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Viewpoint paper
Leveraging
architecture
In the New Style of IT
Viewpoint paper | Leveraging architecture
Table of contents
1 Level set
1 Being digital—in every way
2 Meta forces of change
3 The New Style of IT
5 Changes to the architecture realm
9 Summary and conclusions
9 About the author
Viewpoint paper | Leveraging architecture
Today’s disruptive IT developments affect the practices of the IT
architect. Get prepared for changes in the architecture realm.
Level set
The New Style of IT brings concepts that
can benefit enterprises.
The question is: To what extent will the new
concepts—such as cloud, as-a-service, and
mobility—affect the way enterprises implement
architecture competencies?
The products that emerge from the contemporary information society challenge enterprises in
the processes that constitute the business and IT operations. These challenges are substantial
because they can deeply affect enterprises in their business models and IT departments in
enabling these models. We can rightly speak of disruptive IT developments that emerged into
what HP denotes as the New Style of IT.
There is no doubt that architecture artifacts will be affected by these developments and
challenge organizations to take appropriate architectural measures to deliver business value
by using as-a-service concepts, cloud computing, social media, and more. The question rises,
however, to what extent and how these developments will affect the IT architecture realm.
This paper highlights the changes and the fundamental Meta forces that are driving them,
followed by exploring the requirements that the disruptive IT developments impose on the IT
architecture discipline and the architecture profession in general.
Being digital—in every way
The contemporary information society
deeply affects the habits and practices of
enterprises.
No one expected Twitter would disrupt the realm
of marketing—the traditional funnel approach
in marketing changed into social media-driven
engagements.
Saying that we are living in a digital era is probably a cliché, but understanding its consequences
for organizations and disciplines is important. The way digital technology has been inflecting
our society is noticeable. Digital technologies are merging with our day-to-day lives, products
and services, and business practices. The examples are many, such as a running shoe becoming
wearable technology connected to a smartphone. We use a digital baby app on a smartphone
to monitor our newborns. The number of online courses has massively increased. We can now
book hotels, restaurants, and taxis from every corner of the street.
It seems the result of a perfect storm, where the speed of change, the increase of digital
capacity, and the societal adaption of ”the digital” has resulted in a true digital society. It took
nine years for America Online to get a million users, while Draw Something, an addictive social
drawing game, took nine days to get the same number of users. One billion posts on Facebook
and 200 million tweets on Twitter result in 2.5 billion exabytes of data each day. Researcher
IDC has previously been forecasting that by 2020, the world will have 5ZB, but this number has
recently been increased to 40ZB.1
Most of the time, we do see the writing on the wall through the trends we discover, allowing
businesses to adapt to these new developments. Sometimes disruption comes unexpectedly.
For example, no one expected Twitter to become a political instrument, a tool for bringing
down governments, or changing the world of marketing into a social media-driven model of
engagement. Moreover, it also became a force for good, in serving as a major communications
channel during disasters.
1
zetabyte (ZB) is
A
1.000.000.000.000.000.000.000 (1021) bytes.
1
Viewpoint paper | Leveraging architecture
Disruptive changes are most noticeable when they affect our personal daily habits. For
businesses, it may mean that proven business models are suddenly swept away. But disruptive
change can also introduce new opportunities. For example, cars connected to the Internet will
dramatically change the insurance industry, with personalized insurance (based on driving
behavior) and car-to-car communications leading to safer roads for traveling.
When everything connects to everything, such as objects in the Internet of Things as well as
information systems, a number of things will start to accelerate—the speed of change, the
growth of data, and the number of innovations—that will disruptively affect society.
Meta forces of change
A connected universe, driven by Meta
forces of change
Miniaturization, self-propelling data, and nonrational values are Meta forces that drive the
desire to massively connect objects and systems
with one and other.
