22/05/2007 by Roger Evernden.

I was at a meeting yesterday where someone asked the big question - what do you mean by Enterprise Architecture?

I think there are always two clarifications that need to be made here:

If I am working with a client, my definition of Enterprise Architecture is less important than what they think it means. Rule 1: start with the clients definition of Enterprise Architecture. It may be the same as my definition (or not). I may learn something from their definition, and they might learn something from mine.

The “enterprise” bit says something about scope; the “architecture” bit is more to do with the philosophy of how you approach complex issues related to the use information and IT in an organizational context. Rule 2: focus on the importance of using an architectural approach. Don’t get hung up or bogged down with definitions. When people work together they get to know and appreciate differences of opinion. And guess what - we learn from each other, and our definitions adapt and become stronger, more meaningful and more useful.

I’m reminded of a great post from James McGovern. He said he thought of a good architect “as someone who really understands the systems they oversee - not just the classes and the collaborations but the real ’soul’ of the system. … Real architects are not those who go forth and evangelize methodologies or management by magazine, but are stewards of the enterprise. The key thing to understand about architects is that they also seek to belong to a group of highly skilled talented individuals in which they can prosper. The ideal architecture team is led by the senior most architect (in terms of competencies, not years of service) and other architects brought together from across many different business lines…”

I like the idea that “real” architects, and therefore “real” enterprise architecture, has collaborative soul. Soul is so hard to define - it is a passion, a sense, an intuition, a feeling.

Roger Evernden

Posted in Enterprise Architecture | No Comments »

21/05/2007 by Roger Evernden.

Agile, nimble, responsive, adaptable, flexible, compliant, accomodating - words that describe a pervasive goal for all architectures. The more architecture has these characteristics, the more useful and valuable it becomes.

There are at least two parts to this aspiration.

The one that is most commonly described is fairly passive, being able to respond to changing needs; if we design well, then our designs can adapt to meet emerging business trends or revised organisational strategies. If we are lucky, then not only can our designs adapt, but they can do this with agility and nimbleness - they are accomodating designs that can be changed quickly and easily.

Better still, the architecture can be designed in such a way that it is more proactive - it is designed to be able to anticipate or sense changes and then respond to them. An architecture that has this characteristic is able to accomodate changes that are totally unexpected and unanticipated - as well as scenarios that are predicted. This, of course, is more of a challenge - but there are well-proven techniques that help to create such supple designs.

You may be surprised to find that many of these techniques were pioneered twenty years ago. In fact the term “sense and respond” first appeared in a 1992 Management Review article by Stephan Haeckel. Haeckel has moulded the ideas into an adaptive management framework - described on the sense and respond web site as “a comprehensive, scaleable and internally consistent recasting of industrial age strategy, structure and governance to cope with the post-industrial environment of unpredictable change”.
If you are not familiar with Stephan Haeckel’s work, then I thoroughly recommend the website and the book Adaptive Enterprise: Creating and Leading Sense-And-Respond Organizations.

I was privileged to work with Westpac Banking Corporation in the 1980s. Westpac is regarded as the prototype sense-and-respond organization, and it’s story is told in the book, Adaptive Enterprise. From this experience I have developed EA techniques that have also been adopted and used in many organizations.

Why is this such an important concept? Business expects support and functionality from IT, but IT can only deliver if there are appropriate and corresponding business changes. Having the right organizational or business infrastructure is as important as having the right IT components. And EA is the discipline that ensures that all of these elements are in designed in harmony.
From an Enterprise Architecture perspective, there is much to learn here, especially as EA moves more and more into areas of organizational change and complexity.

Roger Evernden

Posted in Enterprise Architecture | No Comments »

09/05/2007 by Roger Evernden.

I’ve been working on a proposal for a presentation at this years Online Information Conference. The main themes of Online Information 2007 explore different aspects of Web 2.0

Now I’ve been doing a lot of research into connections between Enterprise Architecture and Web 2.0 - in particular I’ve been exploring the trends using the eight factors. It’s proving to be very interesting. Most architectural studies of the web are from an information architecture perspective. So it is very interesting to look at Web 2.0 trends with a different hat.

I am still exploring, but the results so far are very exciting. Looking at the vast array of new sites and ideas using an Enterprise Architecture framework highlights overarching trends and themes, and makes it much easier to see where these might go in the future.

Furthermore I think it opens up possibilities to use Enterprise Architecture techniques on a wider scale for planning web site strategies and development.

I’ve tried a few searches for Enterprise Architecture and Web 2.0, but haven’t come up many other references to anyone else doing research in this area. If you know of any sites or work please let me know. I’ll write up more of my findings as they emerge.

Roger

Posted in Web 2.0, Enterprise Architecture | No Comments »

04/05/2007 by Roger Evernden.

I’ve been interested in information for more than 20 years - more specifically, I have been fascinated by two related themes:

1. How can we (individuals or organisations) use information more effectively? - most of what passes for using information is confusion, misinformation or “let’s ignore any attempt to use the available information and just carry on with business as usual.”
2. Can we architect information in such a way that it immediately becomes more useful, more powerful, more awe-inspiring? - is there some way that we can intervene and provide structure, process, templates, guidelines, or whatever it takes to make the information resource significantly more powerful?

Well I am convinced that the answer to both of these questions is emphatically “YES”. But I think there are two habits that sometimes prevent us from getting to yes - in some cases these habits are so entrenched that it will take a huge effort to break out of them.

1. We’re lazy. We don’t like to make changes. We expect to find simple, quick, cheap answers. And often we fall back on the use of information technology (IT) to improve our use of information rather than learn new skills (at the individual or corporate level). That’s not to say that IT isn’t useful - and as Dr Eddy Kloprogge said in a comment the other day:
• “The deveopment of IT seems to become more exponential” - IT is here to stay, and it’s role will become bigger and greater.
• Technology may help to create awareness - we can’t ignore IT; it often helps by providing insights that we couldn’t achieve on our own.
2. We are still learning how to architect information. We don’t have all the answers. Enterprise Architecture is the label that is most frequently used for providing some discipline and structure in our use of organisational information. (I know there are other definitions, but that will do for now.) In this sense, enterprise architecture is to information as building architecture is to space. But there is still a lot to learn about how we do this - and in my opinion, some of the current methods need serious updating (more of this later).

[For more on this theme - see my website Roger Evernden - enterprise architecture with a difference]

Roger

Posted in Enterprise Architecture | No Comments »

01/05/2007 by Roger Evernden.

I know that information technology is big business and that vendors want to push up their sales.

I know that IT often provides great tools that make us more productive or creative.

And I know that without IT most companies would be unable to operate.

But I can’t help feeling really strongly that we focus too much on the T and not enough on the I - that most of us (either as individuals or organisations) don’t spend the time learning how we can use information more effectively.

This is of course one of the key themes in my book, Information First … it is the key reason why I called it Information First - we need to understand our need for information before we deploy information technology.

But I think that we (information using people anywhere) need to learn more about how we use information and how we could improve our use of information.

I recently saw Dr Edward de Bono talk about the need for better thinking skills. His ideas are now almost universally recognised, and many individuals and organisations have benefited from his thinking skills and techniques.

What do you think? Do we need better skills in using information? I’d be interested to know what others think on this.

Roger

Posted in Enterprise Architecture | 4 Comments »