Justin Butcher

The goals of enterprise architecture include prioritisation and strategic alignment of investments, savings through reduction in unnecessary duplication, and improved agility through reduced complexity. When these goals are achieved the positive impacts can be enormous. These goals are achieved when the enterprise architecture function has input to investment decision making and the way that solutions chosen and implemented. Astute CEOs will involve enterprise architects in assessment of business cases, procurement decisions and project reviews. The UK Government reported a direct saving of AU$6.3 billion from project reviews that cost less than $100 million. Many of these were ICT-based projects, which are known to be higher risk than other project types and are placed under greater scrutiny. Astute CIOs have a clearly defined strategy and process for review of projects under their purview.

Without governance, investment in enterprise architecture is usually wasted. Organisations that have implemented effective architecture boards typically realise benefits that include cost savings, better-controlled and structured systems, and better alignment to strategic architectures. CIOs should draw on the lessons learned from organisations that have implemented effective architecture governance through an architecture board.

Emerging Technologies (such as those relating to Tablets, to Cloud, to Social Media, to Big Data) threaten to complicate and disrupt the work of enterprise architecture. As enterprise architects struggle to understand, simplify and bring governance to heterogeneous technology environments, new and emerging technologies get in the way. Emerging technologies cannot be ignored. They promise tantalising new benefits and bring a vision of hope to CIOs struggling with increasing costs and stagnant budgets. Enterprise architects must understand what is possible with new technology and matching that to the specific needs of an organisation whilst reducing technology sprawl.

Business Capability Modelling is a simple, structured approach that offers a strategic view of an enterprise. A Business Capability Model remains stable even as business processes change, and as your organisation is restructured. A Business Capability Model offers a higher return on investment than Business Process Modelling, and has several advantages as a tool to help bring the ICT organisation closer to becoming a partner with the business.

The ICT organisation within any enterprise can benefit from a structured approach to understanding business capability of the enterprise. Business Capability Modelling is an Enterprise Architecture technique that IBRS sees playing a key role in transforming the relationship in many enterprises between ICT and the business. In organisations where ICT deeply understands the business we see a close relationship between respected partners, and often this is reflected by a direct reporting link between CIO and CEO. Failure to appreciate the business capability consigns the ICT organisation to be a subservient commodity supplier (rather than a business partner). Where the relationship between business and ICT is fragile, the potential of outsourcing to another provider means that the ICT organisation is not seen as a valued strategic partner.