A recent survey by the University of Pretoria of enterprise architecture (EA) practitioners in the South African financial sector found that local companies are aware of the growing importance of EA, and that it is considered important for business and IT alignment, and for guiding change.
"EA projects can be prolonged and costly, so it is vital to know what factors contribute to their success or failure," was the report from Dr Machdel Matthee from the University of Pretoria. "We wanted to establish the status quo of EA implementation in SA, and to identify factors specific to this country. We focused on the financial sector as it is highly dependent on IT and most companies in this sector have EA initiatives in place."
Different aspects of EA were investigated, including the place of EA in organisational and strategic governance, the architects, practices and processes, and the measurement of EA initiatives.
The study found that although the importance of EA is acknowledged, companies differ with respect to the maturity level of EA implementation. Enterprise architectures are comprehensive business frameworks that capture the complexity of modern organisations, providing a blueprint for co-ordinating and integrating all components of an organisation. Highly complex systems require co-ordination and integration in order to manage the existing interdependencies between all these components. If these interdependencies are not sufficiently accounted for, silo solutions and isolated systems with an increased level of complexity may result as a consequence.
EA presents a conceptual map of an organisation from business, applications, information and technological points of view. This conceptual map is a mandatory requirement for various management tasks such as business process engineering or quality management. It`s also indispensable for IT-related initiatives, such as software engineering, workflow management or enterprise systems management. It`s imperative that enterprise architectures reflect strategic and operational as well as managerial and technical issues.
Enterprise architecture presents a conceptual map of an organisation from business, applications, information and technological points of view.
Stuart MacGregor, MD of Real IRM
The main research question, "How do South African companies implement enterprise architecture in the financial sector?" was broken down into sub-questions on the strengths of EA, the place of EA in organisational governance, the architects, practices and processes and the evaluation of EA efforts.
The study was largely based on a similar international study by Schekkerman. It was therefore possible to compare the local results with the international study.
Of the six companies that participated in the study, five were very large, with one having over 50 000 employees, and an IT department of more than 1 000 people. The findings of the study were:
* EA is prominent in both large and small companies. This is not the case at international level.
* Companies believe the most important contribution of EA is its role in managing complexity, transformation, and business and IT alignment.
* Most companies are aware of the growing importance of EA, but it remains the responsibility of the CIO and IT managers instead of the CEO and business managers.
* Most enterprise architects within companies are technology and application architects.
* Most enterprise architects are self-educated, and certification by an official authority is considered unimportant. However, apart from self-education, local enterprise architects are also trained by the organisation itself as well as by external architects.
* Most companies organise coaching by an experienced enterprise architect for their architects. Proven experience is the preferred way of choosing such an expert.
* Most companies prefer to use their own EA frameworks. The study shows a preference for the Zachman Framework and TOGAF (The Open Group Architecture Framework, an architecture framework and methodology that provides a comprehensive approach to the design, planning, implementation and governance of enterprise information architecture), compared to international companies.
* Microsoft Visio is the most popular EA tool. On an international level there is growing use of Telelogic`s System Architect tool.
* BPMN is a popular business modelling technique.
* UML is a popular system modelling technique. The study indicates heavy reliance on a company`s own business and systems modelling techniques. This tendency is declining in international companies.
The study was limited by the fact that only a small number of companies were investigated, but by broadening its scope and refining it, the study could add value to the practices of local enterprise architects by enabling them to better understand their field, and to position themselves both locally and internationally.
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