External Business Environment

(Economy, technology, society, demography, legislation, regulation, competitors, partners, suppliers, customers, etc.)

Fundamental Urgent
Environmental Business
Factors Needs
Initiative N (Business Initiative with IT Component)
Strategic Planning Questions Questions .....................
Goal: Articulate the long-term future course of action for business and IT
What role should IT play in
our organization?
What should IT deliver for the
business in the long run?
Initiative 1 (Business Initiative with IT Component)
Question: How is the business environment changing and what should we do Which IT capabilities should be Where should future business
to react on these changes? provided organization-wide? and IT investments go?

Instances: Single or several for highly decentralized organizations, e.g. one What IT-related policies should What types of IT investments
be complied with? should be made?
instance for each line of business
What level of business continuity
and security is required?
When should IT investments
be made?
Planned
Nature: Continuous and largely unstructured Which IT-related innovations In what sequence should IT Business
Integration: Integrated with regular strategic management activities, e.g. should be adopted? investments be made?
Needs Questions
environmental analysis, identification of competitive advantages and goals
formulation What does the proposed IT
solution look like?
Timing: Aligned to the annual business planning cycle, important business
dates, periods and events, e.g. ends of the financial year, board meetings or
How will the proposed IT solution Step 1:
updates of a business strategy Strategic Planning
modify our business processes?
What is the tactical and strategic
business value of the IT solution?
Initiation Initiative Delivery
Actors: Business Leaders and Architects What is the overall business
Dialog impact of the IT solution? Goal: Deliver optimal business and IT solutions for specific needs
EA Artifacts: Considerations and Visions, e.g. Principles, Policies, Business What are the costs and timelines Question: What is the best way to address the requested need and all the
Capability Models and Roadmaps (see Enterprise Architecture on a Page) of the proposed IT solution?
Business Leaders Architects associated requirements?
Other Documents: Organizational mission and values, strategic goals,
Instances: Multiple, one instance for each active initiative, e.g. project or
objectives, key performance indicators (KPIs) and balanced scorecards (BSCs) Cancelled program
as well as high-level strategic business plans Business Leaders
Initiatives
Content: Development of rules and directions for business and IT and their Outlines Dialog Nature: Sequential with two inherent steps: Initiation and Implementation
(see Enterprise Architecture on a Page)
explicit reflection in Considerations and Visions Considerations Visions Integration: Integrated with regular project and program management
activities, e.g. scoping, estimating, scheduling, budgeting and monitoring
(see Enterprise Architecture on a Page) (see Enterprise Architecture on a Page)
Activities: Informal discussions, meetings, presentations and workshops as 1. Overview and Goals
..................................
8. Business Process Changes
Process 1 Now (10 days in total):

well as periodical formal approvals and sign-offs Principle 1: Standardized Business Processes
2. Scope and Stakeholders Step 1 Step 2 Step 3 Timing: Linked to the established initiative delivery phases and gates, e.g.
Business Strategy ......................................... 3 days 5 days 2 days
Statement: ............................................. 3. Essential Requirements
Process 1 Will Be (5 days in total): scope, evaluate, plan, build, test and deploy
Techniques: SWOT and PEST analyses, Five Forces and other strategy Rationale: ............................................... Goal 1 Goal 2 Goal 3 ........................................
4. Business Benefits
Step 1 Step 2

frameworks Implications: ........................................... Capability 1 Capability 2 ..............................

5. Capability Impact
2 days

9. Architectural Overview
3 days
Architects
Principle 2: Single Customer View
Statement: .............................................
Capability 1.1

Capability 1.3
Capability 1.2

Capability 1.4
Capability 2.1

Capability 2.3
Capability 2.2

Capability 2.4
• Order Fulfilment (High)
• Order Management (Low)
• Customer Analytics (Low)
Step 1
Process 1
Step 2 Step 1: Initiation
Inputs: Fundamental factors of the external business environment Rationale: ............................................... 6. Involved Partners Client 1 App 1 App 2
• IBM
Implications: ........................................... Capability 3 Capability 4 • Accenture
Outputs: High-level strategic plans for business and IT reflected in Capability 3.1 Capability 3.2 Capability 4.1 Capability 4.2
7. Estimations
DB 1 DB 2
Actors: Business Leaders and Architects
Principle 3: Business Continuity
Considerations and Visions Time: 6-8 months
Cost: $1.2-1.5 million
10. Key Risks
...................
Statement: ............................................. Capability 3.3 Capability 3.4 Capability 4.3 Capability 4.4 EA Artifacts: Outlines, e.g. Solution Overviews and Options Assessments
Meaning: Strategy-to-portfolio, i.e. convert an abstract business strategy into Rationale: ...............................................
(see Enterprise Architecture on a Page)
Regular Important Strategic
more specific suggestions regarding the desired IT investment portfolio Implications: ...........................................

