Sharing experience as I help manage Microsoft Corp as an Enterprise Architect, Business Strategist, Business Performance Manager, Business Architect and Solution Architect. Twitter:@Gabriel_Morgan
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/gabriel_morgan/archive/2012/11/12/business-architect-skills-assessment.aspx
hi
http://www.mega.com/en/c/solution/p/ea/p2/business-architecture
http://www.mega.com/en/c/solution/p/ea
Hi
http://enterprisearchitect.blogs.ilrt.org/2012/10/13/what-are-the-benefits-of-benefits-maps/
I have been to a couple of JISC-sponsored events previously at which benefits maps were presented. It was claimed that they can be useful in helping a University to think about return on investment (ROI) in terms of strategic planning. So I suggested benefits maps as being of potential use when I ran an Enterprise Architecture-focussed workshop with the University’s decision-making body (the Portfolio Executive) in a workshop earlier this year. The group agreed to trial the approach and we have been doing quite a lot of work with this tool since then. I’ll give a brief account of this here……
;;__)))
Hi
One of the most often heard complaints about ArchiMate is that the concept Capability is missing. People often use ArchiMate’s Business Function for Capability as it comes closest. Are they right? And: What is ‘Capability’ and how should we model it in ArchiMate?
Capability is widely used as a concept in many different definitions, both in Enterprise Architecture and in natural language. For instance, TOGAF 9.1 gives the followingdefinition of Capability:
Capability: An ability that an organization, person, or system possesses. Capabilities are typically expressed in general and high-level terms and typically require a combination of organization, people, processes, and technology to achieve. For example, marketing, customer contact, or outbound telemarketing.
From an ArchiMate perspective, that sounds like (potential) behavior. But TOGAF also says this when it describes the Core Metamodel:
Function: Delivers business capabilities
Here, from an ArchiMate perspective, TOGAF’s Function sounds like an active object. And:
Function describes units of business capability at all levels of granularity The term “function” is used to describe a unit of business capability at all levels of granularity, encapsulating terms such as value chain, process area, capability, business function, etc. Any bounded unit of business function should be described as a function.
Here, the description of Function casts a very wide net which not so much deliversbut encapsulates Capability. And also when discussing ‘implementing’ an Architecture (the domain of ArchiMate’s Migration Extension) TOGAF says:
Capability: A business-focused outcome that is delivered by the completion of one or more work packages. Using a capability-based planning approach, change activities can be sequenced and grouped in order to provide continuous and incremental business value.
Work Package: A set of actions identified to achieve one or more objectives for the business. A work package can be a part of a project, a complete project, or a program.
Are you confused yet? I am, but probably that is because I am not TOGAF certified (anymore — I did the 8.1.1 certification a few years ago). Anyway, TOGAF 9 uses (and as we know from Uncle Ludwig: meaning lies hidden in use) ‘capability’ as a concept mostly when discussing realizing an architecture (e.g. in ‘capability based planning’) and secondly as something that is encapsulated by a Function. TOGAF’s idea of what a Function is differs fundamentally from what ArchiMate says it is. While ArchiMate’s functions are purely behavioral siblings of separate active objects (‘the other side of the same coin’), in TOGAF Function seems more like an form of GOFBF (see also section 10.3 in theMastering ArchiMate book), a mixture of active and behavioral objects. It also makes the ease with which many use the Business Function concept from ArchiMate for Capability slightly suspect. Do they have ArchiMate’s function concept or GOFBF in their mind when they use the word ‘function’? Are they ”bewitched by language” as Uncle Ludwig would have it? Or are they satisfied with what ArchiMate offers?
Such differences, by the way, make plans to integrate TOGAF and ArchiMate fraught with peril: though names of concepts may be the same (think ‘Function’) their meaning is quite different in both standards and trying to link them will be difficult in the extreme as you have either to fundamentally adapt one of the current meanings or you have to live with the utter confusion of two related but different meanings (‘uses’) for the same word. Before you know it, you will be, as suggested above, “bewitched by language“. It seems that for any chance of success with respect to integration, TOGAF could adopt ArchiMate’s metamodel of the enterprise and re-phrase its method. Adoption the other way around (apart from some additions like Capability that can be made in the proper ArchiMate way, see below) would probably destroy the unique contribution of ArchiMate: looking at active versus behavioral concepts to describe multiple aspects of what is essentially one ‘thing’.
Now, TOGAF’s metamodel sometimes seems not a metamodel about the enterprise, it sometimes feels like a metamodel about the artifacts of enterprise architecture(TOGAF artifacts instead of enterprise artifacts) and its use (again, I am not a TOGAF expert). ArchiMate on the other hand, has a metamodel that consists of artifacts that are about the enterprise (the artifacts in the extensions are meant for modeling changeand architecture). So, when TOGAF talks about ‘capability’ it is often in the context of capabilities that are realized by ‘implementing an architecture’ via ‘work packages’ which sounds like a metamodel for enterprise change instead of a metamodel for enterprise.
