Enterprise architecture

Enterprise architecture is not just a popular term used by technologists. It is the continuous practice of describing the organisation, processes and technology of a business, their relationships to each other and to their environment, in order to identify business opportunities and improve the management of change. A simple way to think about this is as follows:

• Architecture is about "stuff". The stuff we have today, and stuff we may have in future
• Enterprise architects help us to understand and optimise this "stuff"

Enterprise architecture is frequently mistaken to be an "IT" activity.  Information technology is just a sub-set of the technologies in a business environment. Technology architecture, Information architecture, Business Process modelling, Business Analysis, Security Architecture etc are all processes and tools used to help describe aspects of an enterprise, and as such are sub-sets of Enterprise Architecture.

Many enterprise architects make a great deal of noise about methods and tools. These are generally not very important. What matters is the quality of understanding of the business, and the quality of thinking about change. Visio and a spreadsheet can often provide everything else.  Generally an architect will consider the following dimensions of a problem:

• Business context - strategy, goals, processes, organisation, operating models etc.
  
• Information - models of the data and metadata that describe the relevant aspect of business process, organisation, products and services.
  
• Systems - the IT applications / other mechanisms that are used by the business. The versions used, their interfaces, messages and data flows.
  
• Technology - the technological components (in the broadest sense) that enable systems and process to execute. The versions used, how they are configured and their capacity and capability.

Of the above activities, understanding business context and process are critical.  However, the good change manager recognises that PEOPLE are really the most important factor in the design of change.