Seeking advice on chasing a Solutions Architect career path
Hello everyone, i'm a software engineer with about 1 year of experience, working mainly in the Agentic AI space though my work leans more toward backend and system than the AI/ML side itself.
Over this past year, I've realized something about myself: I genuinely enjoy researching new ideas, concepts, and thinking about architecture. I look forward to my code review sessions not because of the code itself, but because of the discussions around why things were designed a certain way. That kind of thinking energizes me more than the actual implementation work.
After some research, Solution Architect seems like a role that aligns well with what I enjoy and moving from developer to SA is one recognized path. But I don't have a clear picture of what that journey actually looks like end to end.
So I'd love to hear from those of you with more experience:
- Should I focus on deepening my engineering skills first, then wait patiently and look for opportunities at my current company to make architectural decisions and gradually grow into the title?
- Or is it better to first target an intermediate, more client-facing role before chasing SA and do roles like that actually exist?
- And roughly, what kind of timeline should I be aiming for at each stage?
I really appreciate any thoughts or advice you're willing to share.