Enterprise Architecture
Define where you want to go.
Discover what you have.
Plan your transformation.
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An enterprise architecture (EA) is a conceptual tool that assists organizations with the understanding of
their own structure and the way they work. It provides a map of the enterprise and is a route planner for
business and technology change.
The EA models provide an ever-increasing level of detail about the enterprise, including:
Its objectives and goals.
Its processes and organization.
Its systems and data.
The technology used.
Read More: EA Blog
The intent of enterprise architecture is to determine how an organization can most effectively achieve
its current and future objectives.
Advantages of having enterprise architecture include:
- Improved decision making – it’s easier to make decisions when the objectives and goals are
defined and data regarding the organization’s processes, systems, and technology exist and
can be easily accessed. .
- Improved adaptability to changing demands or market conditions – the impact of any
change can be quickly identified, evaluated and confronted.
- Elimination of inefficient and redundant processes – once the entire processes are mapped
it’s easier to identify the inefficient and redundant processes.
- Optimization of the use of organizational assets – Understanding what organizational assets
exist gives a clear visibility to the organization and allows optimizing their use.
- The quality and timeliness of business information – Mapping of the processes, organization,
system and data allow getting a hold of the required business information, when it’s needed.
- Ensuring that money spent on information technology (IT) can be justified –The clear definition
of the objectives and goals and the direction that the company wants to go to make it easier to understand
whether IT costs are justifiable and meet the company’s goal.
First we need to map the current situation, understand where are at; what business processes exist,
which systems, what technology is used, etc. Once we know where we are, we want to define where we
want to be, where we want to go to; what are our company’s goal. This will allow us to do an analysis of
the gaps put in place a plan that will allow us to do the required work to achieve our goals and objectives.
Enterprise architects use various business methods and tools to understand and document the structure
of an enterprise. In doing so, they produce documents and models that describe the logical organization
of business strategies, metrics, business capabilities, business processes, information resources,
business systems, and networking infrastructure within the enterprise. There are a number of common
frameworks for enterprise architecture such as:
- DoDaF (Department of Defense Architecture Framework) - All major U.S. Government Department of
Defense weapons and information technology system acquisitions are required to develop and document
an EA using the views prescribed in the DoDAF
- TOGAF (The Open Group Architecture Framework)
- Zachman Framework
- MODAF - The British Ministry of Defense Architectural Framework (MODAF) originally developed
by the UK Ministry of Defense. The purpose is to provide a rigorous system of systems definition when
procuring and integrating defense systems.
- FEAF (Federal Enterprise Architecture Framework)- Promotes shared development for US federal
processes, interoperability, and sharing of information among US federal agencies and other
governmental entities.
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