution being delivered. They also design their solutions with a number of constraints. So the solution might not be the best from your point of view, but it is the solution that will deliver business value in the set amount of time for the set amount of money with the set development team in place.

[re-thc]

If it was just that perhaps the OP would see it.

Problem is solution architects often play their own political games or have absolutely no idea about this field. A lot of solution architects come from networking or other "less in-demand" jobs and transitioned. They often know nothing about the web today or the current practices.

The worst 1s still are the 1s that come from 3rd party vendors who act like an expert but in reality just try to sell you something.

In larger companies solution architects might not even be on your side. It's a different team / department so incentives aren't even aligned. They try to stop you from having a good solution to improve their own KPIs.