Agile Planning and Enterprise Architecture

The Wall Street Journal in conjunction with MIT Sloan School of Management on 15 September 2007 reports that “markets, technologies, and competition are becoming more dynamic by the day. To succeed in this environment…requires a whole new level of flexibility.” Instead of strategy that “too often locks managers into decisions that may turned out to be flawed, because something outside their control doesn’t go as planned. What is needed is…flexibility into strategy—a plan that lays out a series of options for managers to pursue or decline as developments warrant.”

By practicing agile planning (as I call it), decisions are broken down into stages, where management can review events and decide whether “to proceed, hold back, or retreat at each stage” or alter course altogether.

From a User-centric EA perspective, I really like the idea of agile planning in coming up with the architecture target and transition plan. What we may think today is the best business or technical plan to meet user needs, may not be the case 6 months or a year later. Moreover, as plans extend beyond 3-5 year timeframe, the ability to hit the target is often grossly exaggerated.

The concept of agile planning is to come up with milestones and then based on event-driven triggers follow through to a series of next steps. Agile planning gives the enterprise tremendous flexibility to adjust to changes (whether internal or external-driven), and not get trapped in the “planning pit” , whereby decision-makers are caught in the decision hole that they dug for themselves.

While as planners, we cannot be wishy-washy—we must develop a clear way ahead for the organization—developing the capability to move forward, yet be nimble enough to adjust to changing circumstance is the way to build a truly wonderful plan.

Agile Planning and Enterprise Architecture

Vision, Goals, and Enterprise Architecture

In the book, First Things First by Stephen Covey, the author provides insight into setting vision and goals that can be applied on a personal and leadership level.

What is VISION?

“The power of vision is incredible!”

“Vision is the best manifestation of creative imagination and the primary motivation of human action. It’s the ability to see beyond our present reality, to create, to invent what does not yet exist, to become what we not yet are. It gives us capacity to live out of our imagination instead of memory.”

“The passion of vision…we call it ‘passion’ because this vision can become a motivating force so powerful it, in effect, becomes the DNA of our lives. It’s so ingrained and integrated into every aspect of our being that it becomes the compelling impetus behind every decision we make. It is the fire within—the explosion of inner synergy…this passion can empower us to literally transcend dear, doubt, [and] discouragement.”

What are GOALS?

“When we set a goal, we’re saying, ‘I can envision something different from what is, and I chose to focus my efforts to create it.’ We use our imagination to keep the goal in mind, and independent will to pay the price to achieve it.”

“Self-awareness prompts us to start where we are—no illusions, no excuses—and helps us to set realistic goals. On the other hand, it also doesn’t allow us to cop out with mediocrity. It helps us recognize and respect our need to stretch, to push the limits to grow. So much of our frustration in life comes as a result of unmet expectations, the ability to set goals that are both realistic and challenging goes a long way to toward empowering us to create peace and positive growth in our lives.”

“A principle-based goal is…the right thing, for the right reason, in the right way.” This is based on the following:

• Conscience—“through conscience, we connect with the passion of vision and mission and the power of principles.”
• Creative Imagination—“through creative imagination, we envision possibility and synergistic, creative ways to achieve it.”
• Self-Awareness—“though self-awareness, we set goals with realistic stretch and stay open to conscience-driven change.”
• Independent Will—“through independent will, we make purposeful choices and carry them out; we have the integrity to walk our talk.”

As EA practitioners, we are leaders in our organizations. As leaders, we need to have a clear vision for motivating, synergizing, and giving us the imagination to see beyond our present reality. Additionally, as EA leaders, we need to develop principle-based goals that focus efforts, are challenging yet realistic, and help us to maintain our integrity.

EA leaders must have a vision and goals for not only the development of the EA program to further IT planning and governance and enhance decision-making in the enterprise, but EA leaders must also have vision and goals for the enterprise itself—what is the right things for the organization, for the right reason, and in the right way—this is manifested in the EA target architecture and plans.

Of course, the executives and subject matter experts in the organization ultimately have the vision and goals that drive mission execution and performance. However, EA is in a unique position to integrate those various views and bring synergy and consensus to a way ahead.

EA is an awesome responsibility to lead. EA is a stewardship, a trust. As stewards, EA is called to exercise responsible care over the enterprise baseline and target architectures, IT plans, and governance.

Vision, Goals, and Enterprise Architecture

Shooting the Messenger and Enterprise Architecture

The Wall Street Journal, 11 September 2007 reports that the “everyone knows blaming the blameless bearer of bad news doesn’t help, but we do it anyway. It’s…the gulf between knowing a problem and solving it.”

The article continues, “Big bureaucracies are set up to place human barriers around decision makers. Today there’s the added protection of automated phones and web sites that bury contact information for real people. So the buck stops in the lower rungs of the hierarchy.”

“The government agency…sent lower level staffers to break news to clients that they didn’t get approved…’the true irony of the situation is sending in someone who is less qualified to address a hostile situation, and that creates more hostility, which makes it more likely for him to get shot.’”

The following day, 12 September 2007, the Wall Street Journal reported in another article about another situation of shooting the messenger, as follows: “American Airlines told the Transportation Security Administration in July, that a passenger on a flight to New York had slapped a flight attendant across the face when the plane was ordered emptied in Miami after bad weather kept the flight from leaving. Police were called.”

“Those middlemen aren’t responsible for disruptive decisions or business failures. But they’re the poor souls held accountable.” (WSJ, 11 September 2007)

As EA practitioners, we are often the messengers of corporate news; we analyze problems areas and uncover gaps, redundancies, inefficiencies, and opportunities. Often, others in the organization do not want to hear about these problems and do not want EA to be providing the solutions. Instead, they look to shoot the EA messenger. Rather than pointing fingers and letting off steam at the EA folks doing their jobs, how about teaming up, collaborating, and working to improve the organization and make things better for everyone!

Shooting the Messenger and Enterprise Architecture

NASA and Enterprise Architecture

First all of all let me say that NASA and its people are totally awesome.

“On July 20, 1969, the human race accomplished its single greatest technological achievement of all time when a human first set foot on another celestial body.” (NASA)

The trip to from the earth to the moon is approximately 240,000 miles!! (adapted from Wikipedia)

“Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin spent a total of 21 hours on the Moon, two-and-a-half of them outside the landing module. A further 10 astronauts traveled to the Moon in another six missions with the final manned lunar landing, Apollo 17, completed in December 1972.” (adapted from http://news.bbc.co.uk/)

On 20 September, 2005, NASA Administrator Michael Griffin announced a New Spaceship Designed for Travel to Moon and Mars. Griffin defended the $104 billion dollar lunar program, saying it is intended to make President Bush's Vision for Space Exploration a reality. The price of the new lunar program will be spread out over 13 years and adjusted for inflation represents about 55 percent of what the Apollo space program cost in the 1970s. (adapted from globalsecurity.org)

Question:
Why haven’t we been able to send man back to the moon (or to other planets in the last 35 years)? And why do we need to invest another $104 billion to do something that we should already know how to do? Finally, if we were able to go to the moon before the unbelievable technological advances of the last 35 years, why can’t we do it today?

