2015 - Gartner - The Cios New Digital Busines Advisor

2015 REPORT NO.
12
Gartner Executive Programs
The CIO’s New

Digital Business
Advisor: A Resurgent
EA Team
Table of Contents
Executive Summary 5
1. A
business-outcome-driven EA team is a valuable advisor to the CIO 9
2. The EA team provides the CIO with a holistic approach to bridging

strategy and execution 24
3. U
tilize five critical success factors to reshape your EA team 34
Further Reading 45
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2 The CIO’s New Digital Business Advisor: A Resurgent EA Team

Foreword
In this era of digitalization, CIOs must live up to increasingly
challenging expectations that often pull them in different
directions as they look to balance digital opportunities and
threats against the demands of execution. CIOs need the holistic
perspective of an EA team driven by business outcomes.
This report addresses the question: How can CIOs create, and benefit from, an
effective relationship with their EA team when responding to digital business
challenges?
“The CIO’s New Digital Business Advisor: A Resurgent EA Team” was written by
members of the CIO & executive leadership research group, led by Lee Weldon
(managing vice president), assisted by Marcus Blosch (vice president).
Lee Weldon Marcus Blosch
Foreword 3
Acknowledgments
We would like to thank the many organizations and individuals that generously
contributed their insights and experiences to the research, including:
− The contributors to our interviews and case studies: Lucy Montague, Regan
Naidoo and Louise van der Bank, AfriSam (South Africa); Paul Arrigoni and Gavin
Beckett, Bristol City Council (U.K.); Jeff Sampler, China Europe International
Business School (China); Jörn Riedel, City of Hamburg (Germany); John
Harrickey, CSA Group (Canada); Carsten Schüler, Dataport (Germany); Dr. Ariffin
Marzuki bin Mokhtar, IJN (National Heart Institute) (Malaysia); Arthur Hu, Lenovo
(U.S.); Bill Hills and Paul Lough, Navy Federal Credit Union (U.S.); Jan de Klerk
and David O’Brien, Old Mutual South Africa (South Africa); Melanie Sinton, Racing
and Wagering Western Australia (Australia); Chris Eriksen, Roy Hill (Australia);
Jane Moran, Unilever (U.K.); Brigadier General Sarah Zabel, U.S. Air Force; and
Christiane Edington and Allesandro Pomar, Vivo/Telefonica Brasil (Brazil).
− Other Gartner colleagues: Jim Arnott, Nicky Bassett, Betsy Burton, Kelvin
Cantafio, Peter Giuffrida, Axel Jacobs, Jennifer Kinsmann, Jon Krause and
Stephan Rischke.
− Other members of the CIO & executive leadership research group: Remi Gulzar,
Patrick Meehan, Mary Mesaglio, Simon Mingay, Tina Nunno, Andy Rowsell-Jones
and Ansgar Schulte.

Executive Summary
To realize digital business benefits, CIOs need a new kind
of advisor. EA has undergone a resurgence, moving EA
teams into position as key digital advisors to CIOs. Harnessing
EA’s potential requires CIOs to ensure that their EA teams
are business-outcome-driven, with renewed skills.
A business-outcome-driven EA team is a valuable

advisor to the CIO
We are now fully within the era of digital business, and its impact appears set to
increase for the next several years, with CEOs expecting digital revenue to rise
from 22% today to 41% in five years, according to the 2015 Gartner CEO Survey.
In response, CIOs are increasingly expected to fill a role beyond just heading
the IT department, broadening their responsibility to leading and influencing the
use of information and technology assets across the enterprise, regardless of
where they reside. CIOs need a new type of advisor to help them respond to
these expectations while addressing the opportunities, threats and challenges of
digitalization (see figure on page 6).
Executive Summary 5
CIOs are caught between business strategy and execution
– New channels
– New insights Business
– New technologies opportunities
(e.g., Internet of Things)
– Cyberattacks/data loss
Business
– Market disruption
threats
– Faster competitors
– Complexity
– Inconsistent security
Execution
– Lack of visibility
challenges
– Lack of skills
– Inflexibility
Over the past five years, the EA discipline has been undergoing somewhat of
a renaissance. As leading CIOs begin to fully address the opportunities and
challenges of digital business, many are pointing to a resurgent EA capability
as a contributor to their success, which includes the EA team as a key advisor.
These business-outcome-driven EA teams are shifting their focus beyond the IT
organization and even the enterprise, to a more holistic perspective that crosses
the business ecosystem.
Increasingly, CIOs are finding their head of EA (or chief enterprise architect) to
be a key personal advisor. At the heart of this is the need for the head of EA
to be a credible leader in the enterprise, which is achieved by having both a
deep understanding of the business and a reputation for successfully impacting
business outcomes. Without this level of credibility, the head of EA risks being
seen as a bureaucrat rather than a problem solver.
For some CIOs, however, the first step is to overcome a general sense of
skepticism about EA, born out of experience with overly methodical EA teams
that inhibited agility and innovation.
The EA team provides the CIO with a holistic approach

to bridging strategy and execution
Successful EA teams balance innovation and execution by understanding the
organization’s strategy and goals, and the business outcomes they are driving.
These EA teams are multidisciplinary and provide a holistic view from diverse
viewpoints, including business, information, solutions and technology (see figure
opposite), as well as from more specialized viewpoints that cross emerging
business and technology trends, such as cloud and the Internet of Things (IoT).