To understand how the aforementioned changes affect our practices, it is interesting to know
what forces are driving these changes. We can recognize three Meta forces fundamental in
these changes:
•Constant miniaturization of technology objects
•Self-propelling qualities of data
•Rise of non-rational values
Constant miniaturization
That information today is omnipresent is the result a constant miniaturization of technology. We
probably all agree that there is more compute power in today’s smartphone than in the large
computer rooms from the seventies. We still have not found the boundaries of Moore’s law, and
technology continues to find its way into smaller objects. If everything is getting an IP address,
it is not difficult to imagine the accelerated growth of data. Moreover, it increasingly enables us
to embed information-generating technology into objects. The Verichip, for example, proves
that intelligent objects can get really small. In 2013, the American Food and Drug Agency (FDA)
approved the first human implantable radio frequency identification. A microchip no bigger
than a grain of rice can be implanted in the upper arm for connecting patients to healthcare
information systems.
Abundance is the leading paradigm of the
contemporary information society.
Enterprises once managed information as a scarce
resource for reaching their business objectives.
Omnipresence of information from the Internet, as
well as the plethora of technology, introduced the
shift to abundance as leading paradigm.
Self-propelling qualities of data
With information abundantly and always available, a new paradigm has emerged. Traditionally,
enterprises were managing information as a scarce resource to reach the objectives of the firm.
In the information society, however, the leading paradigm is abundance. Systems propagate
information to other systems, making information a self-propelling entity. For example, a
newspaper analyzes Twitter feeds, creates news articles using journalistic software, attaches
a matching image from a database of photographic images, and publishes on their website.
The latter is used by others for their own analysis and stored again into systems. Scientists
call this phenomenon “technical” information2. Interestingly, the author with the most titles on
Wikipedia is a piece of AI software3.
Employees consult the abundance of information sources, often using their own mobile devices
while connecting to systems of unknown vulnerability. They potentially jeopardize the current
information systems in the enterprise. Chief information officers (CIOs) are confronted with a
technological lifestyle that invades the boundaries of the organization: the enterprise becomes
connected to systems of unknown vulnerability.
The plethora of technology available today shows that a broad fundamental shift from scarcity
to abundance has emerged in the information society.
allinikos, J. (2006). The consequences of
K
information. Institutional implications of
technological change. Northampton, MA: Edward
Elgar Publishing.
3
The Wall Street Journal (2014), For This Author,
10,000 Wikipedia Articles Is a Good Day’s Work:
http://tinyurl.com/oj5tly7
2
2
Viewpoint paper | Leveraging architecture
Non-rational values
We are also witnessing an emancipation and democratization of information and technology.
The digital divide becomes evident: digital-savvy individuals connect to a world of information,
developing new businesses and above all, new values systems that exhibit strong non-rational
values. Technology objects, such as smartphones and information, are laden with affect. For
example, young people leave Facebook because too many elderly have become members.4
The aforementioned Meta forces have led to a consumer-driven society that exhibits
fundamentally different economies. Their far-reaching effects on organizational practices are
just beginning to surface.
The New Style of IT
Against the background of the aforementioned evolution and Meta forces, we see new
IT concepts being introduced that fuel the digital evolution with fundamental changes. A
transformational shift in IT development is forcing organizations to rethink how IT is delivered,
and more importantly, how IT is consumed to deliver value. This is what HP refers to as the New
Style of IT: the convergence of cloud, mobility, social media, and Big Data. Einstein once said
that one cannot solve new problems with the same paradigms that created them. We must set
aside our traditional expectations of information and technology infrastructures because we
lean too much on the notion that the future is additive—building on the old premises. Today’s
developments are disruptive and require us to understand the new paradigms that emerge.
Systems of record
Transaction-based businesses rely on static
systems that are well-integrated, producing
consistent data for business users that use
the data as is, rather than engaging with these
systems.
Systems of engagement
Rich user experience has become a leading
concept for businesses. The paradigm of systems
of engagement is important for understanding
how modern information systems affect the user
experience.
The new IT journey for CIOs and CTOs
Current infrastructures are not sustainable and
require CIOs and CTOs to explore and exploit new
business solutions with IT and develop sustainable
roadmaps to leverage the New Style of IT.
From system of record to systems of engagement
One might call much legacy IT the “old style” of IT, an era where change was slow and
incrementally scaled into new boundaries of performance and possibilities. Information
systems primarily focused on automating transactions to support the business and its
processes. Users had to become experts to know all the complex details on how to operate
information systems. For example, experts on analyzing historical data to understand the past
and plan for the future.