Honest answer:
I don’t really know.

Hypothetical answers:

• The alien technology that we acquired to make the trips to the moon has either been depleted or destroyed by the Russians. (Ha ha ha)
• User-centric EA wasn’t around 35 years ago, and therefore, the business and technical processes, information, and means of governance weren’t well documented and have been lost to mankind, and now we need to recreate the whole darn thing (hopefully not).

Barring another Roswell alien landing, we will have to thank the Clinger-Cohen Act for helping us ensure that this critical (and expensive) information is better documented going forward.

NASA and Enterprise Architecture

Information Management and Enterprise Architecture

What is the Information Age?

“Alvin Toffler, a famous American writer and futurist, in his book The Third Wave, describes three types of societies, based on the concept of 'waves' - each wave pushes the older societies and cultures aside.

• First Wave—the society after agrarian revolution that replaced the first hunter-gatherer cultures.
• Second Wave—the society during the Industrial Revolution (ca. late 1600s through the mid-1900s), based on mass production, mass distribution, mass consumption, mass education, mass media, mass recreation, mass entertainment, and weapons of mass destruction. You combine those things with standardization, centralization, concentration, and synchronization, and you wind up with a style of organization we call bureaucracy."
• Third Wave—the post-industrial society, also called the Information Age, Space Age, Electronic Era, Global Village, scientific-technological revolution, which to various degrees predicted demassification, diversity, and knowledge-based production.”

What is a knowledge worker?

“Peter Drucker, in 1959, coined the term Knowledge worker, as one who works primarily with information or one who develops and uses knowledge in the workplace. Knowledge Workers are now estimated to outnumber all other workers in North America by at least a four to one margin (Haag et al, 2006, pg. 4). A Knowledge Worker's benefit to a company could be in the form of developing business intelligence, increasing the value of intellectual capital , gaining insight into customer preferences, or a variety of other important gains in knowledge that aid the business.” (Toffler and Drucker sections are adapted from Wikipedia)

How does EA fit in the Information Age and support the knowledge worker?

EA is a process for capturing, analyzing, and serving up information to achieve improved IT planning, governance, and decision making. So, EA works with data and information and supports the knowledge worker in the following way:

• Acquisition—captures business and technical information
• Analysis—analyzes information problem areas and identifies gaps, redundancies, and opportunities for standardization, consolidation, integration, interoperability, and so on
• Description—describes data and information using metadata and various information products, such as profiles, models, and inventories
• Classification—catalogues data using taxonomies (i.e. schemas) and ontologies (that relate the data)
• Warehousing—stores the data in a repository
• Dissemination—makes the information available for discovery, exchange, reporting, and queries
• Management—establishes data standards, institutes policies and practices for describing, registering, discovering and exchanging information; administers configuration management of the data; ensures data backup and recovery.

In User-centric EA, all aspects of information management (in terms of development, maintenance, and use of information products) are done with the enterprise and end-user in mind. User-centric EA seeks to make all aspects of EA information useful (i.e. relevant—current, accurate, complete) and usable (i.e. easy to understand and readily accessible) for the information age enterprise and knowledge workers that we support!

Information Management and Enterprise Architecture

Engaging Employees Hearts and Minds and Enterprise Architecture

The Wall Street Journal, 1 October 2007 reports that “employers should—and increasingly do—care about creating a great workplace.”

Companies are realizing the “the human beings who execute the goals of business are more than just cogs in a wheel.” Companies are now showing they do care more about their workers, through:

• Best workplace lists—vying for venerated positions on best-workplace lists
• Luring recruits—“pledging their devotion to work-family balance” and other employee-friendly benefits
• Employee engagement—boasting about their level of worker-commitment, which manifests itself in low employee turnover; or employees volunteering to make an extra effort on the job

In the traditional rigid, controlling workplace, workers’ needs are left unmet; over time, this “erodes concentration, commitment, and creativity.” Good workplace policies “enable employees to manage their large lives, freeing them to apply more brainpower to complex information-age jobs.”

What’s more, organizations are finding that creating a great workplace for employees actually pays off in dollars (i.e. it “actually causes an increase in a company’s overall financial performance.”)

The New York Conference Board found in a study last year “clear and mounting evidence that employee engagement is strongly correlated to ‘productivity, profit, and revenue growth.’”

User-centric EA is driven to mission execution and meeting end user needs (including employee satisfaction). This is why I have been a long-time proponent for adding a human capital reference model and perspective to the Federal Enterprise Architecture. Balancing these two approaches (mission and employee) creates the synergy that organizations need for long-term success. There is a motto that I often use that expresses this right on—“mission first, people always!”

Engaging Employees Hearts and Minds and Enterprise Architecture

Guns versus Butter Model and Enterprise Architecture

“In economics, the guns versus butter model is the classic example of the production possibility frontier. It models the relationship between a nation's investment in defense and civilian goods. In this model, a nation has to choose between two options when spending its finite resources. It can buy either guns or butter, or a combination of both. This can be seen as an analogy for choices between defense and civilian spending in more complex economies.” (Wikipedia)

The guns versus butter model teaches us that you cannot have it all! There are clear limitations to resources, and it is not possible to produce or spend beyond that.

Yes, of course, our resources can be extended by increasing the limits of production through for example, advances in technology that make us more efficient (like advances in automation or agricultural production). Similarly, we can spend more than we have on both guns and butter, through deficit spending, although this is a temporary phenomenon where we borrow to spend now, and this must be repaid in the future.

The point is that as society, organizations, or individuals with finite resources, we must make choices, since we can’t have it all. Even Bill Gates and Warren Buffet with their billions of dollars, have to make choices too (although their choices may be a little bit larger than ours—should I buy this mega-company or that one).

From a User-centric Enterprise Architecture perspective, the lesson of the guns versus butter economic model is very important. As we baseline the architecture of the organization and see all that is wrong with it (gaps, redundancies, inefficiencies, and opportunities), we are tempted to want to fix everything, right away. In other words, the target architecture becomes an unrealistic wish list and one that seeks to solve all that is wrong in the enterprise. One of my associates calls this the feed the world solution, which he promptly points out are those initiatives that never really go everywhere, because you can’t “swallow an elephant in one bite.”

In EA, we have to develop a target architecture and transition plan that is realistic: one that takes into account the limitations of resources as well as the limitations of the organization to rapidly undergo change. It becomes an issue of priorities. A good architect not only helps the organization identify the possibilities for improvement, but also works with leadership and stakeholders to prioritize those and phase them in. realistically, through the transition plan.

