Aggregated enterprise architecture wisdom
Back on the toolsets theme, what’s the Why behind all this focus on a new type of toolset? Why won’t the existing toolsets do the job? In practice, the core concern is as per the previous post ‘Toolsets, pinball and un-dotting…
Some years ago, I was engaged in a discussion with leadership peers on tackling a particularly challenging issue that seemingly had no answer to satisfy the trifecta of ambitions, resource constraints and ability to execute. We’ve all been in this meeting. You circle until one of two things happens. Some person or faction gives in, […]
While in every day operations the lack of proper management practices is easy to conceal, this would most likely fail the company at its first large transformation.
Toward the end of 2014 an American legend walked off-stage. Stephen Colbert wrapped his final episode of the pseudo-politically-charged Colbert Report before preparing to take over David Letterman’s Late Show post. I’m personally sad to see him go, as he brought political awareness to the masses, albeit it through a comedic lens. Throughout all the laughs, sarcasm and pageantry, one thing was certain: Colbert’s favorite pastime was ribbing the federal government for bureaucratic inefficiency.
It’s true that the government gets a bad rap for being inefficient, redundant and slow-moving. However, in 2014 we witnessed a spike in federal agencies innovating IT to fly in the face of that perception. We saw agency CIOs, CTOs and enterprise architects employing enterprise intelligence to make government IT operations more manageable, cost-effective and even secure.
For example, FedScoops’s Greg Otto interviewed Department of Energy Chief Architect Rick Lauderdale on how he used enterprise intelligence from Troux, hardware and software lifecycle data from BDNA and a team of just three data experts to deliver on-demand reports highlighting potential cybersecurity vulnerabilities related to end-of-life technology assets. Government Computer News (GCN) reporter John Moore also picked up on the story, noting that the DoE’s approach could be a revolutionary model for other branches:
“Dismissed as little more than ‘shelfware’ over the years, enterprise architecture is now getting a fresh look as an approach for addressing specific IT problems, including enhancing agency cybersecurity defenses,’ Lauderdale said.”
Another case of government organizations using EA to move in a more modernized, streamlined direction belongs to the Census Bureau, which implemented an EA initiative led by CTO Avi Bender and Chief Enterprise Architect Necarsia McKinnon. McKinnon also spoke with FedScoop about Census’ progress along its 10-step EA framework, which is allowing it to remedy “more than 1,500 IT products and 1,000 business applications that were either overly redundant or one-off solutions that could have easily been shared services.” This customized program is helping the Census Bureau’s internal development shops integrate and collaborate on making the census a purely digital data collection campaign by 2020.
If you read all the way to the end of the FedScoop article on Census, you’ll see that McKinnon is incredibly proud of the progress the agency has made thus far, but isn’t resting on her laurels. She already has plans to drive further innovation and results. That shared ambition by the DoE and Census for continuing to stretch the imaginative use-cases of EA is especially important as the role of IT evolves across the federal government – a prime example being the predicted trend of responsibility for federal cybersecurity falling to IT departments just as often as it does to CSOs.
Frankly, if Colbert was into IT, I’m pretty sure he (even in all his hilarity and wit) would have a tough time poking holes in the positive impact enterprise intelligence has had on the government of late.
For further detail on the EA program that Rick Lauderdale has seen such success with at the Department of Energy, check out this third-party case study written by an IDC analyst or listen back to the webinar we hosted with Mr. Lauderdale.
To find out more about how the U.S. Census Bureau is using the Troux Platform, please read our case study.
Download our whitepaper, The Power of Enterprise Intelligence, to learn more about how our solutions help decision-makers take a step back to see the big picture to understand exactly where they should be investing in their business.
By The Open Group This is part one in a two part series. Professional development and training is a perpetually hot topic within the technology industry. After all, who doesn’t want to succeed at their job and perform better? Ongoing … Continue reading →
Digitization is creating a lot of opportunities, but with those opportunities come challenges. This is especially the case in financial services, where digitization is causing noticeable disruption. Banks are going to have to make some radical changes if they want to stay profitable and relevant to a broad range of customers. What is happening in […]
Strategy execution remains a challenging task for many organizations. The ‘Digital Enterprise’ requires major business transformations, delivered at speed. Most organizations are in a constant state of change. The ‘unfreeze-change-freeze’ model, reasoning from the current to a desired future state, no longer applies; the current state is always in flux and the future state is a moving target.
Strategy+Business has just published an interesting article about how companies are making data a source of sustainable growth. It’s not a new topic – data architects have long recognized the need to treat data as a treasured corporate assets. The article is called “The Quantified Self Goes Corporate”
In the world of Audit[1], a Control[2][3] is basically a mechanism allowing to validate that an organization is functioning in an effective[4] and efficient[5] manner. It is also a way to reveal potential risks, areas of improvement and anti-patterns[6]. Controls allow to assess the gap between the reality and the perception we have of it. […]
Colorado Springs, CO, USA — Jan. 27, 2015 – John A. Zachman is set to present at The Open Group Conference in San Diego, CA on Feb. 3, 2015.
The division of labour has been the main principle for structuring organisations in the last two centuries. That is still the dominant approach for allocating resources, information and power in companies and public institutions. The new dynamics in a connected world have revealed a rich spectrum of problems related with these structures ranging from ineffective coordination to […]
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