Cloud, Big Data, mobility, and social media are just a few of the disruptive technologies, but they
converge and reinforce each other.5 We are entering an era where change is really fast and IT
has evolved beyond being a mere supportive tool. IT today has become a primary business
instrument for developing new services. For example, employees, as well as customers and
business partners, now have access to real-time data analytics—enabling on-the-spot decision
making and delivery of new types of business services. Moreover, these kind of techniques have
become indirectly available to the masses. As-a-service concepts enable easy access and
extensive tailoring of systems for creating new types of business solutions, where the user
experience has become paramount.6 In this new wave, we are moving from what we call systems
of record to systems of engagement: a new paradigm for understanding the context in which it
is essential to focus on the rich user experience of IT, a leading concept in businesses today.
Current infrastructures are not sustainable
The infrastructures built with our beloved IT concepts—such as client server, Web 2.0, and our
legacy applications—were serving user environments that were pretty predictable and static.
Current infrastructures are no longer sustainable because the New Style of IT, which includes
cloud, mobility, social media, and Big Data, fuels a world that is increasingly unpredictable and
dynamic. Consequently, enterprises respond by enhancing their agility with new hardware,
software, and service concepts. It challenges CIOs and chief technology officers (CTOs) to optimize
legacy investments while introducing new architectures that are capable of serving the mobile
information revolution. This will be a journey of exploring and exploiting new business models
and solutions, as well as developing sustainable roadmaps to leverage the New Style of IT.
iStrategy Labs (2014), 3 Million Teens Leave
Facebook In 3 Years: The 2014 Facebook
Demographic Report, http://tinyurl.com/qda3fho
5
IDC (2013), Supporting a New Style of IT: The
Value of the 3rd Platform, http://tinyurl.com/
lhlo9mw
6
Greenway, M. (2013), New Style of IT: Employee
empowerment taps into the power of people,
http://tinyurl.com/p9hwraq
4
3
Viewpoint paper | Leveraging architecture
Change of business strategies
With the New Style of IT, there are new business models that come into the reach of enterprises.
That have a profound impact on the way they organize and operate. The legacy systems
and approaches are not capable of addressing these new business needs because different
problems need to be solved. It is important to understand what operational trends in business
are relevant to the IT developments in the enterprise. We recognize three imperatives that
emerge in businesses:
Businesses have new options available but
they challenge how they operate.
Businesses increasingly pursue becoming
knowledge providers. Though they are optimizing
their models, IT optimization continues to take
place. Leaders are challenged to optimize the
bottom line while looking for new revenue
streams.
•From services to value: Because enterprises have access to highly commoditized and
consumable IT services—everything-as-a-service—they are increasingly focusing on
becoming value creators and moving away from being the traditional services provider. Having
access to IT is no longer making the difference. The way enterprises can become a knowledge
center in creating business value will be a recurring topic on the strategic agenda.
•Fixing the competency gap: Increased dynamics and unpredictability exemplify that
business in the digital economy will be much more competitive. Enterprises will focus more on
optimizing business value and require informational competencies to build competitive edge.
IT strategies, however, are caught in increasing service levels, optimizing costs, and more, but
need to introduce new concepts supporting new business models. A tough dilemma with the IT
optimization journey still continuing.
•Sustained shareholder value: Cost reduction—do more with less—has been a top priority
until two to three years ago, increasing the bottom line. The increased competition in the
digital economy, as well as the economic downturn, has increased the quest to sustained
shareholder value. The C-suite wants to enter new markets, reach more customers, serve
them more effectively, and build brand perception to create top-line revenue growth.
This typically sketches the climate that CIOs and CTOs currently operate in. It is truly challenging,
and there is no doubt that IT in enterprises will face even more challenging times in the near
future. Business leaders with creative appreciation of new technologies want to create new
business strategies and models that exploit them. This provides opportunities for enterprise
architects, who understand both the business and the technologies, and can suggest better ways
to implement their current business strategies and business models. They can also recommend
new business strategies and models that exploit them to their competitive advantage.
IT operations have evolved from being
siloed to efficient service aggregators.
By maturing in the way they create value, tightly
managing costs and efficiency, and delivering
value-add to the business, today’s IT operation
offers comprehensive services aggregated from a
variety of sources, internal and external.
