Advancing Enterprise Architecture Maturity

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Advancing Enterprise Architecture Maturity
Concept Level January 7,2003
IAC EA SIG Draft This is a work in progress
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Agenda

• Credits
• Background
• Purpose of White Paper
• Successful Practices for On-Going EA Development
• IAC Recommendations
• General Recommendations
• FEA Alignment Recommendations

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Credits

• Authors
• Name Organization E-Mail Address
• Chander Ramchandani CSC
  cramchan_at_csc.com
• Andrew Dziewulski SAIC Andrew.M.Dziewul
  ski_at_saic.com
• Jim Iannuzzi MSD, Inc. jiannuzzi_at_msdinc.com
  
• Michael Tiemann ATT Michael.tiemann_at_grcits
  c.com
• Peter Rothschild SRA
  International Peter_Rothschild_at_sra.com
• Roger Menzel
  SAIC Roger.A.Menzel_at_saic.com
•  
• Acknowledgements
• The authors would like to thank the following
• The IAC Enterprise Architecture (EA) Special
  Interest Group (SIG) leadership team Puvvada
  Venkatapathi (PV), Davis Roberts and John Dodd
  for their sponsorship of this white paper
• SAIC for providing the resources for hosting team
  meetings and for providing editorial and
  publication support for the paper
• CSC participants in the IRS Enterprise
  Architecture (EA) development program
• SAIC and Management Systems Designers
  participants in the INS EA development program,
  and SAIC personnel supporting the U.S. Customs
  capital planning initiatives

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Background
 

• Agencies confronted with dual challenges of EA
  development going forward
• Many agencies are currently struggling with
  completing their enterprise architectures GAO
  audit showed fewer than 10 agencies at Stages 4
  or 5 in the maturity model
• New challenge facing agencies alignment with
  the FEA PMO reference models to minimize
  cross-agency redundancies
• Need for joint agency/OMB efforts
• Minimize derailment/breakage of previous IT
  management improvements

 
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New Challenges Facing Agencies

• Goals
• EA that provides measurable business value
• Implemented in a series of integrated, value
  enhancing steps

• Challenges
• Focus on Business needs
• Develop Business Line
• Architectures
• Align with FEAF Reference
• Models
• Manage EAs across the Federal Government

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Cross-Government EA Management
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Purpose
 

• To describe successful practices and pitfalls to
  avoid for ongoing agency EA development
• Successful practices that go beyond FEAF
  Guidebook published by CIO Council
• Activities selected based on experience of
  authors
• Federal, State, Local Government and commercial
  experience
• Proving to be a significant implementation
  challenge to many agencies
• Provide high added value to agencies in
  completing their EAs
• Intended to be representative, not comprehensive
• To provide recommendations on alignment with the
  emerging FEA reference models

 
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Scope - EA Activities Selected
 
Align with FEA

Provide Sponsorship
Develop a Marketing and Communications Plan
Plan the EA Program
Define Metrics Early
Manage EA Change
Obtain Organizational Buy-in
Tie the EA to the CPIC Process
Recognize and Leverage Thought Leadership
Conduct IVV
 
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Overview of Successful Practices

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Provide Sponsorship

• Successful Practices
• Provide Funding appropriate for program
• Provide realistic budget commensurate with size
  and scope of enterprise
• Fund all needed elements of program, including
  PMO and contractor support
• Ideally, separate line item in agency budget
• Provide resources across the agency committed to
  the fulfillment of the EA program
• Develop Sponsorship Network
•  Reinforce sponsorship by agency head through the
  organization in order for the EA program to
  receive the degree of cooperation from and
  participation by all needed stakeholders, or at a
  minimum, from the influential business units 
• Pitfalls
• Sponsorship provided after the EA program is
  underway, or
• Provided only in passing to a few senior managers
  with no further reiteration of the message

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Plan the EA

• Successful Practices
• Establish the Management Structure
• Maintain visibility into the EA process across
  leadership and management functions
• Business area management oversight of the EA
  process ensures alignment with the mission,
  vision, and business strategy of the agency.
• Specify Enterprise Architecture Scope, e.g.,
• Business versus technical architecture
• For example, technology considerations may not
  require as much initial emphasis in an
  organization requiring significant business
  transformation
• Scope and depth of as-is and to-be
  architecture
• Select Automated Tools
• Tool requirements should be identified early, and
  tested and demonstrated as part of the initial
  planning for the project
• Maximize easy access to EA across agency
• Pitfalls
• Making technology rather than the business the
  driver
• EA developed at too high a level limited value
  of results
• Current/target architectures developed at too
  detailed a level, jeopardizing completion within
  budget

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Develop the Marketing and Communications Plan

• Successful Practices
• Tie EA to employee opportunities and training
• Manage stakeholder expectations
• Particularly with respect to impact on business
  units
• Publish Successes
• Particularly important during the startup phase
  of an EA program
• Build team confidence in the EA program and
  accelerate buy-in and support by team members.
• Solicit feedbabck and act on recommendations
• Tap reservoir of insight
• Improve team morale
• Update to reflect changing needs
• Pitfalls
• Not using commonly used media
• Inadequate face-to-face communications
• Answers not obtained in a timely manner

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Develop the Metrics Early

• Successful practices
• Establish complementary IT and Business Metrics
• Enable the tracking and recording of the data
  required to report implementation results
• Determine if the ROI or cost/benefits have, are
  or will soon be achieved
• Establish  EA Program Metrics, e.g.,
• EA information repository should track the use of
  the information, by whom and when, translate into
  opportunity and cost avoidance
• Reuse of data objects and associated
  consolidations to measure cost avoidance
• Pitfalls
• Failing to identify and collect the data that can
  substantiate the impact of the EA on the
  enterprise and its business processes
• Collecting cycle time and statistics relative to
  the supporting technologies but not making it
  relevant to the business

