Enterprise Architecture, Strategy, Governance Report - Analysis

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Enterprise Architecture (EA), focusing on strategy and governance within organizations. It reviews the literature on EA, highlighting its role in aligning IT and business objectives, the evolution of EA frameworks, and the challenges in successful implementation, including project failures and stakeholder management. The report delves into the importance of understanding relational and social aspects of EA, examining the relationship between architects and stakeholders, and identifying under-researched areas. It also discusses the implications for EA practice, emphasizing the need for effective communication, stakeholder involvement, and a shared conceptual understanding for successful enterprise development. The report offers valuable insights into the complexities of EA implementation and provides recommendations for addressing challenges and improving outcomes.

Running head: ENTERPRISE ARCHITECTURE, STRATEGY AND GOVERNANCE
Enterprise architecture, Strategy and Governance
Name of the university
Name of the student
Authors note

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Table of Contents
Answer to question 1:......................................................................................................................2
Reviewing the literature on enterprise architecture:........................................................................2
Challenges faced in successful implementation of EA:..................................................................3
Importance of understanding relational and social aspects of EA:..................................................4
Dominant approached EA failure:...................................................................................................5
Part 2:...............................................................................................................................................5
Answer to question 2:......................................................................................................................5
Examination of relationship between architect and their stakeholders:..........................................5
Under researched areas of stakeholder relationship and architect that remain:...............................8
Part 3:...............................................................................................................................................9
Answer to question 3:......................................................................................................................9
Implication for enterprise architecture practice:..............................................................................9

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Part 1:
Answer to question 1:
Reviewing the literature on enterprise architecture:
Enterprise architecture (EA) is regarded as a strategy for aligning the information
technology and business within an enterprise. The maintenance, development and management
of enterprise architecture is done through the implementation technology of enterprise architect.
EA has developed into a core competitive advantage as business is becoming holistically
occupied with coherency among organizational elements such as IT functions, business needs
and strategy of organization. For business enabling to sustain in competitive advantage for
enhancing decision making and increased efficient through information technology. The main
concern of EA is to represent and understand the fundamental component of enterprise through
notations and methods of modelling. The emergence of EA being in the beginning of 1980s with
the business system planning method of IBM and later on with the development of framework of
Zachman (Abraham 2013). Main focus of EA is on standardizing existing process and providing
technological solutions to business. This helps in alignment between information technology and
rest of business. It was recognized by some authors that the basis of initiative of EA is successful
implementation of architecture.
A powerful framework has been provided to organizations through enterprise architecture
for managing, planning and coordinating the organizational strategy alignment. It was reviewed
by early authors that implementation is considered as essential part of process of EA. Every
organizations faces few problems that can be addressed only through the architecture
development. However, most of architecture project fails because of weakening interest in effort
given to architecture, failure of projects to address relevant issues, perception that documentation

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of architecture planning is not relevant and greater time requirement for delivering such project.
In the later research, authors have paid attention on implementation issues and technical
challenges of organizing and producing the plan of EA. A framework was developed by
Zachman in year 1987 that employed the approach of business planning system and provided
emphasis on process of business, alignment of data and technology. A structure of information
management of EA is provided by the original framework of Zachman. The original version of
framework of Zachman for information system architecture is extended by Sowa in year 1992
that led to crystallization of concept of enterprise (Cameron and McMillan 2013).
Implementation is to require to be treated as part of plan development and implementation
model. An actionable and appropriate level of information of architecture can be developed by
implementation challenge. There has been rapid growth in discipline of EA after 1992 with
production of many methodologies, framework, models, description language description
language, styles, and tool and model representation. Various factors are responsible for
development of interest in EA such as disruptive change and opportunities brought to
organization through EA, network technologies propagation and effort toward inter connection
of functions and process of business (Simon et al. 2014)
Challenges faced in successful implementation of EA:
The addressing of problems resulting in failure of EA by researchers, rate of failure of
enterprise architect continues to rise and has become a cause of concern. It is revealed by recent
survey on eighty nine organizations that 66% of EA efforts failed due to inadequate awareness
about the benefits derived from such system, politics prevailing in organizations and distinct
expectations and perspectives of architects and stakeholders. It is projected by many practitioners
of information technology and business that many EA projects fails and they have little