Guns versus Butter Model and Enterprise Architecture

First Things First and Enterprise Architecture

In the book “First Things First” by Stephen Covey, the author describes an important dilemma of what’s important to us in life versus how we actually spend our time. Covey uses the metaphor of the clock and the compass to explain this.

• The clock—“our commitments, appointments, schedules, goals, and activities—what we do with, and how we manage our time.”
• The compass—“our vision, values, principles, mission, conscience, and direction—what we feel is important and how we lead our lives.”

The idea here is that we “painstakingly climb the ‘ladder of success’ rung by rung—the diploma, the late nights, the promotions—only to discover as we reached the top rung, that the ladder is leaning against the wrong wall.”

“Absorbed in the ascent, we left a trail of shattered relationships or missed moments of deep, rich living in the wake of the intense overfocused effort. In the race up the rungs we simply did not take the time to do what really mattered most.”
What is really important?

Covey sums it up nicely, as follows:

• To live—our physical needs (“food, clothing, shelter, economic well-being, health”)
• To love—our social needs (“to relate to other people, to belong, to love, to be loved”)
• To learn—our mental needs (“to develop and to grow”)
• To live a legacy—our spiritual needs (“to have a sense of meaning, purpose, personal congruence, and contribution” and most important of all to serve and sacrifice for the one almighty G-d)

In case you don’t recognize it, these align nicely to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.

http://usercentricea.blogspot.com/2007/08/maslows-hierarchy-of-needs-and.html

Maslow “in his last years, revised his earlier theory and acknowledged that the peak experience was not “self-actualization, but “self-transcendence,” or living for a higher purpose than self.

George Bernard Shaw put it this way:

“This is the true joy in life…being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one…being a force of nature instead of a feverish selfish clod of ailments and grievances, complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy…I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community and as long as I live it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can…I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no brief candle to me. It’s a sort of splendid torch which I’ve got to hold up for the moment and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.

Covey says it this way:

“The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.”

As an enterprise architect, who works everyday to build a better organization, with efficient and effective business processes, timely and meaningful information supporting the business, and information technology solutions that drive mission execution, I thought it was important to put this important job in perspective. Because in order to be effective in the role as an enterprise architect, we have to realize that “balance and synergy” among the four needs—physical, social, mental, and spiritual—are imperative.

As Covey states: “we tend to see them [these needs] as separate ‘compartments’ of life. We think of ‘balance’ as running from one area to another fast enough to spend time in each one of a regular basis [or not!]…but [this] ignores the reality of their powerful synergy. It’s where…we find true inner balance, deep fulfillment, and joy.”

First Things First and Enterprise Architecture

Functionalism and Enterprise Architecture

“Functionalism is about the structure and workings of society. Functionalists see society as made up of inter-dependent sections which work together to fulfill the functions necessary for the survival of society as a whole. The theory is based around a number of key concepts. First, society is viewed as a system – a collection of interdependent parts, with a tendency toward equilibrium. Second, there are functional requirements that must be met in a society for its survival (such as reproduction of the population). Third, phenomena are seen to exist because they serve a function. Functionalists believe that one can compare society to a living organism, in that both a society and an organism are made up of interdependent working parts (organs) and systems that must function together in order for the greater body to function.” (Wikipedia)

User-centric EA is firmly grounded in functionalism. EA sees the enterprise as composed of interrelated parts that rely on each other in order to function and survive. Each individual, group, department, division and so on plays a critical role (like organs in a body).

Enterprise architects develop models of the business, data, and systems that show exactly what the parts (or elements) in the organization are and how they interrelate and function—this is functionalism. For example, in the business model, the actors perform activities (or tasks); the activities make up processes, and the interrelated processes make up functions. Clearly there is a structure and interdependency of like components that fulfills enterprise functions. Similarly, the organization’s IT hardware and software products are combined with databases to make up applications with specific business functions. The functionally interrelated applications combine to make up systems. Again, the collection of independent parts (products, applications, systems) forms collections that serve specified functions for the organization.

If a business activity or process or an IT product or application no longer serves a necessary or viable function for the growth and “survival” of the organization or if there are redundancies in these, then the architect recommends that those unnecessary components be discontinued. Similarly, if there are gaps or inefficiencies in the business or IT, where required functions are not being served or served well, then the architect recommends a those gaps be filled or those business or IT areas be reengineered.

EA’s basis in functionalism is what makes it grounded in the realities of the organization needs for survival and maturation.

Functionalism and Enterprise Architecture

Hoshin Kanri and Enterprise Architecture

“Hoshin Kanri is a strategic planning methodology that uses a Shewhart Cycle (Plan-Do-Check-Act) to create goals, assign measurable milestones, and assess progress.” (Adapted from Wikipedia)

In Hoshin Kanri (HK) “the vision must be shared by all, so that everybody acts (at his own level) consistently to hit targets. Each company layer or function defines its own targets, according to the top ones. The principle goes cascading down to the base (vertical diffusion) or in coordination between divisions (horizontal collaboration) or a mix of both. The concept’s idea states: if all underlying objectives are met, the higher objective is automatically met, and so on, cascading up.”

(http://membres.lycos.fr/hconline/hoshin_us.htm)

The four phases:

1. Plan— higher objectives set by uppermost authority and in cascading fashion, each sub-division defines its own objectives, based on the level above (alignment phase).
2. Do—everyone carries out their objectives
3. Check—monitor, evaluate, and report on progress
4. Action—make course corrections to improve the process and achievement of results (Adapted from Wikipedia)

In general, setting the ‘right’ objectives means they should be SMART:

1. Specific
2. Measurable
3. Achievable (yet ambitious)
4. Realistic
5. Time-Specific

(adapted from http://www.valuebasedmanagement.net/)

In HK objectives should also:

• Improve current ways of doing things (efficiency, effectiveness, cost-savings…)
• Innovate (new techniques, technologies…)

How does HK differ from Management By Objective (MBO)?

• HK is focused on the process, while MBO is focused on the target
• HK defines how it will achieve the target, while MBO does not
• HK uses lot of communications and builds consensus (horizontally and vertically in the organization), while MBO is more top-down management

(adapted from http://membres.lycos.fr/hconline/hoshin_us.htm)

In short, Hoshin Kanri seems like an evolution of Management by Objective.

The methodology and principles of Hoshin Kanri is a terrific match with User-centric EA. Both focus on developing SMART plans, improving processes, using innovative (yet trusted) technologies to meet mission and user needs, communicating clearly with stakeholders, and building consensus on a way ahead.

Hoshin Kanri and Enterprise Architecture

Succession Planning and Enterprise Architecture

“Succession Planning—is the process of identifying and preparing suitable employees to replace key players within an organization. From the risk management aspect, provisions are made in case no suitable internal candidates are available to replace the loss of any key person…a careful and considered plan of action ensures the least possible disruption to the person’s responsibilities and therefore the organization’s effectiveness. A succession plan clearly sets out the factors to be taken into account and the process to be followed in relation to retaining or replacing the person.” (Adapted from Wikipedia)

How difficult can succession planning be?