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Obtain Organizational Buy-In

• Successful Practices
• Recognize Organizational Structure
• Accommodate existence of an EA above or below the
  level where the EA is targeted.
•  An EA developed at the agency level must allow
  bureaus to develop EAs that are suitable for
  their business needs
• Design EA for Organizational Structure
• Design a modular EA, so that organizational
  subunits may implement the pieces that they
  require
• Provide Implementation Support
• Business units more likely to buy-in if
  implementation assistance is provided for the EA
• Demonstrate feasibility of the EA via a test bed
• Consider having some of the more respected and
  influential subunits implement the EA first, and
  then assist other subunits
• Pitfalls
• Assuming that the CIO, agency head, or other top
  official can force an EA onto a large agency
• Developing an EA that is a one size fits all
  approach
• May have to offer the choice of a large, medium,
  and small size solution
• Offering so many choices that EA does not bring
  the benefits of standardization and common
  practices

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Leverage Thought Leadership

• Successful Practices
• Identify thought leaders
• EAs require highly creative thinking to provide
  maximum benefit to the enterprise
• May require allowing thought leaders to emerge
  even from unexpected quarters
• Provide training on nurturing thought leadership
• Include as part of project management training,
  personnel leadership training, or other suitable
  forums
• Pitfalls
• Assuming that the thought leadership must or will
  come from the CIO or agency head
• Failing to recognize a thought leader when one
  begins to emerge
• May not be a vocal or aggressive person, and must
  be encouraged and nurtured
• Insisting that the thought leader be an
  individual
• A group or committee could develop a common
  vision
• Assigning a thought leader
• Believing that thought leadership is too nebulous
  to define or recognize

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Tie the EA Sequencing Plan into the CPIC Process

• Successful practices
• Establish a well-documented and
  automation-supported review and evaluation plan,
  e.g.,
• Example DOE review of Form 300s using explicit
  criteria, guidance to creating offices on
  correcting deficiencies
• Assess Project implementations and incorporate
  changes into the EA as needed 
• Pitfalls to avoid
• Establishing too complex a set of criteria or too
  broad of a grading criteria for the business
  cases
• Not carrying through with or following up on 300s
  after reviews
• Not asking relevant questions during the review
  process and not normalizing the ranges of grades
  given through facilitation or arbitration.

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Manage EA Change

• Successful Practice
• An EA, once developed, must be managed by a group
  that represents all stakeholder organizations
• A formalized change management committee must
  represent various technical program and
  management levels within the organization as well
  as headquarters and field organizations
• Review and approve proposed EA modifications
• An essential function is to respond quickly and
  efficiently to changes in the four layers of the
  EA Business, Data, Application and Technology
• The committee should be considered the focal
  point for technology consequence, standardization
  and integration.
• Pitfalls
• Organizational elements not formally meeting to
  discuss or integrate critical programmatic
  changes, e.g,
• IT support elements independently initiate
  infrastructure or technology improvement
  initiatives without coordinating directions with
  program or business concerns
• Conversely, program/business elements tend to
  implement major application requirements without
  proper consideration for associated impacts on
  supporting IT applications or technology support
  structures

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Perform IVV

• Successful Practice
• Develop effective interface between EA developers
  and IVV team
• Minimize rework by maintaining currency of
  requirements and evaluation criteria for
  deliverables
• Communicate common requirements and acceptance
  criteria baseline to both teams
• Pitfalls
• Tendency to define a common technology
  infrastructure, but not to pursue common data,
  business, or applications requirements
• A good IVV program ensures the correct balance
  between the business, data, application and
  technology architectures  

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Recommendations

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General Recommendations

• EA programs would benefit from
• Agencies and departments sharing lessons learned
  i.e., best practices and pitfalls to be avoided
• IAC recommends that the FEA PMO/CIO Council
  facilitate information sharing across agencies,
  e.g.,
• Sponsor a series of conferences/workshops
• Share successful practices and pitfalls
  encountered
• Guidance in meeting new challenges
• Develop a process for documenting, collecting and
  vetting EA assets from across Federal Government
• Lessons learned successful practices and
  pitfalls
• Examples of high quality artifacts and work
  products
• Populate in a repository

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FEA Alignment Recommendations

• OMB should provide leadership for implementing
  updates to agency/department EAs for implementing
  in a manner that is efficient and cost-effective
• Set policies
• Provide forums for interagency cooperation
• Supply approved official guidance

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FEA Alignment Recommendations, Contd

• OMB Should
• Provide a forum, and establish policies, for
  encouraging business process factoring (sharing,
  alignment and reuse) across agencies
• Select (with CIO Council assistance) and
  prototype several cross cutting business segments
  within the FEA, for detailed process analyses,
  factoring and interface frameworks development
• Define and develop a set of frameworks, technical
  standards or reference models for specifying
  interagency interfaces within various cross
  cutting business segments to facilitate
  interoperability and integration

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Specific FEA Alignment Recommendations

• Update and extend the EA process in the FEAF, and
  the other EA Guides to integrate interagency
  business segment definitions and process
  factoring, the use of the FEA reference models,
  interface frameworks and guidelines on defining
  and using component based architectures in order
  for agencies to update their EAs, building on
  work already done
• Develop a strategy to address the whats in it
  for me questions that are likely to be asked by
  the agencies and to resolve concerns regarding
  how to transition to a common FEA while balancing
  the agency specific EA implementations
• Develop and implement a realistic plan for
  developing the above definitions, frameworks,
  processes and guidance for the agencies, and for
  the agencies in turn to implement the necessary
  EA updates