Enterprise Architecture planning is a blueprint that defines the use of IT infrastructure and information systems to achieve business strategies and objectives. It is a top-down approach clearly explaining the processes, information components, applications, and technology platforms that need to be implemented within different Enterprise Architecture frameworks to help accomplish targeted business outcomes while staying abreast of industry developments and disruptions.
How To Deliver Value to the Business with Enterprise Architecture Planning?
Enterprise Planning Architecture is critical to a company’s performance and success because it assists the organization in identifying the gap between the current state and the desired state, developing a plan to bridge the gap, sharing information across the organization, tracking performance, and reducing overall performance costs.
Some of the Ways Enterprise Architecture Planning Helps Deliver Value to Your Business
- It enables transparent collaboration between the IT departments and the other business units, which helps improve company operations.
- Provides a ready-made blueprint for tracking if the present architecture is per the long-term aims.
- Helps establish processes to evaluate and procure the latest technologies that are best fit to achieve the desired business objectives and stay ahead of their competitors
- It gives the business the ability to prioritize investments.
- Increase ROI by removing obsolete and needless technological infrastructure.
- Giving a comprehensive view of the Enterprise architecture and taking the help of the stakeholders involved during enterprise architecture planning can benefit the organization by increasing the chances of executive buy-in.
Different Frameworks Used for Enterprise Architecture Planning
Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF)
It is a famous enterprise architecture framework used for Enterprise Architecture Planning developed by the Open Group. TOGAF provides a high-level approach to planning, designing, implementing, and governing the Enterprise Architecture and model for business, application, data, and technology.
TOGAF helps businesses by helping them implement software technology in a structured and organized way such that business objectives are met by:
- Ascertaining that everyone speaks the same language.
- By standardizing open approaches to enterprise architecture, firms can avoid becoming enslaved to proprietary solutions.
- Saving time and cost along with efficient resource utilization
- Achieves measurable ROI
The Zachman Framework
Zachman Framework is a popular EA framework named after the pioneers who defined enterprise architecture. In this framework, six architectural focal points and six primary stakeholders help create a blueprint for the enterprise architecture.
The different views described in the Zachman framework are as follows.
- The planner’s view is a high-level overview of the business and the overall strategy
- The Owner’s View discusses critical business concepts
- A designer’s view examines how the system will meet the information needs of the organization
- The user’s view is an account of how the system is functioning in its operational setting
- The implementers’ view is a perspective on how the system will be constructed and what constraints it faces
- The sub constructor’s view shows in detail how each part of the system is implemented
- The user’s view is a view of the system as it operates in its operational environment
Each stakeholder is presented with the following questions: who, what, when, where, and how, resulting in a 36-category matrix that reveals the gaps and redundancies in the company that the Zachman framework may assist in tackling.
The Gartner Methodology
Gartner established this methodology for Enterprise Architecture Planning after acquiring the Meta Group in 2005; it is a practical methodology that can be implemented to achieve business outcomes in a few simple steps.
The Gartner Methodology helps bridge the gap between business strategy and technological implementation by bringing in the three key groups of stakeholders together- Business Executives, IT experts, and the people who implement these technologies.
The Gartner Methodology believes that uniting these three key groups of people under one common shared vision for the organization helps build a successful enterprise architecture that can be evaluated on tangible parameters such as minimized costs and higher ROI.
Conclusion
Enterprise Architecture Planning is required for every organization that wishes to incorporate new technologies, optimize business processes, increase automation, and ensure consistent future revenue production. It aids in aligning the goals and vision of everyone working in the organization to achieve optimal performance and efficiency.