The Wall Street Journal, 8-9 September, 2007, describes how difficult succession planning can be and especially for an organization such as Cirque du Soleil (where 21 performers are former Olympians and the majority has backgrounds in acrobatics or traditional circus arts): “Working with such singular talent forces Cirque to walk a tightrope. The artistic side is always looking for new acts. The business side wants to make sure they aren’t irreplaceable.”

How far will some organizations go to manage their succession planning?

Scouts [from Cirque]…travel the world, scour the internet, and vet thousands of unsolicited applications to fill 500 new roles. In their quest, they have created a database of 20,000 potential performers. Among them: 24 giants (including a Ukrainian who is 8 foot 2), 23 whistlers, 466 contortionists, 14 pickpockets, 35 skateboarders, 1,278 clowns, 8 dislocation artists, and 73 people classified simply as small.”

In User-centric EA, succession planning, although not normally part of an EA program, should be considered for future addition. Particularly, with the addition of a human capital perspective to EA, the development and maintenance of succession plans would be an excellent fit!

Succession Planning and Enterprise Architecture

Enterprise Architecture: Catalogues, Portfolios, and Inventories

There are three levels of architecture in the organization: enterprise, segment, and solutions. This is explained in a prior post.

Each level of the architecture identifies and categorizes business and technical information. However, the information captured in the three architecture levels (enterprise, segment, and solutions) differs as to their level of detail.

Here’s how this works:

• Catalogues—Enterprise architecture maintains catalogues of strategic-level enterprise assets. For example, EA provides catalogues of enterprise business functions and activities, enterprise systems, and enterprise hardware and software products and standards.
• Portfolios—Segment architecture maintains portfolios of items scoped to the individual lines of business (LOB), at a medium level of detail, with impact focused on business outcomes. For example, a portfolio of systems or databases relevant to the functioning of a specific LOB such as for Finance, HR, and so on.
• Inventories—Solutions architecture maintains inventories of configuration items for the enterprise. The configuration items are at the maximum level of detail for maintaining control of changes. This is used, for example, for software configuration management and for engineering support of IT infrastructure.

All three types of information products types—Catalogues, Portfolios, and Inventories—contain similar types of information pertinent to the organization; however, each product functions at a different level in the architecture—enterprise, segment, and solutions. Each of the information product types should be traceable and align to the next, so that inventories roll up into portfolios, and portfolios roll up in total to the enterprise asset catalogues. In this way, the architecture framework is consistent throughout the organization, items are traceable at all levels—from the solutions developers up to the strategic-level EA—and items can be viewed at the appropriate level of detail depending on whether the viewer is a senior leader, an executive decision-maker in the LOB, or a solution provider (“fixer-doer”).

Some organizations have chosen for simplicity’s sake to call all three of these product types “inventories.” That is acceptable, with the understanding that these “inventories” are providing different levels of detail corresponding to the different levels of architecture.

Enterprise Architecture: Catalogues, Portfolios, and Inventories

Gestalt Theory and Enterprise Architecture

"Gestalt theory is a theory...that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts...This is in contrast to the "atomistic" principle of operation of the digital computer, where every computation is broken down into a sequence of simple steps, each of which is computed independently of the problem as a whole." (Wikipedia)

Gestalt theory and the atomistic principle are important lenses with which to understand User-centric EA. Both gestalt and atomistic views are used to build the enterprise architecture.

• Modeling—“A model is a pattern, plan, representation, or description designed to show the structure or workings of an object, system, or concept.”(Wikipedia) Enterprise decompose the business and IT of the enterprise to view functions and activities, information and data, and manual and automated solutions for supporting those. In modeling the organization and decomposing it into its foundational elements, we view both the distinct parts as well as the relationship between those; this is the atomistic principle is at work. architects develop business, data, and systems models to show the elements and relationships in the enterprise, identify the business processes, information requirements, and technology solutions. To perform this modeling the architects
• Planning and Governance—EA develops the baseline, target, and transition plan, and develops or supports the IT strategic and tactical plans. Further, EA facilitates the IT governance process by conducting IT projects, product, and standard reviews and providing finding and recommendations to ensure business and technical alignment and architecture assessment for the organization. Both of these functions of EA require the synthesis of “boat loads” of business and technical information to develop realistic plans and valuable reviews in support of sound investment and portfolio management. In developing the plans and managing the IT governance for the organization, we are synthesizing information to create a holistic view of where we are, where we going, and how we will get there. This involves bringing together the multiple perspectives of the architecture (performance, business, information, service, technology, security, and hopefully soon to be added human capital) to get a view of the organization that is larger than the sum of its parts. The architecture is more than just a federation of these perspectives, and incorporates the analysis of gaps, redundancies, inefficiencies, and opportunities used to drive business process and technical reengineering and improvement in the organization. This is the gestalt theory at work.

Together, the gestalt theory and atomistic principle show us how enterprise architects decompose or break down the organization into its parts and then synthesize or build it back together again, such that the whole is now greater than the sum of its parts. The ability to do this is the marking of a true enterprise architect master!

Gestalt Theory and Enterprise Architecture

Use Cases and Enterprise Architecture

User-centric EA fulfills many different needs (as portrayed through Use Cases) in the enterprise.

In the Journal of Enterprise Architecture (JEA), August 2007, the authors of the article “Analysis and Application Scenarios of Enterprise Architecture: An Exploratory Study” (Winters, Bucher, Fischer, and Kurpjuweit) provide a variety of these “application scenarios” for EA.

Use Cases can help us understand the importance and benefits of Enterprise Architecture by showing its application to real-world scenarios. Below is a list of key use cases for EA (adapted from JEA):

1. Adoption of Commercial and Government Off-The-Shelf Software (COTS/GOTS)—informs on enterprise IT products and technical standards for integration, interoperability, and standardization.
2. Business Continuity Planning—identifying the dependencies between business processes, application systems, and IT infrastructure for continuity of operations.
3. Business Process Optimization—reengineering or improving business processes based on modeling of the business processes, the information required to perform those, and the technology solutions to support those.
4. Compliance Management—helps verify compliance with legal requirements such as privacy, FOIA, Section 508, records management, FISMA, and so on.
5. Investment Management—supports Investment Review Board; determines business and technical alignment and architecture assessment of new IT investments.
6. IT Business Alignment—aligning IT with “business, strategies, goals, and needs.”
7. IT Consolidation—“reveals costly multi-platform strategies and wasted IT resources originating from personal preferences of certain IT stakeholders and/or a lack of enterprise-wide coordination.”
8. IT Planning—develops target architecture and transition plan; develops or supports IT strategic plan and tactical plans.
9. Performance Management—Management of IT Operations Costs through the development of IT performance measures to manage IT resources.
10. Portfolio Management—categorizes IT investments into portfolios and prioritizes those based on strategic alignment to the target architecture and transition plan.
11. Post Merger and Acquisition Integration—identifies gaps, redundancies, and opportunities in business processes, organizational structures, applications systems, and information technologies.
12. Procurement Management—aids sourcing decisions; specifies standards, provides reviews of new IT investments.
13. Project (Initialization) Management—specifies projects requirements, looks at the potential for existing systems to meet user needs, and avoids redundant development activities.
14. Quality Management—document business processes, information requirements, and supporting IT; helps ensure performance.
15. Risk Management—managing technology risks; understanding which technology platforms support which business processes.
16. Security Management—documenting business and IT security and defining user roles and access rights.