Change in IT strategies
Technology innovations and the increased demands from business have driven IT operations
to become more efficient in their service delivery, increasing the focus on added-value to their
consumers. Formerly, IT operations supported businesses with dedicated specialized IT staff
to increase their competitive edge. Today, mature IT operations are comprehensive service
integrators, aggregating IT with third-party management being their core competency. They
have become responsible for, and create value from, best-value service delivery in terms
of cost, security, flexibility, scalability, and quality. Today’s business consumer selects from
segment-focused aggregated catalogs and is ensured of compliance with company policy
and standards. Matured IT operations have truly become the one-stop shop for all IT-related
business services.
The New Style of IT has challenging effects on IT operations and creates a strong momentum
for enterprises to further mature their IT operations. Adding on to how IT operations create
value, manage their costs and efficiency, and deliver business value-add, the New Style of IT will
have IT operations converging toward real-time brokers of IT commodity.
IT operations will head toward being
real-time brokers of IT commodities.
The way that IT resources have become
available from the cloud, for example, will turn
IT departments into real-time brokers analogous
to the trading of familiar commodities such as
electricity.
The data center of the future will look like a
trading room for IT resources. IT operations will
continuously scan markets for the best value price
offerings to optimize demand-supply.
4
IT operations create value by tightly regulated demand-supply constructions for using
external IT resources through pay-per-use concepts and smart buying. As real-time brokers, IT
operations need to introduce value-based pricing for transparent cost and revenue structures.
IT brokerage will be analogous to trading and/or brokering of physical commodities, such as
electricity. Delivery of IT resources aims at minimal idle or unused resources through highly
optimized allocation mechanisms that are capable of serving multiple client organizations on
the same IT environment, such as cloud. Businesses gain a competitive edge through bestvalue pricing of their business services, enabled by on-demand and pay-per-use IT.
Viewpoint paper | Leveraging architecture
Conclusion
The fundamental shift that exhibits with the New Style of IT clearly affects how business
operate, explore new models, and how IT operations have become critical in its success in so
doing. Business models and IT strategies have become part of the same equation. As real-time
brokers, IT operations must become transparent in their cost and revenue structures. For
enterprises to get a grip on their competency gaps, they must understand the art of the possible
of IT. Business and IT must reinforce one another and explore new grounds instead of maintaining
the distinct separate relationship as with the traditional business-IT alignment paradigm.
Changes to the architecture realm
With the digital revolution and the accompanying New Style of IT, new overarching questions arise:
•How do all these development affect the architecture realm?
•More precisely, does it change the way we architect solutions and interact with businesses,
and consequently, are there new skills required?
Finding insights and possible answers require us to reconsider the architecture realm from
three different perspectives:
•Architecture function: the processes and roles that result in architectural artifacts, guidance,
and coherence
•Architecture discipline: the rules and methods resulting in a best practice way of working
•Architecture profession: the skills, expertise, and certification that result in getting the job
done and career progression
The New Style of IT will have profound
effects on the way architecture is done.
The new opportunities that emerge with the
New Style of IT, as well as the Meta forces that
drive them, will affect the architect function, the
discipline, and the profession.
The premise developed earlier, with the change of business and IT strategies against the
background of the New Style of IT, is the transformation of IT toward a real-time broker of
commoditized IT resources and the three business imperatives that emerge. They are becoming
value creators, fixing the competency gap, and seek sustained shareholder value through top-line
revenue growth. It makes sense to explore the three architecture perspectives with this premise.
Architecture function
There are three developments that require enterprises to reconsider the current
implementations of their architecture function. First, since customer-centric business models
emerge to create enhanced customer experiences, enterprises increasingly exploit external
services because it is not part of their core capabilities. Enterprises become part of larger
ecosystems. Or better: enterprises ”become” ecosystems.
Second, brokerage and operational agility drive increased automation of performance
management in general. Enterprises more and more seek to standardize on automated
service delivery and leverage external services and IT resources. Both are capable of providing
automated key performance indicator (KPI) information. New techniques, such as operational
analytics, will drive the performance of demand-supply processes and capabilities.
