The Enterprise Architect, The Evolving Profession
I read a post on LinkedIn recently asking the question paraphrased as, “do we need Enterprise Architects with companies moving to the cloud?”. Just moving to the Cloud doesn’t mean you have eliminated problems, you just have newer, less well understood, problems.
The question does raise a valid point in the fact that the role of the Enterprise Architect is evolving. I offer two high-level topics of discussion on this point; First, the Enterprise Architect in the cloud and secondly, the Enterprise Architect’s role in the enterprise.
Moving to a cloud service provider does not eliminate problems or complexity for an organization, in fact, the move introduces additional complexities, problems and a new cost model. Two main reasons justifying the move to cloud are flexibility and cost management. The improvement in flexibility is obvious due to the rapid provisioning of services, integration of tools and platforms supporting an agile and rapid go to market strategy. The cost model, however, can be complex and have to be understood before moving services to the cloud. One of the largest drivers of cost mismanagement is the lack of a robust provisioning/permissions model. As part of the transition to the cloud, organizations need an architectural blueprint and a vendor management model with clear assignments of responsibilities to ensure permissions, provisioning, de-provisioning, tool utilization are properly managed.
The days of the Enterprise Architect being the CIO’s Strategist and Troubleshooter (I refer to this as the Luca Brasi role), are changing. Data has become too abundant and a mission critical asset for organizations to delegate to the CIO as it’s custodian alone. This trend has seen the rise of the Chief Data Officer (a.k.a. Data Czars) as well as other chiefs. All having ownership and responsibilities for the data and more importantly the monetization of the data.
With these touch points across the organization and beyond, what is the right role to make this happen? I have heard some companies refer to this role as their Digital Architect, that is either just semantics or too limited in scope to truly make the impact necessary to move the organization into the digital age. What should the role of the Enterprise Architect be in the face of rapidly evolving technology landscape?
The most significant contribution the Enterprise Architect can offer is to encourage adoption and mitigate the impact emerging technologies in the enterprise. Introducing new technologies into an intricate highly integrated and connected eco-system is risky and can be very disruptive or even punitive to the business. At Syzygy Solutions, we do not view emerging technologies as disruptive or revolutionary, we view them as necessary evolutionary requirements for organizations to move rapidly.
What does the future hold for Enterprise Architects? To remain competitive, companies are committed to or making claim of focusing on their Digital Transformation. Transformation to what? If you are expecting to achieve Digital Transformation by picking up digital widgets on the journey and at some point, a digital singularity will occur and you will be in Digital Utopia…think again. Digital Transformation is a journey towards the Digital Enterprise. The Digital Enterprise is complex, interrelated, interconnected, interdependent with infinite internal and external touch points, unlimited data volumes, ever changing tools with infinite opportunities for the quick. And like any journey, you need a destination, a plan and means. That is the role of the Enterprise Architect of the future.