When done right, EA helps to create “order out of chaos” for the execution of business and IT in the organization.

Use Cases and Enterprise Architecture

Strategy and Enterprise Architecture

There are many schools of thought when it comes to strategic planning in which the organization develops its strategic plan through the following means:

• Design – facilitating a fit between the internal capabilities and external possibilities; strategy is prescriptive.
• Positioning – selecting the competitive positions in the marketplace they desire to occupy (examples include: low cost leader, high quality supplier, niche player, #1 service provider, and so on).
• Entrepreneurial – grounding it on the leader, who is the visionary guiding the organization forward; there is no formal strategic plan.
• Cognitive – understanding and responding to how customers and competitors perceive us.
• Power – Negotiating, persuading, networking, developing alliances, and lobbying; all based on power and politics.
• Cultural – Deriving organizational shared beliefs and social interactions.
• Learning – trial and error based on results of strategy implementation.

(Adapted from American Management Association)

In User-centric EA, it is helpful to understand all these approaches to strategic planning. The schools of though are not mutually exclusive, but rather all affect—to a greater or lesser degree—how the EA target and transition plan is formed.

What I believe is fascinating is that planning is only partially about the plan itself (i.e. what the plan actually contains and prescribes), and that much of planning is about the process for developing it.

The process of planning benefits the organization almost as much as the end-product plan itself, since the process is a journey of self-discovery for the organization. In other words, if the plan was just dropped on the organization—without the process of having developed it—it would be of little to no value. The process of planning teaches the organization what it is currently, what challenges and opportunities it faces, and how to adapt, incrementally change, and occasionally transform itself. The planning process is quite involved and often includes aspects from all the schools of thought, including: designing a capabilities-possibilities fit for the organization, positioning it in the marketplace, incorporating the vision of the leader, identifying perceptions of customers and competitors, navigating through organizational politics, realizing a shared organizational culture, and continuous learning through it all.

Strategy and Enterprise Architecture

Driving Innovation and Enterprise Architecture

The Wall Street Journal, 24 September 2007 reports that “managing innovation is one of the biggest challenges that companies face.” Why? “They not only need to come up with new ideas, but also need to foster a culture that encourages and rewards innovation.”

Douglas Solomon, the Chief Technology Officer of IDEO (an innovation and design consulting firm) provides some insights on how to make a culture more innovative:

In general, “corporations inherently have antibodies that come out and try and kill any innovation.” Small companies don’t have sufficient resources and big companies “don’t always have the thought processes and the skills to really think outside their current business, nor the permission to really do it.”

Here are four things organizations need to be innovative:

1. Degree of discomfort—“there are still people who say, ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. And I don’t think these companies are in a really good position to change…you have to have a certain degree of discomfort in your business to be willing to make the changes that are necessary”
2. Design thinking—rather than analytical thinking extrapolating from the past to the future, innovative thinking requires ‘design thinking’, which is rooted in creativity, optimism and is goal-driven, trying to create new possibilities for a new future.
3. Time to innovate—“you have to actually build processes, you have to support people, you have to give them time…to think on their own…you have to provide a reward system for encouraging innovation.”
4. Risk tolerance—“you have to tolerate risk, if you’re going to try to be innovative.” Doug Merrill the VP of engineering and CIO of Google adds that “Every company in the world says ‘don’t ask permission, ask forgiveness.’ Every company in the world says ‘It’s OK to fail.” And for 99% of them, it’s probably not true.”

In User-centric EA, developing a target state and transition plan for an organization requires innovation. If there is no innovation in your target architecture and plans, then you’re just regurgitating the same old stuff to the enterprise and it’s probably of very limited, if any, value. EA must step outside its traditional box and come to the table with innovative ideas and new approaches to the business; that is it’s real value add.

As we see above, being innovative is hard: It requires sometimes going against the grain, standing out amidst nay-sayers and the ‘old guard,’ looking outside the enterprise for best practices and marketplace trends, and being optimistic and open-minded to future possibilities that are not eclipsed by ingrained thinking and turf battles. Finally architecting the future state must be grounded in present realities (including constraints such as resources, politics, and other priorities and requirements), but innovate we must if we are to make a better state tomorrow than the one we have today!

Driving Innovation and Enterprise Architecture

The Situation in Myanmar and Enterprise Architecture

The Wall Street Journal, 28 September 2007 reports that “as Myanmar’s regime cracks down on a growing protest movement, ‘citizen journalists’ are are breaking the news to the world.”

Cellphone cameras, text messaging, blogging, and even satellite phones are enabling democracy movements to subvert oppressive governments from restricting communications into and out of their regimes and sanitizing media coverage of their repressive, cruel rule.

While soldiers fired automatic weapons into a crowd of pro-democracy demonstrators, Burmese citizens were sending photos and text messages to news agencies around the world. And the world responded with warnings and sanctions against the Myanmar government, keeping the death toll to only nine people so far.

“Even in countries like Myanmar, the spread of the Internet and mobile phones has meant the footage will always continue to get through and the story will be told, one way or another.”

If only this technology existed when the Nazis where herding the Jews unto cattle cars and taking them to the myriad of concentration (i.e. extermination) camps—perhaps, the shocking, real-time information and brutal photos would’ve moved the world to action sooner.

In fact, even the last time there was a large scale protest in Myanmar in 1988, the technology was not widely available and the result was a military massacre of more than 3000 civilians!

“Technology has changed everything…now in a split second, you have the story.”

From a User-centric EA perspective, we apply technology solutions to meet information requirements of the end-users in the enterprise. The business of EA is information and technology—those things that are opening up democracy in Myanmar. In EA, the results are improved mission execution and results of operation. That’s in a business or government setting. But how does information flow and technology affect geopolitics?

The answer is greatly, as we can see from the events in Myanmar:

Information technology is not only important to business and consumers, governments and citizens, but it is critical to the world’s progress—IT has geopolitical implications, including:

1. Spreading freedom and human rights
2. Feeding the world’s hungry
3. Healing of the world’s sick
4. Imposing peace and order

“Information is power” and this is enabled and magnified by the application of technology and modern communications. If we use the information technology wisely, we can make the world a better place for everyone!