Third, with enterprises becoming ecosystems, there is an increased interest in developing
model-driven reference architectures for the architecture function. The model for an IT
operation has matured over the years, such as ITIL. Despite all the new developments, it
remains the same when we look at it from an information perspective. The IT4IT initiative is
exemplary in developing standard information models and reference architectures to operate IT
and align it with the architecture function in the enterprise.7
7
he Open Group IT4IT Consortium (2014),
T
http://collaboration.opengroup.org/it4it/
5
Viewpoint paper | Leveraging architecture
These three developments—standardization, automation, and the run back to core
capabilities—reinforce each other. It is another perfect storm within the perfect storm that
resulted into the New Style of IT that raises the urgency for enterprises to reconsider their
architecture function.
Enterprises must refocus their
architecture function.
The strong technology focus of the architecture
function will not address the real business
questions that are necessary to guide the
business through the art of the possible.
The original notion of applying the concept of architecture to the IT domain focused specifically
on the relationship with the business domain. IT only develops successfully when there is a
fit-for-purpose with the business need. Perhaps the concept of architecture was positioned as a
too-technical concept, often lacking appropriate languages for bridging the business-IT relation
The business, however, has always had a slightly contorted reaction to an architecture function
in enterprises.
Somehow architecture in relation to the IT domain was downgraded toward strong technologyfocused activities, avoiding the real business question behind the technology projects: Are
we doing the right project for entering new markets and enhancing customer experience?
Architecture became primarily executed out of the IT department. Now the New Style of IT is
driving a fundamental shift, where IT strategies and business strategies have become part of
the same equation. With this shift, architecture becomes pivotal in exploring new business
models. Enterprises need to catch up with architecture in the business-IT relationship.
With the New Style of IT, new business models come in reach. That impacts the way enterprises
organize. The conventional wisdom is that architecture guides and secures coherence in the
development of solutions used by the enterprise for doing business. Of course, you can think
of many subdomains of architecture, some that can be very technology-focused. In general,
enterprises must prepare to refocus the architecture function to a practice of architecture
that is a strategic instrument in exploring the art of the possible. This should be done in close
collaboration with the business to deliver business value and not just IT. Ultimately, envision
how technology can disrupt the market in which a business operates and how the enterprise
can apply technology to enable that change.
To conclude, enterprises must go back to the roots of architecture: guidance and coherence
for increasing or transforming business outcome with technology. The architecture function
must be pivotal in the overall IT governance processes, where business and IT must leverage
architecture practices to explore the art of what is possible in the New Style of IT.
Architecture discipline
There is the notion ”this time is different” in a sense that the IT industry is facing a fundamental
shift with the New Style of IT. The challenging question then arises whether the current state of
the art in the architecture discipline is capable of creating this better world. More precisely, do
we have the right methods and models to cope with the changes explored previously?
Exploring new styles businesses.
With IT becoming a strategic enabler, the
architecture discipline increasingly has to
involve methods, models, and tools that are
capable of higher levels of abstraction, levels
that understand the bigger ecosystem of the
enterprise.
6
The previous section on the architecture function argued that there is too big of a divide in
the business-IT relationship and that architecture degraded toward technical activities in
the IT department. This is problematic because the emergence of the New Style of IT made
information technology and concepts evolve from supportive tools to strategic enablers
for doing a new style of business. That style of business makes traditional models become
increasingly irrelevant.
Business leaders want to explore new models, and more importantly, with the increasing
pace of change they must recognize business threats from opportunities. This requires a
level of abstraction capable of handling topics such as extended ecosystems, as-a-service,
interconnectedness, and social engagement. They will become the dominant subject of
discussions in the C-suite and are not easy to address without a structured approach.
Viewpoint paper | Leveraging architecture
In general, architecture is an attractive concept for aligning different levels of abstractions while
eliciting invisible dependencies. The question is: Are the current architecture practices prepared
for the new topics of the C-suite? When IT has become “just a socket,” architecture methods and
models should have an increased integral focus on:
•Strategy—understanding the business strategy and defining its model
•Structure—how value can be delivered to solve business problems
•Operations—designing, implementing, and operating IT business solution
Strategy, structure, and operations have always been the domain of three different professions:
consultancy, architecture, and engineering. When business and IT have become part of the
same equation, their disciplines will start to unify. When IT becomes “a socket,” enterprises will
focus on connecting services to IT legacy and how they impact daily practices of the business
and their customers.