Other Documents: Business proposals and business cases

Strategic Strategic IT Content: Analysis of possible solution implementation options and their
Directions and Capabilities and explicit reflection in Outlines
Requirements Constraints Initiative Activities: Frequent discussions, presentations and approvals

Delivery Techniques: Business process modeling, customer journey mapping,

return-on-investment (ROI) and architecture debt estimation
Technology Optimization Standards
(see Enterprise Architecture on a Page)
Landscapes
(see Enterprise Architecture on a Page)

Delivery
Technology 1 Technology 2
Channels
Technology 1 Technology 2
CRM DB 1
Backup
BU App 1

Queue
Calls from
Step 2: Implementation
Applications and Integration App 6 Partners

Goal: Improve the overall quality of the organizational IT landscape Technology 1 Technology 2 Technology 3 Technology 4
(Plan)
App 2 App 3

Question: What is wrong with the current IT landscape and what should we Databases and Information Management
Update RPC

Enterprise Service Bus

Binary EJB

Designs Actors: Architects and Project Teams

Technology 1 Technology 2 Technology 3 Technology 4 (see Enterprise Architecture on a Page)
do to improve it? SOA REST Messaging EA Artifacts: Designs, e.g. Solution Designs and Preliminary Solution
Security and Access Management

Instances: Single or several for highly decentralized organizations, e.g. one App 5
App 7
(Plan) Reporting
1. Brief Overview 5. Data Architecture Designs (see Enterprise Architecture on a Page)
Technology 1 Technology 2 Technology 3 Technology 4 App 4
Technical ..........................
Table 1 Table 2
Other Documents: Business requirements and project management
instance for each business division Infrastructure and Networks DB 4 2. Goals and Objectives Column 1: Int
DB 1
Column 1: Char

Rationalization
(Plan) .................................... Column 2: Char Column 2: Clob
Technology 1 Technology 2 Technology 3 Technology 4 DB 3 ETL Warehouse 3. Detailed Requirements
.......................................
Column 3: Byte
1

6. Application Architecture
*
Column 3: Blob

Step 2: plans
Nature: Continuous and largely unstructured
Unsupported Current Emerging
DB 2
Suggestions 4. Solution Context Call
Form
Implementation
Process 1 App 1 App 2 Store

Integration: Not integrated with any regular processes or activities Step 1 Step 2
Rep ly Read
DB 1
Content: Development of Designs based on Outlines and then their
Client 1
7. Infrastructure Architecture
actual technical implementation
Timing: May be carried out independently without any systematic schedule, Internet

often on an as-necessary basis or even opportunistically, e.g. in the absence of

App 1 App 2 Linux
Server 1
Firewall Linux
Server 2 Activities: Daily collaborative work
VM 1 Hot
DB 1 DB 2
Techniques: User stories and MoSCoW requirements prioritization
Switch

other higher-priority activities

Technology Optimization
Standby
Server 1 Server 2 VM 2

method
Actors: Architects alone
EA Artifacts: Standards and Landscapes, e.g. Technology Reference Models, Architects Inputs: Specific business, and sometimes technical, needs
Guidelines, Landscape Diagrams and Inventories (see Enterprise Architecture Outputs: New working IT solutions
on a Page) Architects Updates and Questions Dialog Meaning: Need-to-solution, i.e. convert a specific need into a concrete IT
Other Documents: None solution addressing this need in the most optimal manner
Learnt Best What business requirements
should be addressed?
Content: Analysis of the current IT landscape, update of Standards and Practices
What new software should be
maintenance of Landscapes developed or installed?
Activities: Numerous informal discussions and periodical formal approvals Which data types and entities Project Teams
Techniques: Total cost of ownership (TCO) and architecture debt
Questions Questions should be used?

management What servers and hardware

What technologies and vendor What IT assets are maintained should be deployed?
products are used? by our organization?
How should new IT systems
Inputs: Current structure of the organizational IT landscape What approaches and best Which IT assets are barely used or interact with the existing ones?
practices are followed? provide similar functionality?
Outputs: Technical rationalization suggestions reflected in Standards and
Which technologies and products Which IT assets are no longer
Landscapes
are redundant or duplicated? supported by their vendors?
Meaning: Structure-to-rationalization, i.e. understand the current structure of Which technologies, products or Which IT assets may become
the IT landscape and formulate the rationalization strategy to guide its future approaches cause troubles? problematic in the future?
evolution Do the current technologies and Are the existing IT assets fit for
approaches meet our needs? our general business needs?

Structure of New
the Current IT Working IT
Landscape Solutions

Organizational IT Landscape
Primary Flow Secondary Flow (Existing information systems, applications, integration platforms, databases, network and server infrastructure, etc.) Enterprise Architecture Practice on a Page v1.0 (http://eaonapage.com)
Svyatoslav Kotusev (http://kotusev.com)