Search Results for: open group

The Journey from Visibility to Governance to Standardization to Reuse

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Firms need to have a single picture to guide their efforts, to build a “foundation for execution” as described in Enterprise Architecture as Strategy[1].  It is not enough to have a single picture of the vision, mission and strategies of the firm.  Firms will need to decide what business processes need to be standardized and what data need to be integrated.  There is no right answer, but not having a common picture will mean that different parts of the firm will be building to their own visions.

However, I noticed through my interviews with CIOs that not many companies had this single picture.  In fact, on probing further, some of them were not able to provide a high-level, organization-wide view of their organizations’ processes.  As such, I postulated that organizations must mature through two stages before they can get to the standardization (and integration) stage. 

Even star war troopers need mirrors!
photo credit: Kalexanderson
Firstly, they need to firstly establish an organization-wide, regularly updated view of the current situation in their organizations.  This is akin to individuals looking into the mirror to decide what to change about their appearances.  Similarly, organizations need visibility into their current state before they can decide what to standardize and what to leave alone.  This is not a trivial exercise, especially in large organizations.  Creating a current view from scratch can take months; keeping the view updated as the organization changes is an even bigger challenge.

Can you tell if something is out of line?
photo credit: chekobero
Second, organizations also need to have strong governance processes in place, so that changes to existing processes and data are channeled through a common approval body.  How can any organization standardize unless all changes and new initiatives are checked against standardization requirements?  In many of the organizations I studied that had mature EA practices, the organizations had strong governance in place.  The Enterprise Architecture team was involved in approving new business initiatives, to ensure that the initiatives are not deviating from the organization’s standardization and integration vision.  Without such a governance framework in place, standardization is just talk that has no teeth to be realized.  It is possible for organizations to have strong governance first before having visibility.  However, as mentioned above, organizations will need to establish visibility before they can move into the standardization stage.

Re-use seems to be a long way off for many organizations.  Or is it?  Maybe a iterative approach with fast and short iterations will work?  I will be keen to hear from your experience of standardization and reuse.

[1] Enterprise Architecture as Strategy by Jeanne W. Ross, Peter Weill and David C. Robertson    

The Journey from Visibility to Governance to Standardization to Reuse

by

Firms need to have a single picture to guide their efforts, to build a “foundation for execution” as described in Enterprise Architecture as Strategy[1].  It is not enough to have a single picture of the vision, mission and strategies of the firm.  Firms will need to decide what business processes need to be standardized and what data need to be integrated.  There is no right answer, but not having a common picture will mean that different parts of the firm will be building to their own visions.

However, I noticed through my interviews with CIOs that not many companies had this single picture.  In fact, on probing further, some of them were not able to provide a high-level, organization-wide view of their organizations’ processes.  As such, I postulated that organizations must mature through two stages before they can get to the standardization (and integration) stage. 

Even star war troopers need mirrors!
photo credit: Kalexanderson
Firstly, they need to firstly establish an organization-wide, regularly updated view of the current situation in their organizations.  This is akin to individuals looking into the mirror to decide what to change about their appearances.  Similarly, organizations need visibility into their current state before they can decide what to standardize and what to leave alone.  This is not a trivial exercise, especially in large organizations.  Creating a current view from scratch can take months; keeping the view updated as the organization changes is an even bigger challenge.

Can you tell if something is out of line?
photo credit: chekobero
Second, organizations also need to have strong governance processes in place, so that changes to existing processes and data are channeled through a common approval body.  How can any organization standardize unless all changes and new initiatives are checked against standardization requirements?  In many of the organizations I studied that had mature EA practices, the organizations had strong governance in place.  The Enterprise Architecture team was involved in approving new business initiatives, to ensure that the initiatives are not deviating from the organization’s standardization and integration vision.  Without such a governance framework in place, standardization is just talk that has no teeth to be realized.  It is possible for organizations to have strong governance first before having visibility.  However, as mentioned above, organizations will need to establish visibility before they can move into the standardization stage.

Re-use seems to be a long way off for many organizations.  Or is it?  Maybe a iterative approach with fast and short iterations will work?  I will be keen to hear from your experience of standardization and reuse.

[1] Enterprise Architecture as Strategy by Jeanne W. Ross, Peter Weill and David C. Robertson    

Architecture Styles

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This article is also available as a PDF document. Could businesses benefit from applying different architectural styles to design systems in different areas of the enterprise, just as cities apply different architectural styles for designing Cathedrals, Town Halls, and Bazaars? Applying different architectural styles would practically imply that when designing a system for finance we […]

#ogChat Summary – Walled Garden Networks

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Didn’t catch the walled garden tweet jam? Here is the official summary of the event. Continue reading →

EA in the icefjord

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Enterprise Firn and Other Excuses Retreat for CxOs and enterprise architects Ilulissat, Greenland 24-28 August 2012 Join me at this special location in exploring the concept enterprise firn and other emerging concepts in enteprise architecture. Located on the west coast of Greenland, 250 km north of the Arctic Circle, Greenland’s Ilulissat Icefjord is the sea mouth …read more

Link Collection — June 17, 2012

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  • Data Scientist (n.): Person who is better at stati

  • Why We Need More IT Leadership, Not Less – Valuedance

    “We don’t really need executives to blog, friend, or tweet, but we do need them to understand how their current IT capabilities stack up against the competition; how IT-enabled changes to business processes and information could enhance the customer experience; and what it means to sponsor a project, drive IT adoption, and realize value from IT-enabled investments.  It’s time (actually way past time) for executives to assume personal accountability for understanding and managing IT and to cascade digital accountability and authority down through their organizations by incorporating IT-smarts in job descriptions and hiring criteria.”

    tags: cio leadership susancramm

  • Rafael Nadal demonstrates Babolat Play & Connect interactive tennis racquet

    This is ‘data-gadget-sports’ cool. And hey, my tennis game has nowhere to go but up.