Competitive edge in a hyper-competitive,
digital-driven market
Enterprises with the competencies to manage
and maintain the synergy between new business
models and the New Style of IT build and sustain a
competitive edge in a hyper-competitive, digitaldriven market.
New services, business, and customers have become tightly interrelated and raise new
questions for enterprises. For example, can new concepts—such as payment services,
analytics-as-service, and mobility services—be introduced without introducing the next IT
legacy? Said differently, can we introduce the services created by the New Style of IT without
blocking future business developments? The shift toward digital business infrastructures
requires an increased focus on a business-oriented modeling that integrally includes modeling
of the IT domain.
The competencies to manage the intersection of new business models and the New Style of
IT will be the differentiating factor for enterprises to build and sustain a competitive edge in a
digital-driven market that has become hyper-competitive. The shift toward digital business
infrastructures, or better, business-technical structures, requires the architecture discipline to
increase the focus on business-oriented modeling that integrally includes the IT domain.
The tight connection of business and IT—we can truly speak of a duality because business now
is IT—raises the demand for structured languages capable of strict articulation of strategic
intent and its impact on operations. It also calls for a co-evolution toward a sustainable
business model enabled by technology. This is the focus of the emerging subdiscipline of
business architecture.
Business architecture will gain interest
in a hyper-competitive, digital-driven
market.
For exploring the impact of strategic intent of
businesses with the New Style of IT, business
architecture will emerge as a guiding methodology
to realize the necessary competencies in the
enterprise.
The current notion of business architecture differentiates in two practices. The first one is
solution-focused, expressing a view of processes as business context complemented with an
architectural view of business information, concepts, value, and risk. The second practice aims
at formalizing the holistic description of how organizations use business competencies that are
essential in realizing strategic intent and objectives. The latter focuses on the external view:
strategic intent, strategic priorities, business structure and execution, and efficiencies in the
appropriate context of the business ambition.8 New approaches and enhanced methods are
necessary to fully exploit the integral business-IT potential. The holistic approach with business
architecture is a promising concept for this.
To summarize, current trends have a larger impact at operational, structural, and strategic
levels than the architecture practices are used to addressing. That raises new challenges for the
architecture discipline. New approaches and enhanced methods are necessary to fully exploit
the business-IT potential.
endricks, H. (2014), Business architecture
H
360 degree methods, The Open Group summit,
Amsterdam
9
Moghaddam, Y., Bess, C., Demirkan, H.,
& Spohrer, J. (2014), How to Thrive As IT
Professionals in a Converging ICT World. Cutter
IT Journal (Vol: March).
8
Architecture profession
Great technology cannot go without the right talent. To create traction and make
transformations really happen, however, the appropriate conditions in the environment are
necessary for the right talents to converge. IT has always been instrumental in the business-IT
equation, but the New Style of IT introduces new paradigms that force architecture practitioners
to raise questions other than those they are used to asking.9 The previous treatise on the
architecture discipline illuminated the increased focus necessary on complex issues that are
outside the instrumental domain of IT.
7
Viewpoint paper | Leveraging architecture
The mainstream architecture practices have emerged from the technology domain aiming at fitfor-purpose of technology to business. Despite all its premises—and promises—architecture
still is strongly technically biased. Architecture practices require thought to integrate more
business-related perspectives and holistic alignment focus. Business architecture was
only recently recognized as a way to govern and align the differing aspects of business and
technology. Profession development, such as skills and certification, is still in its infancy.
Since there is no widespread adoption yet for business architecture, professionals have great
opportunities ahead to develop and enhance their careers with the New Style of IT architecture.
According to the human-technology Meta
narrative, IT now adapts to humans.
There is a big opportunity for architecture
professionals to meaningfully apply IT into the
business-IT equation now that IT has become an
enabler of adapting new users.