Still, these concepts are close enough and the first definition given above seems pretty usable to me from an ArchiMate perspective. So, I will start from the TOGAF definition of Capability (the first one, not the second one) and see where that takes me when looking at it from the ArchiMate side. In fact, I am looking here at how ArchiMate could get inspiration from TOGAF.
From ArchiMate’s perspective, what a business produces are Services and these are — in ArchiMate — purely behavioral objects (though in principle always linked to an Interface— an active object). ArchiMate is a bit skimpy on allowing passive objects to be produced. ArchiMate’s Product concept aggregates Services and a Contract, and that’s it. No Interface or other active objects at all. No passive objects other than Contract. So, if your business for instance builds web sites to customers, you can model the offering of a ‘web site building’ Service, but you cannot model the ‘web site’ code itself as part of the ArchiMate Product. That seems to be an omission in ArchiMate. I think it would be a good idea to have the possibility to aggregate a Business Object as well in a Product, then the Business Object could be ‘web site’ and this one is realized by — for instance — a zip file (Artifact) with a Joomla setup. But I digress.
So, given that Capability, as defined initially above, is missing from ArchiMate, how would we add it? My initial thought would be to create a concept related to Product. Before everybody gets bored by the lack of illustrations in this post, here is a first attempt:
http://masteringarchimate.com/2012/12/27/missing-from-archimate-business-capability/#more-617
;;_))
hi
http://www.harris-management-solutions.com/business-capability.html
Effective business capability involves a business having the structure and capability that will enable it to develop and grow to reach its full potential. As well as having a good organizational structure, the business needs to have good governance, clear lines of accountability, and have effective leadership.
Once a sound strategy and a business plan is developed, it will become clear what capabilities the business will need for the future. The key things that need to be considered regarding organizational capability are:
• The ownership structure of the business
• The business competences that are needed to compete effectively in the marketplace
• Capability development stages
• The design of the management and organizational structure
• Strategic alliances
• Access to professional advisors
• The responsibilities of business owners, principals or directors
• Business risks and business continuity.
;;_))
hi
Intervista – Canada
http://www.intervista-institute.com/educational.php
Business Architecture outline course
Day 1 | Day 2 & 3 | Course Fees | PDF Version | ShareThis
Day 1 – Strategy, Innovation and Business Architecture
1. The innovation imperative.
Challenges of business agility.
3. Real World Business Architecture.
Drives and imperatives for business architecture.
4. Identifying a Strategic Roadmap.
Getting started: Analysis of business.
5. From strategy to Business Architecture.
Bridging the gap.
In this interactive workshop, team members use a real world case study to understand the strategy of
introducing a direct self-service channel.
Days 2 & 3 Implementing Business Architecture for the Client-Centric Enterprise
1. Fundamentals of enterprise models.
Managing change.
2. Business services design.
Modeling for a client-centric world.
6. Modeling business processes.
Living in a world of distributed and virtual services.
7. Capturing policy and business rules.
Gaining enterprise agility.
8. From over-the-counter to 24/7.
A world of disintermediation.
9. Patterns in the business environment.
The power of reference models.
10. Managing the transformation portfolio.
The reality of priorities.
11. Building the business blueprint.
Achieving the adaptive enterprise.
Enterprise Architecture Course
Course Outline | Course Fees | PDF Version | ShareThis
2 Day Course - Understanding Enterprise Architecture
Framework Fundamentals
1. The innovation imperative.
Business drivers for Enterprise Architecture.
3. Addressing the paradoxical challenge.
Rapid delivery & enterprise infrastructure.
4. Behind the scenes.
EA implementation essentials.
5. For good measure.
The role of EA standards in successful implementation.
6. Planning the work.
Enterprise Architecture methodologies.
7. Working the plan.
Enterprise Architecture practicalities.
;;_))
Hi
http://isismjpucher.wordpress.com/2009/05/14/why-a-business-architecture/
May 14, 2009 by Max J. Pucher
The main goal of a Business Architecture (as a subset of Enterprise Architecture) is to enable the business to improve customer service quality through a better transparency, flexibility and adaptability of business operations. The market environment changes more rapidly and the use of technology by customers dramatically influences how a business can operate. Financial services calculation processes, marketing programs, business rules and content change already weekly rather than monthly. A BA includes both the definitions for a business strategy and business processes, which are linked through goals and outcomes.
However, if a business architecture has to be modeled, encoded and assembled by using a large number of tools and software components it cannot provide the benefits. Today’s heavily fragmented and hardcoded-integrated IT systems (including SOA) are too rigid to enable rapidly changing business environments. Most IT departments do not focus on adaptability and innovation because they have been requested to focus on lowering cost and system stability. Therefore, six month rollout cycles are the norm with three month being the exception. Business users expectations of stability and executive demands for lower cost are incompatible with the ability to achieve a flexible and adaptive, competitive IT infrastructure. Efficiency is still the main IT goal, with effectiveness a far-off second and agility being no more than an overused buzzword….
;;_))
