What you don't see can cost you dearly

What you don't see can cost you dearly

How the technology, processes, and data in your company actually interrelate, and why enterprise architecture can be key to understanding it.

Business architecture is not something you paste on your wall and forget. It's the very map of how your business is interconnected. A living map that shows how strategies, processes, applications, people and data play together. And perhaps most importantly: how changes in one place can have consequences quite another.

I've seen time and time again how much insight lies in actually modeling the business. Not just in silos, but as a whole. It allows you to make better decisions, faster. It reduces risk. It creates common understanding. And it makes visible what you actually have, and what you might have thought you had.

It's all interconnected.

I've always had a fondness for graphs. Not in the sense of bar or line charts, but technical graphs with nodes and edges, or more simply explained dashes between boxes. For me, it's the most elegant and powerful way to model a business. Not just to see what you have, but to see how it all ties together.

A process is associated with an application, which in turn handles data, which is owned by a role, and which is involved in a strategy. When you see that picture, you suddenly see the whole.

Then you can, for example:

• Prevent downtime by understanding which systems are interconnected

• Avoid buying tools you already have

• Get control of your personal data and GDPR

• Assessing Maturity, Risk, and Lifespan of Applications

• Identifying skills gaps and responsibilities

• Prioritize digitization projects based on facts, not gut feeling

and much more..

A shared reality

One of the most valuable results of enterprise architecture is that it enables talking together. Across academic environments. Across management and technology. Across silos and wards.

When we model architecture and visualize it, we create a shared reality. A common language. Not a closed tribal language for the particularly interested, but an image everyone can relate to. This will make it easier to understand each other, easier to prioritize, and not least: easier to go in the same direction.

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From foundation to roof, from infrastructure to strategy

Business architecture is also about tying together the technical details with the big lines. Most often we talk about an “architecture pyramid” where:

• The foundation is infrastructure - Networks, platforms and technical foundation. Without this, nothing stands still.

• The next layer is systems, applications and data - the digital ecosystem and information flow that makes work possible.

• Further follows the capabilities, roles and organization - What the business is capable of doing, and who is responsible for what.

• Then comes Processes and Workflow - How work is actually carried out across systems and roles.

• At the top we find strategy, goals and value creation - Why we do what we do, and what direction we steer by.

Why we do what we do. What gives direction and creates value. Managers naturally relate to the top, while technologists work in the foundation. But with enterprise architecture, we can connect everything. Then you not only have a map of how the business is interconnected, you also have the compass. And when the map is updated and the compass points the right way, it becomes possible to navigate.

Good business management stands on the shoulders of good business architecture. For it is only when you understand the connections between strategy, processes, applications, roles and data that you can actually manage the whole with precision. You get a basis for decision based on insights, not assumptions.

With that overview, you can suddenly answer questions like:

• What needs to be put in place to achieve this goal?

• Which systems support which processes?

• What risks do we have to take into account before we change anything?

Planning in practice

The British Armed Forces has a simple but powerful mantra: “Proper Planning and Preparation Prevents Piss Poor Performance.” It may sound rough, but it hits.

Business architecture is precisely what this is all about: Planning well. Understand the contexts. Get an overview before you shop. For it is, after all, far cheaper to detect weaknesses in a model than in reality.

It works. I've seen it.

Through using enterprise architecture, I myself have:

• Prevented downtime

• Make tools visible to employees who didn't know they existed

• Reported on GDPR status with overview and peace of mind

• Mapped Digital Maturity and Priority Basis

• Identified risk, ownership and skills gap

And I still could. The point is that it works. It gives you control. Insight. And the opportunity to act before it's too late.

Business architecture is not just for architects. It's for leaders. For developers. For decision makers. For those who want to understand the whole.

Because what you don't see can actually cost you dearly.

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