The human-technology Meta narrative is how technology adapts to individuals instead of the
other way around. With the rise of friendly, intuitive user interfaces, easy access to information,
and the extent of wearable technology, IT now adapts to humans. Instead of learning special
skills and organizing big operational changes, information technology has come within reach of
the masses and can be used by anyone and all organizational environments. The discourse has
changed from a technical discussion on how to implement technology and the special expertise
required, to what IT can do for enhancing the business.
The new focus of the architect is showing the business how technology can transform and
increase business outcomes. If there is one thing that architects must develop, it is empathy:
think beyond IT and understand its use by the business. This requires architects to enhance
their skillsets. Architects must understand how the major trends impact the strategic intent
of the enterprise and what business logics and competences are required. They must support
the business in creating new value propositions, changing the revenue models, and playing the
competitive game.
Architecture professionals must develop
empathy and be a source of inspiration for
businesses.
Developing business models enabled with the
New Style of IT requires architects to understand
how IT is experienced by users. They must develop
empathy and inspire the business how the user
experience can be beneficial.
The architect must be capable of driving dialogues on higher levels of abstraction and rapidly
tieing them down to technology to inspire and play the art of the possible. It is a dialogue on
how technology-driven, business-IT models can create value in the enterprise ecosystem.
Concepts—such as value propagation, service interfacing, and business modeling—need
to become the comfort zone of the architect to support the business in exploring its role
or position in the ecosystem. The architect must get a grip on how that affects enterprise
architectures by using business architecture and developing the appropriate roadmaps for
solutions for the New Style of IT.
From the technology point of view, the focus will be solution assembly rather than solution
building. Again, since IT has become a socket, it involves the architect applying different skills
in weighing the qualities and added-value of IT in the business ecosystem rather than worrying
about its technical implementation.
Architecting does not mean drawing boxes
and lines.
Architecture is not about drawing boxes and lines
and hoping for the best in getting support from
the boardroom in funding the next major change
in the IT landscape. Architecture is a meaningful
process that engages the business.
Tying it together
Perhaps we are allowed to provocatively say “architecture has never become what it has been.”
Of course, technology is an integral part of the architecture realm, but as discussed previously,
technology became its dominant focus. Architecture is not about drawing boxes and lines and
hoping for the best in getting support from the boardroom in funding the next major change in
the IT landscape. Architecture is a meaningful participatory process for creating constructs of
understanding. With the New Style of IT, this has become eminently clear, because the purpose
of architecture is to explore new possibilities and materialize strategic intent as business logic
and enabling technologies.
Architecting is about changing the frames of reference that organizations have on the businessIT relation. For a long time, we have been preaching to manage business-IT alignment. The
time has come to let go of this paradigm and enhance architecture practices to support
governing and developing an integral understanding how enterprises can leverage the New
Style of IT in businesses.
8
Viewpoint paper | Leveraging architecture
Summary and conclusions
This paper started by introducing the New Style of IT and what the underlying Meta forces are
that fuel its development. We have seen that with “the digital” this time it is fundamentally
different than regular evolutionary changes. This has far-reaching impacts on business
operations: the move from services to value, the continuous optimization of IT, and the quest
for sustained shareholder value. IT operations have evolved over the years. They now are
entering an era where they develop into real-time brokers of IT resources, either internal or
external. The shift from services to brokerage requires them to develop competences on smart
buying and agility.
The results of all these developments are that architecture increasingly will become
instrumental in considering the choices that are fundamental for enabling new or enhanced
business models with the concepts that come with the New Style of IT. Enterprises are advised
to reconsider the position of their architecture function. This cannot happen without enhancing
the architecture discipline with a new emphasis for architects in their professionalism.
About the author
Dr. Peter Beijer, chief technologist, HP
Dr. Peter Beijer works in the Office of the CTO of Enterprise Services, leading the architecture
profession for EMEA. He is recognized pioneer in practicing HP architecture methods and
core contributor to the development of the architecture profession. Dr. Beijer is the chair of
the Specification Authority for Open Certified Architect (Open CA) in the Open Group; eligible
certification board member and chair; and holds a professional certification by the Open
Group as master certified IT architect. He received a PhD from the University of Amsterdam,
concerning economies of meaning in image building for innovation processes.
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Viewpoint paper | Leveraging architecture
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4AA5-5569ENW, October 2014