The Situation in Myanmar and Enterprise Architecture

Yin and Yang and Enterprise Architecture

Yin and Yang describe two primal opposing but complementary principles or cosmic forces said to be found in all non-static objects and processes in the universe.

The outer circle represents the entirety of perceivable phenomena, while the black and white shapes within the circle represent the interaction of two principles or aspects, called "yin" (black) and "yang" (white), which cause the phenomena to appear in their peculiar way. Each of them contains an element or seed of the other, and they cannot exist without each other.

Yin is passive, dark, feminine, downward-seeking, and corresponds to the night. Yang is active, light, masculine, upward-seeking and corresponds to the daytime.

All forces in nature can be seen as having yin and yang states, and the two are in constant movement rather than held in absolute stasis.

Yin and yang is a process of harmonization ensuring a constant, dynamic balance of all things. Excessive yin or yang state is often viewed to be unbalanced and undesirable.

User-centric EA applies the concepts of Yin and Yang—in terms of balance and harmony─to the way the chief enterprise architect relates to and works with users, the way products and services are developed, and the way architecture plans are formulated. Some examples:

• Working with users: The chief enterprise architect needs to recognize that in planning for the future state of the organization, there are going to be different points of views, diversity of aims and aspirations, and general conflict. The architect can use the principles of Yin and Yang to understand that opposing points of view are complementary and in fact necessary to vet issues and achieve better decision on behalf of the enterprise. The architect works to listen to all viewpoints and reconcile these to achieve a harmonized and optimal way ahead for the organization.
• Developing products and services: User-centric EA provides useful and useable products and services to the end-user. The philosophy of Yin and Yang helps guide the architect to develop information products that are dynamic (actively pushing out information to the end user), balanced (evenhanded, reasonable, and objective,) and where the information flows clearly and concisely. The point is to effectively communicate with users, so that they can access and use the EA knowledge base to make better decisions. EA communicates up, down, and across the organization as well as with outside entity stakeholders, such as customers, suppliers, partners, and oversight authorities. In all cases clear and balanced communication is a key ingredient to building and maintaining the architecture and leveraging use for all parties.
• Formulating architecture plans: In developing a User-centric EA plan, the concepts of Yin and Yang help to develop plans that are neither black nor white (absolute) and that are not static (but rather fluid). For architecture plans to be effective, they need to provide “wiggle room” to the organization to adjust to changing needs and environment factors (i.e. plans should not be “black and white”, but should take into account shades of gray or in the case of the Yin and Yang, there is a little Yang in every Yin and vice versa). Additionally, as the flowing symbol of the Yin and Yang indicate, plans need to be fluid and move the organization in phases. You don’t just jump to the next big technology or slice and dice your business processes, but rather you evolve in a careful, planned, and incremental course—flowing from one state to the next and so on.

Yin and Yang and Enterprise Architecture

The Hype Cycle and Enterprise Architecture

“A Hype Cycle (term coined by Gartner) is a graphic representation of the maturity, adoption and business application of specific technologies.

Hype cycles characterize the over-enthusiasm or "hype" and subsequent disappointment that typically happens with the introduction of new technologies. Hype cycles also show how and when technologies move beyond the hype, offer practical benefits, and become widely accepted.

The hype cycle comprises 5 steps:

1. "Technology Trigger" breakthrough, product launch or other event that generates significant press and interest.
2. "Peak of Inflated Expectations" frenzy of publicity typically generates over-enthusiasm and unrealistic expectations.
3. "Trough of Disillusionment" Technologies fail to meet expectations and quickly become unfashionable.
4. "Slope of Enlightenment" some businesses continue to experiment and understand the benefits and practical application of the technology.
5. "Plateau of Productivity" the benefits become widely demonstrated and accepted. The technology becomes increasingly stable and evolves in second and third generations.

Hype cycles aim to separate the hype from the reality, and enable executives to decide whether or not a particular technology is ready for adoption.” (adapted from Wikipedia)

The Hype Cycle is a tool that can be used by EA to help evaluate new technologies and whether it’s the “right” time to jump in and invest.

The hype cycle teaches us not to be blind, bleeding edge technology adopters, but rather to allow ample time for the technologies and their applications to mature. Often a swift follower can implement a relatively new technology cheaper, faster, and better than those on the bleeding edge: the kinks have been worked out, the patches applied, and the applicability fleshed out. More important, those technologies that were more hype than substance have been eliminated from the mix.

While early adoption can be a winning strategy (and extremely lucrative) for those gifted to recognize and be able to apply real innovations early on, in most cases, the swift follower is the big winner and the bleeding edge adopter the loser.

The Hype Cycle and Enterprise Architecture

Centralized, Distributed, & Hybrid IT Management and Enterprise Architecture

In User-centric EA, users IT needs are met (timely and with quality solutions), while governance ensure that those needs are aligned with mission and prioritized with others across the organization. To achieve these goals, how should IT management best be organized in the enterprise—centrally or distributed?

The debate over a centralized or distributed management model is an age-old battle. A popular theory states that organizations vacillate in roughly three year cycles between a strong centralization philosophy and a strong decentralization philosophy. The result is a management paradigm that shifts from standardization to autonomy, from corporate efficiency to local effectiveness and from pressure on costs and resources to accommodation of specific local needs, and then shifts back again. The centralized system is perceived to be too slow to react to problems in the field or to issues within a particular company department or division, and the decentralized operation is perceived as fragmented and inconsistent.

To address the pros and cons of each model, there is a hybrid model for IT management, which incorporates centralized IT governance and solutions along with distributed IT planning for the line of business and niche execution.

In the hybrid model for IT governance, an IT Investment Review Board (IRB) centrally directs, guides, and authorizes IT investments through enterprise architecture, IT policy and planning, and a CIO governed-consolidated IT budget. At the same time, IT requirements come from the lines of business, and the lines of business develop their own segment (business) architectures. In some cases, the lines of business actually plan and execute niche IT projects for their areas, while the systems development life cycle for enterprise IT systems and customer support are handled centrally.

The hybrid model for IT management is a very workable and balanced solution that demonstrates true business acumen in that it recognizes the strengths and weaknesses of both approaches (centralized and distributed management), and capitalizes on the strengths of each in coming up with a best solution for the organization.

