From Troux Blog
A picture may be worth a thousand words. But business leaders won’t hear anything an EA model has to tell them unless it’s in a form they can understand and find value with. That’s why the architecture team at USAA is using circular EA visualizations to convince users at all levels of the business to pay attention to their models.
Before devising its eight “wheel” visualizations late last year, “business leaders did not find value in validating the models the architecture team was using to help define the business and IT capabilities the company needs”, says Michael Pemberton, Enterprise Architect in Transformation and Integration at the San Antonio-based financial services firm.
While the models described in great detail various processes such as underwriting, they provided no context such as the information the underwriter received to do their job, who they sent their findings to, or the role underwriting played in the larger insurance process. Business leaders find no value in the isolated views, says Pemberton. “They only care about applications within the context of function, process and organization.”
Over the 2010 holidays, the USAA architecture team admitted their approach needed to evolve and, with the help of an outside consultant, developed the wheel visualization. At the “axle” in the center is the customer, surrounded by the “wheel” (generic business functions) which is surrounded in turn by the “tire” — the processes and applications required to perform specific functions for one organization or type of product within USAA. “Each business area is permitted to sequence the business functions according to their requirements, and we call that a process,” he said.
“Once you show them a process, in the context of infrastructure, the organization, an application, then they understand it, and validate it, and correct it,” says Pemberton.
One project in which the wheel visualizations have greatly helped is an effort to ensure that customers receive equally accurate information whether they contact USAA by phone, email or the Web. Before showing them the wheel, “Our executive sponsor and our infrastructure team felt they knew their space and only had to be involved with one space on the `wheel,’” says Senior Business Architect Amy Crockett. But with the wheel, “the managers had several ‘ah ha’ moments where they realized they needed to review other parts of the wheel to reach their business goals.” By encouraging this more complete review up-front, the “wheel” was able to improve customer satisfaction and reduce customer support costs by assuring they get more accurate information.
USAA’s architecture team has also learned that business leaders and managers understand the wheel best if the start of any process (such as the initial marketing contact with the customer) is at the top of the circle as that’s where peoples’ eyes focus first.
The time required to create the wheel is worth the effort because it avoids mistakes that would take longer to fix later. It also increases user acceptance of the resulting application because the users knew they were consulted early on. “If you find stakeholders early on and involve them, it reduces the resistance to change later,” Pemberton says.
With this more complete view of the organization’s infrastructure, business managers can do a better job of prioritizing investment, eliminating unneeded expenses and understanding exactly where business assets and IT assets are and are not delivering value to the business. This helps USAA be more effective, efficient, and agile in meeting its members’ needs.
To learn more about how USAA is using its “wheel” visualizations to communicate across the organization, click here