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confidence. One of the primary determinant of failure of EA is cost associated with such project.
In event of architecture being applied all over organizations, organization could not afford
integrated and collective set of architects and as a consequence of this, in short and medium
term, positive return on investments cannot be delivered by potential architect projects. Another
possible factors that poses difficulties in architecture competence development is lack of
stakeholder’s interest in such projects. The competence of EA is developed very slowly as
evident from previous research and that results in lower success rate of efforts of EA.
Organizations facing such difficulties either seek alternative strategies of enterprise architecting
and greatly abandoning efforts of EA. Failure of EA is also affected by multiple and
contradictory perspective of architects and stakeholders and complications in establishing
requirements of business. One of the root cause of failure of EA projects is existence of gap
between stakeholder’s requirement and what is designed by architects (Hoffman et al. 2014).
Importance of understanding relational and social aspects of EA:
Arguments have been made by researcher for practically oriented methods, planning and
framework of EA while other researchers have made arguments for indicated the balances to
narrow existing research on technical focus and relying more on multiple perspectives. It is
indicated by recent research that design tradeoffs is represented by architecture such as
maintainability, usability, cost and performance. Architecture can be regarded as a process for
resource negotiation and decision making that is required for system building that comprise of
expert skills, personnel and funding. EA successful implementation is dependent upon
cooperation between architects and stakeholders along with considering situational constraints of
available technology, legacy system, monetary resources, experience and skills of staffs. Social
process of EA ash some limited research that has potential outcome as the issues of concern and

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topics are not addressed (Hansen and Hacks 2017). It has been suggested by research that
disappointing outcome of EA are mainly associated with social aspects rather than development
plans. The findings of information system literature and EA social problem s are similar.
Understanding of social concepts of EA helps in dealing with problems by providing useful
insights.
Dominant approached EA failure:
Examination of the particular area of EA project is depicted by positivism paradigm of
authors. It is researched and ascertained by many authors that there are many factors including
technical factors for the failure of EA projects. Nonetheless, if an organization architect is
capable of handling and dealing with such factors, then possibilities of failure is prevented. The
management functions of EA is main focus of researchers and the enterprise architecture project
is required to be implemented within those functions. An organization might be provided with
opportunities of remaining flexible and gaining market share by EA implementation and
proficiencies of exploring linkage between architect, stakeholders and function implementation
effectiveness (Iacob et al. 2014). Research activities have contributed to planning, designing and
management of EA knowledge.

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Part 2:
Answer to question 2:
Examination of relationship between architect and their stakeholders:
The relationship between stakeholders and architect is established by researcher in terms
of social aspect of enterprise architect implementation. Effective communication and interaction
between stakeholders and architect is not encouraged because of issues of working styles of
architects. It has been pointed out in research by authors that there exist difficulties in
communicating between stakeholders and architects and working with each other. Failure of EA
is addressed by identifying the relationship between them and sometimes different perspectives
of stakeholders are not understood by architect. Stakeholders have difficulties in interacting with
architect due to reclusive personalities of some of architect. Failure of projects result on part of
architect failure to walk in shoes of stakeholders and development of their emphatic
understanding. It is required by architect to develop stakeholder concerns and appreciating the
world from their perspectives that would consequently help in birding the gap between
stakeholders and themselves (Hope et al. 2017). Furthermore, the failure of A project is driven
by is incapability on architect part to identify critical requirements if business and embodying it
in the plans of EA implementation.

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PED (Proactive enterprise development) model:
(Source: Bowie 2017)
This model demonstrate role played by stakeholders in carrying out strategic role
enterprise and situational analysis. Its stakeholder that impacts the model formation in domain of
architectural designs. Application of EA process is architect responsibility in process designing.
The motivation derived from EA implementation and its selection should be informed to
stakeholders by architects. The political perspectives forms the basis of this model that
emphasizes on improvement of business performance in relation to information technology
system by stakeholder involvement. Model helps in clarifying architect role in organization
development. The participatory process necessitates enterprise designs by integrating the
perspectives of management and stakeholders. For minimizing the loss of such projects and in
order to create win-win situation, architect is required to listen to stakeholder views (Jugel et al.
2014).

