Our third annual awards honor the most influential CTOs who are leading their companies -- and their industry -- to better times It’s never easy to evangelize. During the boom, there was too much noise. Since the boom, there has been too little money. So, to lead their organizations into better times, our 25 honorees had to get creative in 2003.Fortunately, they’re a creative group. Many of them speak explicitly about art and architecture, as well as the elegance that comes from a well-designed system. Still others exult that their job enables them to turn a conceptual drawing into concrete reality. The bridge from dream to deployment is not the only chasm they span.These visionary technology leaders say they are fundamentally chartered with keeping one foot in the present and one foot in the future. These CTOs distinguished themselves in 2003 by driving initiatives that both influenced their companies internally and their industries externally. They’ve kept the engines of creativity humming so that they’re poised to deliver new ideas and products just as their customers are beginning to invest again. Click for larger view. Software Development