Has in-person communication become the unwilling victim of technology?

by

In Enterprise Architecture, one of the most important aspects of the job is not only to communicate, but to lead change.  In other words, it is great to have the data to point to a problem in an enterprise.  It is better to help that enterprise overcome it by changing something (processes, technology, training, staff levels, departmental structures, roles and responsibilities, artifacts, governance mechanisms, etc).  Change requires more than simple communication.  It requires a kind of in-person, face-to-face, listening and hearing and absorbing interaction that is difficult or impossible over written mechanisms like e-mail, word documents, and powerpoint presentations.

Our technology has led us to the point, in modern business, that we consider outsourcing and remote work to be a net benefit for all involved, but each of these “distance” mechanisms introduces the RISK of poor communication.  That risk is magnified when the person on one end of the line is hoping to change something that the person on the other end is doing.  Change is harder across distance, and that difficulty becomes magnified when dealing with the array of different interactions that are needed at the enterprise level.

I wonder if the PC revolution, that brought us personal access to written communication, has created a deep reliance on written communication in corporate processes.  I wonder, further, if that access to technology isn’t directly harming our ability to look a person in the eyes and communicate with them.

As a culture, we have moved from the age of face-to-face all the way to text-messaging-someone-in-the-same-room in the course of a single generation. 

Enterprise Architecture is more difficult because of this shift in communication patterns.  All forms of face-to-face communication are hampered by it.

Modern technology has done more to damage interpersonal communication than any other paradigm shift in human history.

This worries me.

Link Collection — April 7, 2013

by

  • What’s Next in the Techonomy? — Hagel & Seely Brown

    “In the last few decades, we have witnessed a steady doubling in the price performance of digital technologies. However, we are reaching a tipping point of this exponential growth, and it is unclear how the cumulative effects of technology will reshape our economy, political systems, and collective future. One thing is clear: in the hands of existing institutions-firms, schools, non-profits, civic institutions and governments-this awesome technology will achieve only a fraction of its potential.

    Unfortunately, we haven’t seen the same exponential rate of change in institutions as we have in technology (Unlike computer chips, government and business structures don’t predictably get faster and less expensive). Managerial fiefdoms, rigid hierarchies and tightly scripted procedures remain from the industrial revolution era like vestigial structures; they were important at some point, but it’s unclear what purpose they serve now…”

    tags: innovation technology institutions

  • How To Think Like An Engineer ⚙ Co.Labs ⚙ code + community

    Good insights in here. If you already think this way, consider passing it along to folks who “don’t get your thought process”…

     “Excelling in business today means knowing how to think through technological abstraction and ambiguity. Here, we listen in as engineers discuss this very skill–and decode their secrets for how to hone it.”

    tags: thinking engineer

  • Big Data’s Promise and Limitations : The New Yorker

    “Big Data can be especially helpful in systems that are consistent over time, with straightforward and well-characterized properties, little unpredictable variation, and relatively little underlying complexity.

    But not every problem fits those criteria; unpredictability, complexity, and abrupt shifts over time can lead even the largest data astray. Big Data is a powerful tool for inferring correlations, not a magic wand for inferring causality.”

    tags: bigdata

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

AGILE architecture vs. agile ARCHITECTURE

by

As an architect involved in an agile implementation (my current gig), you can imagine how interested I was to see that there’s a new book on Agile Architecture, and perhaps how disappointed I was to see that it focused on SOA and Cloud.  That’s not to put down SOA or the cloud.  I’m a huge fan of both.  But it wasn’t the area of agility that I was hoping that a book, with that title, would address.  The misunderstanding was mine, not the authors.  I haven’t read the book yet, but I’m sure I will.

That moment of misunderstanding crystallized a thought: how even a two word phrase like “agile architecture” had two completely different meanings.  The opening scene of the movie “The Hobbit, An Unexpected Journey,” puts a rather humorous twist on this idea, when Gandalf introduces himself to Bilbo Baggins (who has apparently forgotten having met him as a boy).

Bilbo: Good Morning

Gandalf: What do you mean? Do you wish me a good morning, or mean that it is a good morning whether I want it or not;

Bilbo: <stunned silence>

Gandalf: Or that you feel good this morning; or that it is a morning to be good on?

Bilbo: All of them at once, I suppose.

Of course, in Enterprise Architecture, we have the same problem.  Does Enterprise Architecture mean “the practice of using technology architecture at an enterprise-wide scale,” or does it mean “the practice of using architectural ideas to shape the enterprise itself?” 

And after a bit of stunned silence, perhaps it means

“Creating an architecture to describe the externalities of an enterprise to set its context and improve the relationships it has with customers, partners, and suppliers?” 

All of them at once, I suppose.

Having just re-watched the Hobbit movie on my morning flight, these bits connected up in my head.

I’m proud to be both an architect of agility (applying the principles of agility to the processes of a business so that the business achieves the ability to change its own processes in response to agile demands), as well as a person who can craft technology architecture that reflects the notion of agility itself (technology that can be set up to change rapidly in response to business events).

All of them at once, I suppose.

The Open Group Speakers Discuss Enterprise Architecture, Business Architecture and Enterprise Transformation

by

By Dana Gardner, Interarbor Solutions Listen to the recorded podcast here: Expert Panel Explores Enterprise Architecture and Business Architecture as Enterprise Transformation Agents, or read the transcript here. Dana Gardner: Hello, and welcome to a special BriefingsDirect Thought Leadership interview series, coming to you in conjunction with The Open Group Conference on April 15, in … … Continue reading →

The System Context Diagram

by

We use a system context diagram in the early stages of our Investigative Architecture™ process. It provides a high level functional view of a system and, while it is very powerful for the early stages of functional design, it also ensures you have identified any functional needs that impact the non-functional, or architectural, aspects of […]

Metrics for qualitative requirements

by

Just how should we handle qualitative requirements in system-design and enterprise-architecture? Should we, for example, reframe them into quantitative terms, as metrics – because it’s a lot easier to keep track of ‘measurable things’? Over the past couple of days…

Capabilities Demystified – Part 3

by

Assessing Business Capabilities Business capabilities have quickly become the core element of most business architecture models. Their appeal is largely driven by three factors. First, business leaders at all levels find capabilities an appealing and useful way to think about growing their organization’s impact. Second, capabilities are versatile, easily applied to high level strategic activities […]