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Complexities and inflexibilities of technical infrastructure, business process and
information technology system are dealt by large organizations by having large grip of them. An
efficient collaboration between stakeholders and architect is considered as one of the critical
success factors. Investigations is required by practitioners of architecture into the degree to
which support and commitment of EA is influenced by them. In relation to literature discussed
above, two observations have been made. This involves that many EA studies have not adopted
same stakeholder label. Another observation is that the main focus of enterprise architect is
technology stakeholders rather than business stakeholders that have led to conflict and clashing
of stakeholders inters and ultimately EA project failure (Kasemsap 2015).
One of the significant stakeholder’s aspects is communication, commitment and
collaboration of stakeholders. Participatory nature of stakeholders might get clashed with
stakeholder’s individuality. Some of important shareholders in any large organization are
customers, suppliers, support staffs, managers, executives and local communities and some other
groups that bare associated with enterprise. Shareholders are regarded as source of knowledge
and they often conflict with perception of enterprise architect. Researcher have identified
alignment of socio-cultural for reflecting harmonious relationship between goals, objectives of
organization and enterprise information technology system. It is required to address mutual goal
commitment, values sharing and collaborative behavior in organization. An established structure
is required to be accepted by both stakeholders and architects. Such alignment helps in creating
harmonious contribution between internal and external stakeholders and information system
(Santana et al. 2014).
Various ways have been addressed by researcher that helps in influencing the
competencies of architecture resulting from enterprise meaningfulness of perspective of

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stakeholders and management of an organization. Notion of meaningfulness of architecture helps
in providing helps in gaining a win-win effect resulting from involvement of shareholders.
Under researched areas of stakeholder relationship and architect that remain:
Social process on enterprise architect comes with limited research and researcher has not
been able to address emerging interest of practitioners and concerns. Researchers have not been
successful in explaining implementing concerns of EA and role that an architect must fulfill for
successful implementation of system. Concerning inefficiency of architect as one of the reason
attributable to the failure of EA, research work has mainly been concentrated and confined to
education and training of architects as revealed from published article and research work. As a
consequence of this, it is required by researcher to conduct research work on practices of
architect in implementing the system that would assist in identifying the extent of interactions
and involvement between both parties and how such practices facilitates existing relationship.
An implication for gaining an understanding of support and commitment of EA plans that is
influenced by practices of architect is provided by findings of such research. A shared
conceptualization and understanding amongst stakeholders is required for governing enterprise
development. Concerning this, an overview is required to be developed for gaining shared
understanding and conceptualization.
Part 3:
Answer to question 3:
Implication for enterprise architecture practice:
Specific aspects of organization are required to be taken into consideration while
developing the process and methods of architecture designs. The process, methods and tools of

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architect designs necessitates incorporation of stakeholder’s perspectives and their needs.
Software engineering and design and description of architecture should not be separated. In
context of adoption of architectural tasks, particular stakeholders’ definition is required to be
incorporated. Some of the implications of architecture practices can be listed below and they are
as follows:
Innovation:
Organization seeking innovation should emphasize on essential activities of enterprise
architecture. Sufficient communication is required between enterprise architecture and
organization is needed along with contribution of identification and realization of resource
synergies. If organization is placing great importance on innovation, then documentation of
architecture such as blue print, principles and requirement is not important. Paper based
documentation can be detrimental to the organization focusing on innovation and resource
complementary beliefs is considered crucial for innovation. Innovative seeking organization
should focus upon enhancing and facilitating communication among various stakeholder and
architect (Trevino and Nelson 2016).
Alignment of organization by exposing to high quality information:
Well pursuits organizations deals with effective utilization of resources by pursing such
strategy. Enterprise architecture helps in improving organization alignment by formulation of
enterprise strategy and proper execution of project that are considered as essential component for
reasoning alignment. High quality information helps in positively impacting internal growth and
learning of organization. Nonetheless, effects of enterprise architecture will not help in
improving the quality information availability. Improvement of information quality can be