    “But tech can also make us better athletes by providing us with information about our sporting performance – whether it’s shoes which log a basketball player’s jumps, or outfits which give dancers feedback about their moves. Tennis players could soon be getting in on the tech-helping-hand action with the introduction of an interactive racquet.”

    tags: tennis babolet data

  • The Functional Art: An Introduction to Information Graphics and Visualization: An information graphics and visualization reading list

    Good list. I’ve read some — Roam, Tufte, Yau.

    Perhaps this one should be next for me:

    2. Nigel Holmes on Information Design, by Steven Heller (Amazon)The art director of The New York Times interviews one of the best infographics designers ever. 140 pages of insight.

    tags: information graphics visualization

  • When Venture Capitalists Become IT Consultants – Businessweek

    I see this with my clients. Establishing relationships with VCs is a part of a good listening post strategy

    “When Equinix (EQIX) Chief Information Officer Brian Lillie wants new business tools, he seeks advice from a venture capitalist, bypassing sources like IT consultants or the biggest names in enterprise software.

    He takes that unusual route because many of the latest innovations in cloud computing and software-as-a-service are coming from startups, not enterprise mainstays like Oracle (ORCL) or International Business Machines (IBM). Venture backers who get early looks at emerging companies as they consider cash infusions can be the best guides to the most promising new technology.

    tags: CIO CTO VC

  • Chevron explores the use of open source software called Hadoop to reduce costs. – The CIO Report – WSJ

    ““The ship collects ridiculous amounts of data,” said Walker. Chevron gathers information that includes five dimensions – the x and y coordinates of both the wave’s source and target – along with the time it was collected. The company uses Hadoop software to sort that data. It’s one step in more than 25 steps Chevron takes with the data to create a picture for engineers to use to locate oil reservoirs. Chevron uses a supercomputer to create models and simulations of the underground environment.”

    tags: chevron open source hadoop

  • Technology Business Management Council Creates New IT Benchmark – The CIO Report – WSJ

    Good idea. Share experience and metrics in commodity stuff. Free up CIO agenda for differentiating uses of technology.

    “A new non-profit group, launched today during a videoconference attended by over 500 members, says it wants to help CIOs by developing best practices and benchmarks they can use to run their IT organizations. The new group, the Technology Business Management Council, is an outgrowth of IT optimization services vendor Apptio, and inherits the vendor’s methodology for managing IT organizations. The organization’s governing council includes respected IT executives, including its co-chair, Cisco CIO Rebecca Jacoby, as well as First American Financial CIO Larry Godec and Clorox CIO Ralph Loura.

    The council is trying to address a problem CIOs have traditionally struggled to resolve– proving the value of the IT services their organizations provide, and making the case for IT investments the company needs to improve productivity and seize new market opportunities.”

    tags: IT management cio

  • How Starbucks is turning itself into a tech company | VentureBeat

    Similar to the creation of e-commerce groups in the 90s — mix of business and tech pros — organizations are now creating Digital Ventures for customer touching, revenue generating, business-technology (digital) capability. As e-commerce was led by tech-aware business exec (marketing), digital ventures are being run by Chief Digital Officers (CDO).

    This continues the bifurcation of classic IT into supporting and revenue lines.

    ‘Adam Brotman, formerly senior vice president of Starbucks Digital Ventures, was named to an entirely new executive role, chief digital officer. With the creation of the CDO role, all of Starbuck’s digital projects — web, mobile, social media, digital marketing, Starbucks Card and loyalty, e-commerce, Wi-Fi, Starbucks Digital Network, and emerging in-store technologies — were packaged together and placed under Brotman’s care.’

    tags: starbucks CDO

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

Related posts:

  1. Link Collection — June 3, 2012
  2. Link Collection — June 10, 2012
  3. Link Collection — February 5, 2012

Customer-Driven Conversation

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Understanding how to handle customer needs and expectations is critical to success. From better service levels to lower costs to new, innovative product offerings, the pressure is on for organizations to go above and beyond. And, as consumerization continues its exponential growth, organizations need to find better ways to meet the ever-changing demands of their […]

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Modelling mixed-value in Enterprise Canvas

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One of the more subtle problems in enterprise-architecture – in English-language, anyway – is the distinction between values (plural) and value (singular, but often used as plural). The Enterprise Canvas frame provides several useful methods via to disentangle an existing values-mess, and prevent getting into that kind of mess in the first place. In Enterprise Canvas, we […]

Announcing: Third Annual Enterprise Summer School

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Week 31 is for students and researchers as well as practitioners in the field of enterprise architecture, who want to spend a pracademic week together and share and learn more about EA. 
Dates: 30 July – 3 Aug 2012
Location: IT University of Copenhagen
REGISTER NOW
Themes:

EA as a Discipline and a […]