Centralized, Distributed, & Hybrid IT Management and Enterprise Architecture

James Madison, the First “Federal Chief Enterprise Architect”

James Madison, Jr. (March 16, 1751 – June 28, 1836) was an American politician and the fourth President of the United States (1809–1817), and one of the most influential Founding Fathers of the United States. Considered to be the "Father of the Constitution", he was the principal author of the document. In 1788, he wrote over a third of the Federalist Papers, still the most influential commentary on the Constitution. As a leader in the first Congresses, he drafted many basic laws and was responsible for the first ten amendments to the Constitution, and thus is also known as the "Father of the Bill of Rights". James Madison also drafted the Virginia Plan, which “called for a national government of three branches—legislative, executive, and judicial…The concept of checks and balances was embodied in a provision that legislative acts could be vetoed by a council composed of the Executive and selected members of the judicial branch; their veto could be overridden by an unspecified legislative majority.” (Wikipedia)

As the Father of the Constitution, Bill of Rights, and Virginia Plan, James Madison was the original Chief Enterprise Architect (CEA) for the federal government. As the Federal CEA, Madison architected the performance, business, and information perspectives of the federal enterprise architecture (the information technology side of the equation—services, technology, and security—would come later with the post-industrial, technological revolution)

Performance—The mission execution and expected results are laid out in The Preamble to the Constitution, that states: “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.” Additionally, the Bill of Rights ensures that the government performs its business functions all the while protecting the rights of its citizens.

Business—The functions, activities, and processes are detailed in the Articles of The Constitution, including the functioning of the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of government, as well as state and federal powers, and processes for amendments and ratification. Additionally, the checks and balances ensure that functions are well-defined and that limits are placed on each branch of the government to protect democracy and forestall tyrannical rule.

Information—The information requirements of the Federal government are provided for in the various branches of government. For example, the legislative branch, Article One provides for free debate (the archetype for information sharing and accessibility) in Congress. Additionally, the checks and balances between the branches, provides for information flow. For example, Congress enacts the laws, and these go to the Executive Branch to carry them out, and to the Judicial Branch to interpret them. Furthermore, the political value system, Republicanism, ensures that the people remain sovereign and that they not only elect their representatives and politicians, but also can provide information and lobby to affect the enactment of laws and regulations that will ultimately affect them. Citizens are asked to perform their civic duties and to participate in the political process, so there is a free-flow of ideas and information throughout the governing process.

James Madison is indeed the original federal chief enterprise architect and a very good one at that!

James Madison, the First “Federal Chief Enterprise Architect”

24 TV Series and Enterprise Architecture

“24, last year’s most Emmy Award-winning television series with five Emmys, including Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series (Kiefer Sutherland) and Outstanding Drama Series, is one of the most innovative, thrilling and acclaimed drama series on television.” (TV.com)

What makes 24 so thrilling?

Well there is the drama, the intrigue, the ever twisting plot and constant terrorist threats, and of course, Keifer Sutherland and the rest of the 24 team.

There is also the technology and its application to track the terrorists, communicate effectively, and the business intelligence to decipher the terrorist plots. While the technology is not perfect and often it is used by the terrorists to thwart CTU as well, it still comes across quite impressively.

On a Bluetooth technology website, I found this:

“Fox's hit television show ’24’ has always displayed the latest in cutting edge technology.CTU (Counter Terrorist Unit) agents and terrorists alike. But which model of Bluetooth headsets are they actually wearing?” (bluetomorrow.com) During this season (Day 5) of 24, Bluetooth wireless headsets can be seen constantly being used by both

The technology used in 24 is viewed as cutting-edge and trend-setting (i.e. everyone wants to know which model CTU is using).

On another site, Government Computer News, 7 January, 2007, it states: “Federal superspy Jack Bauer battles fate and countless foes on the hit TV show “24”—a drama unfolding in real time and depicted on several windows within the screen. Like the Bauer character, who himself is the fictional successor to an earlier superagent who liked his tipple “shaken, not stirred,” federal IT users frequently will have to share information quickly if they hope to prevail or even survive in 2007.” (http://www.gcn.com/print/26_01/42874-1.html)

Again, the 24 series is viewed as a model for information technology users and IT sharing.

In the same GCN article, Homeland Security Department, G. Guy Thomas, the Coast Guard’s science and technology adviser for the Maritime Domain Awareness Project, states: “The ultimate goal that technologists and policy-makers should strive for is user-definable interfaces, which would provide a ‘common operational picture [COP] that serves as an interface to a collaborative information environment.’”

The COP contains an operational picture of relevant information shared by more than one command and facilitates collaborative planning and assists all echelons to achieve situational awareness. This type of operating picture is often seen being used in CTU to track and ultimately catch (with Bauer’s help) the terrorists.

For Homeland Security enterprise architecture, 24 can serve as a target state forsynthesizing business process and technology. For example, the integration between the business processes and the technology is virtually flawless in CTU, where business intelligence at the Los Angeles office is communicated and made virtually immediately available to the agents in the field for quickly following up on leads and cornering conspirators.

Additionally, even the character Jack Bauer himself displays not only tremendous heroism and patriotism in his efforts to protect this nation and its citizens, but also his innovative and can-do persona is a model for enterprise architecture development of creative yet grounded target technology states and transition plans for our organizations.

Additionally, from a User-centric EA perspective, we need to look outside our agencies at business and technology best practices in the public and private sectors, and yes, even at fictional portrayals. It is even from dramas like 24, and maybe especially from such visionary elements that EA can adapt information, creativity, and innovation to plan a genuine target state for our enterprises.

24 TV Series and Enterprise Architecture

The Pareto Principle and Enterprise Architecture

In the book, The 80/20 Principle, by Richard Koch, the author states how we can achieve more with less effort time and resources, simply by identifying and focusing our efforts on the 20% that really counts.

The Pareto Principle or 80-20 Rule postulates that 20% cause yields 80% effect!

The corollary is that little of what we spend our time on actually counts, but rather by concentrating on those things that do we can unlock the enormous potential of the 20%.

In User centric EA, we recognize that there are limited resources in the enterprise and to be effective in using technology to enhance mission outcome and planning the future success of the organization, we have to first focus on the 20% where we can have the greatest impact on 80% of the organization.

In User-centric EA, we focus where possible on the low hanging fruit. We don't try to tackle all the problems of the organization at one time, but we implement a phased approach by tackling the issues with the biggest payback first. User-centric EA looks at the users and the enterprise’s pain points and identifies those areas where EA can have “the biggest bang for the buck".

The Pareto Principle and Enterprise Architecture

Getting Performance Metrics Right

Architecture and Governance Magazine, Volume 3, Issue 3 has a great piece on developing “Metrics that Matter”.

The idea is that metrics are a critical management tool for tracking, managing, and ultimately, changing organizational behavior!

All too often, organizations do not develop or keep metrics on anything below a top-level organizational view, and even then just develop metrics that either make them look good (i.e. the metrics are very achievable) or that are easy to measure (i.e. the measures are readily available from existing data).

Organizations cannot really drive improved performance if they do not measure systemically and strategically thoughout the enterprise!