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improved through foundation and alignment of enterprise architect (Zarvić and Wieringa 2014).
Proper execution of these two activities of EA would positively impact quality of information.
Resource portfolio optimization:
All aspects of business performance is impacted by resource portfolio optimization that is
considered as benefit enabler. Integration of removing redundancies and compatible resources is
considered as one of important element according to literature and thereby optimizing the
portfolio of business. The pursued strategy of organization should be aligned with possibilities
and opportunities of existing portfolio. Staffs of enterprise architect helps in seeking formulation
of strategy of enterprise. Proper hiring of architect staffs and their appropriate training
significantly influences enterprise architecture capability to optimize the portfolio of resources of
organization (Huber et al. 2017).
Improving the Enterprise architecture effectiveness:
Wide range of scope exists for improving the efficacy of enterprise architecture as
indicated by current research and connecting people within organization at broad level is
considered of utmost importance for delivering successful EA projects. Collaboration between
architect and business organization is regarded as one of the ways fort improving enterprise
architecture. The development of activities of EA can be formalized and developed through
future organization architecture. Enterprise architecture often overlook architectural design social
implication and such system incorporates invariable tradeoffs. EA ignores consideration of
human factors such as productivity, cost, and efficiency and throughout. Architectural designs
would mainly benefit several groups of stakeholders and does not provide advantage to rest of

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groups (Weiss 2014). For improving the effectiveness of enterprise architecture, research work
should take into consideration some social implications.
Research work helps in making contribution to the practices of enterprise architecture in
organization by way of providing foundation of planning and prioritizing investment in such
architecture, presumed benefits validation and providing with efforts that will help in directing
future benefits of enterprise architect. Academics and practitioners have demonstrated qualitative
claims of EA as indicated by literature review. The assessment of relationship between activities
of enterprise architect and benefits helps in identifying the planning and prioritizing the
investments related to enterprise architect (Aier 2014).
Researchers are required to conduct study on enterprise architecture on broad basis as
indicated by findings and literature review results. There are several pre suppositions involved in
the present enterprise architecture concepts of enterprise architecture, architecture designs and
their description. These pre-suppositions does not corresponds inn practice and real world of
business organization. Communication and interpretation of architecture description by
stakeholders is viewed as one of the practical problems associated with enterprise architecture.
Other associated factors incorporates several aspects of enterprise architect, skills and
experiences of architect staffs. One of the aspect that is considered at the core of designers is the
objective of designing and implementing the system as per the description of architecture.
Architecture description helps in creating a common ground and understanding of structure of
system and technological solutions. An empirical research is required to conduct for categorizing
the ways of communication enhancement in architecture designs (Haki and Legner 2013).
Description of architecture requires to make emphasis on different rationales as different
stakeholders considers different intentions. Architecture is regarded as means of communication,

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interpretation and decision making as emphasized by stakeholder group of an organization and
further on architect designs and implementation basis. This particular observation acts as a
challenge to common concepts of designs of enterprise architect. Communication between
diverse stakeholder groups helps in facilitating technology and complex solutions that is coped
by the description and description of enterprise architect (Ferrell and Fraedrich 2015). Therefore,
the main goal of enterprise architecture is shifting to create common understanding relating to
non-technical rationale and technological complexities that is relevant to organization
environment and business.
It is required by researcher to improve the understanding of practices of architects and
improve the relationship between stakeholders and architect by emphasizing on technical aspects
and social aspects of enterprise architects as per existing research and based on knowledge gaps.
The success of implementation of enterprise architect by interaction between these two groups
and stakeholders role in addition to being focused on technology. The coordination of program
that will lead to working of EA implementation and technology selection planning is facilitated
by linking of architecture multiple domain into having an integrated and articulate view on
portfolio of technology of organization. However, efficacy of such studies and further research is
dependent upon how well architects analyze the perspectives and concerns of stakeholders and
assimilating the same into their architecture planning.

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