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For some time now I have been promoting the idea that the practice of business architecture is not about creating blueprints and models but applying a set of tools and techniques to form broader perspectives, create deeper insight, and solve business problems. If business architecture is a practice then what is its portfolio of services? I have created my take on the business architect’s service portfolio and broken it down into four categories: strategy development and articulation services, organizational performance services, organizational change services, and project support services. This isn’t meant to be a comprehensive list that completely describes the business architecture practice but a starting place to spur your imagination of what can be done.Do you have other ideas? Please comment!
Organizational Change Services
Complex decision making frameworks – The ultimate goal of all business architecture activity is to facilitate better and faster decision making. While many business architecture deliverables provide insight and information, many complex decisions could benefit from a more formal decisioning process. Develop frameworks, models, and methods that facilitate thinking through complex problems, considering a wide array of relevant factors.
New idea generation – Really new ideas are harder to create than most people realize. Typical brainstorming often leads to group think. Utilize mind mapping, slip writing, starbursting, and other creative brain storming techniques to generate new ideas.
Context assessment – Help organizations identify and illuminate how the organizational context surrounding them affects their strategies and plans. Contextual elements include: culture, management style, innovation attitudes, financial mechanics, and organizational dynamics. These factors are often more important to an initiative’s success than the actual process and technology work.
Process based capability modeling – Capability models are typically designed around an organization. But many transformational initiatives are built around one or more high level processes such as enhancing innovation, leadership development, or customer engagement. Develop detailed process- centric capability models to create deeper understanding of what is needed to make the transformation successful.
Force field analysis – Force field analysis has been around for a long time. It is a simple way to analyze proposed changes to understand where resistance will come from and where it will be the most intense. This method can be used to help organizations understand the factors that support and resist change to new strategies, goals, products, processes, technologies, etc.
Transformation planning and management – Managing large scale change requires many different tools and techniques. Business architects can help managers understand the progress (and lack of progress) of these initiatives by creating a service bundle of other deliverables such as capability roadmaps, force field analysis, and strategy mapping.
In the next post, I will look at project services.
Tagged: Business Architecture, Business Architecture Practice 