For IT metrics, Architecture and Governance Magazine proposes that we use three core categories of metrics:

1. Strategic Value—The most difficult area to measure, but one of the most valuable from the business point of view; it “identifies the degree of a business unit’s effective use of technology,” to achieve mission execution and and results of operation.
2. Project Management Effectiveness—this should “cover the quality, scope, and milestones…includes schedule adherence, functional delivery requirement specifications, and—the least often measured—return on investment for several years after deployment.”
3. Operational Effectiveness (And Efficiency)—effectiveness, which is the more important metric, involves measuring such things as customer satisfaction, cost-savings, income generation, or ehanced mission capabilities; efficiency, on the other hand, is where IT leaders often “drown executives in operational data such as help-desk resolution times and network uptimes—data that is meaningless to the corporate strategy and cements IT’s reputation as being little more than a janitorial service for technical systems.” Additionally, “if they demonstrate only efficiency, they play into the bean-counter mentality that all that matters is extracting more efficiency from the system. That’s an easy road to continued cuts…‘this cost focus had led to the suboptimatization of IT’…[and] can even lead to the eventual outsourcing of IT.”

In general, emphasize the top 2 categories of measures, and focus only on the 3^rd “if the IT department has a history of failure and thus needs to be closely monitored on the basics.”

Finally, “a good rule of thumb is that there should be less than a half-dozen key metrics provided to executives…if they need more detail, provide the drill-down capabilities, but don’t make it part of the standard report.”

In User-centric EA, performance metrics are one of the primary perspectives of the enterprise architecture (which include performance, business, information, service, technology, security, — and human capital, in the future). The performance measurement view of EA is the pinnacle of the architecture, where we identify mission execution and results of operation goals and then track and manage to these. The performance measures cascade throughout the organization to build performance results, bottom-up, to achieve mission execution and the performance goals set at the highest levels.

Additionally, IT needs to take a front position (i.e. lead by example) in developing and managing to solid performance measures that not only demonstrate the effectiveness of its utility operations, but that demonstrates effective management of new IT investment dollars to bring new and enhanced capabilities to the end-users and most importantly, that it adds to the strategic results of the enterprise.

Getting Performance Metrics Right

David Ben-Gurion and Enterprise Architecture

Ben-Gurion was named one of Time Magazine's 100 Most Important People of the Century.

“Part Washington, part Moses, he was the architect of a new nation state that altered the destiny of the Jewish people — and the Middle East.”

What made Ben-Gurion the great architect of state of Israel?

1. Vision—Ben-Gurion had a clear vision for the future survival of the Jewish people. “Shocked by anti-Semitic pogroms in Eastern Europe, he saw the creation of an independent homeland for the homeless Jewish people as, first and foremost, a crucial provision for the survival of persecuted Jews.” Further, Ben-Gurion always wanted Israel to become a ‘Light unto the Nations,’ an exemplary polity abiding by the highest moral standards.”
2. Strategy—Ben-Gurion had a strategy to accomplish his vision. “Throughout the tragic years from 1936 to 1947, while millions of Jews were rounded up and murdered by the Germans, denied asylum by almost all nations and barred by the British from finding a home in Palestine, he subtly orchestrated a complex strategy: he inspired tens of thousands of young Jews from Palestine to join the British army in fighting the Nazis, but at the same time authorized an underground agency to ship Jewish refugees into the country…This strategy helped bring about the favorable atmosphere that led to the 1947 U.N. resolution, partitioning Palestine into a Jewish state and an Arab state.”
3. Determination—Ben-Gurion was determined to execute his strategy. “Ben-Gurion's iron-will leadership during the fateful 1 1/2 years of that touch-and-go war [after 1948] turned him from ‘first among equals’ in the Zionist leadership into a modern-day King David.”
4. Leadership—Ben-Gurion was a true leader. “The crux of his leadership was a lifelong, partly successful struggle to transplant a tradition of binding majority rule in a painfully divided Jewish society that for thousands of years had not experienced any form of self-rule, not even a central spiritual authority. In the early years of the state, many Israelis saw him as a combination of Moses, George Washington, [and] Garibaldi.”
   

(adapted from http://www.time.com/time/time100)

To me, David Ben-Gurion is a hero who led the Jewish people on a road toward survival and statehood at its darkest hour in history. From the ashes of 6 million Jews murdered in the holocaust, David Ben-Gurion, like Moses, led the people from near total annihilation to rebirth in the promised land.

As an enterprise architect, I can only marvel and be utterly inspired by the building blocks of vision, strategy, determination and leadership that made David Ben-Gurion the “great architect and builder” honored by Time Magazine's 100 Most Important People of the 20^th century.

David Ben-Gurion and Enterprise Architecture

When Information Sharing Becomes Destructive

This week Columbia University hosted a true demagogue to speak.

The Wall Street Journal 25 September 2007 states in the editorial “Columbia’s Conceit” that the the acting dean of Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, not only defended having this horrific demagogue speak to the students of Columbia University, but he remarked that “if Hitler were in the United States and…if he were willing to engage in a debate and discussion to be challenged by Columbia students and faculty, we would certainly invite him.”

I assume even Osama Bin Laden would be welcome to discuss his views on killing 3000 Americans on 9-11. Free and open debate of ideas, right?

How unbelievably low Columbia University has sunk!

I grew up on the Upper West Side in Manhattan, and I fondly remember as a child taking many wonderful strolls through the the Columbia University campus. With its magnificant buildings, monuments, landscaping, and courtyards, I walked with awe and amazement up and down the paths of what I then believed to be a noble and prestigious higher learning institution.

With utter shock and dismay, I watched this week as this world demagogue and grand enemy of the United States and Israel was welcomed to Columbia and given a platform and opportunity to share his hatred and distort the truth about the nature of this country, Zionism, and even the horrific events of the Holocaust.

Columbia’s president stated “Columbia, as a community dedicated to learning and scholarship, is committed to confronting ideas.”

Well, when does confronting ideas and sharing information go from constructive to destructive? Is there a point, when allowing anyone to say anything they want, even if it is full of hatred and lies, goes beyond the point of rational ‘debate and discussion’?

I am not a lawyer, but even in this great and free country, we do not allow someone to yell fire in a crowded theatre. Nor, do we allow people to incite others to violence. There are limits to free speech and the sharing of baseless hatred and distorting the truth. In fact, our justice system is supposed to be dedicated to truth and our vast news reporting to keeping the public duly informed.

I understand now that Columbia University has agreed to invite the devil himself to speak to its students and faculty (for lively debate and discussion). The only condition placed on the devil is that he leave his pitchfork outside the campus limits. Apparently, Columbia University has not only invited the devil, but has decided to sell their soul to him as well.

So much for the great and noble institution of higher learning that a little boy once looked upon and marveled at.

As a professional enterprise architect, I believe that there are a couple of lessons here:

• In building the architecture and plans for the enterprise, full and open debate and vetting of ideas is not only encouraged, but absolutely necessary to get the best product. However, when constructive debate turns to venting, naysaying, personal insults, and destructive criticism, then the time for debate is over.
• The enterprise architecture is a knowledge base for the organization, and it is the role of the architects in conjunction with leadership, stakeholders, and end users to ensure that the knowledge base has integrity. Bad data just enables bad decision-making.

When Information Sharing Becomes Destructive