Business-outcome-driven EA provides a holistic view across
diverse viewpoints
Business Business Execution

opportunities threats challenges
CIO advisory
Business-outcome-driven enterprise architecture
Cloud Information IoT
Business Technology
Security Mobility
Solutions
…
…
Effective EA teams focus on actionable deliverables that address the CIO’s key
needs for strategic options and visibility into issues such as execution. They also
provide guidelines for putting technology and information to the best use, and
“guardrails” that clarify where the enterprise has flexibility, and where it needs to
comply with tighter principles (e.g., in security and privacy).
To produce deliverables, EA must take a highly collaborative approach. The

EA team adds business value throughout the execution process — first by
providing the deliverables to support stakeholder decision making, and then by
orchestrating stakeholder involvement and interaction. When setting up an EA
practice, the CIO needs to enable key relationships with the office of the CIO
(OCIO), the PMO, business executives and others.
Utilize five critical success factors to reshape

your EA team
An EA practice is not “one size fits all.” First, it must be thoughtfully designed based
on specific business outcomes. Second, EA teams should develop their practice;
they can use standard EA frameworks, but our research suggests that it is better to
draw on elements of these rather than see frameworks as methodologies requiring
comprehensive implementation. Third, EA teams must apply lean thinking and only
enough architecture to support the enterprise — not so much that it is difficult to
change. This includes a flexible approach to governance that focuses more on
coaching and guiding than on policing and enforcing.
Executive Summary 7
The fourth success factor is to extend the EA team beyond traditional
architectural skills to include more business and information-related skills.
Several researched enterprises affirm that training business colleagues
to be successful enterprise architects is easier than training career IT
professionals. Fifth, CIOs must have a clear roadmap in place when building
up, or rebooting, their business-outcome-driven EA team.
In short, for CIOs to get the most out of their EA team, they need to ensure
that it supports strategic options, provides visibility into issues, establishes
enterprise guardrails and has the capabilities to collaborate with players
across the business ecosystem. With these building blocks in place (see figure
below), the EA team can become a valuable advisor to the CIO regarding the
digital business agenda.
An effective EA team is business-outcome-driven

CIO advisory
Strategic options
Visibility into issues
Enterprise guardrails
Business-outcome-driven
enterprise architecture
Ecosystem collaboration

1. A business-outcome-driven
EA team is a valuable advisor to
the CIO
The transition to digital business brings opportunities,
threats and challenges that CIOs must address. Increasingly,
they are turning to a renewed EA capability to provide
critical expertise on these issues. These CIOs are also
finding EA to be a valuable digital business advisor.
New digital business expectations demand a new type

of CIO advisor
We are now fully within the era of digital business. For some enterprises, the impact
so far has been minimal, characterized by continuing to improve operations, but
with a focus on new opportunities provided by analytics, cloud, mobile and social
technologies (what Gartner calls the Nexus of Forces). For other enterprises, the
impact has already been significant, with increased growth through new digital
channels, new market opportunities and disruptive business model innovation. The
impact of digital business appears set to increase for everyone in the next several
years, with CEOs expecting digital revenue to rise from 22% today to 41% in five
years, according to the 2015 Gartner CEO Survey.
1. A business-outcome-driven EA team is a valuable advisor to the CIO 9

“Everything is going digital, digital, digital. Everyone is learning to code. My business
partners are doing ‘code in a day’ classes because they want to understand
technology better. The role of IT is to enable the transformation — the disruption,
really — that’s happening in the industry right now. You need an enterprise
architecture group that can stay one step ahead.”
Jane Moran, Global CIO, Unilever
“For me, digital is all about agility. At the business level, it should be about minimum
viable product, and at the IT level, it should be about agile development with a big
focus on refinement of the user experience, post-delivery.”
David O’Brien, General Manager, Customer Engagement and Digital, Old Mutual
South Africa
For CIOs, these changes bring a mix of opportunities and threats to a full and
often complex agenda. As the figure below shows, the CIO does not always
control these opportunities and threats but nonetheless must respond to them.
Naturally the threat of cyberattacks and data loss is a perennial concern for CIOs,
but again, this is one of many issues on their plate. To benefit from new channels
and new insights, the business needs to understand the options that innovations
in technology and the use of information present, and how these innovations fit
into the bigger picture of existing business capabilities and legacy IT services.
Similarly, the business cannot respond to threats such as market disruption
and faster competitors unless it can rapidly experiment with new technologies,
and agilely evolve or create new business capabilities in response to business
model innovation.
CIO opinions of the biggest digital business opportunities and threats
Top 3 digital business opportunities Top 3 digital business threats
1. New channels 1. Cyberattacks/data loss
2. New insights 2. Market disruption
3. New technologies (e.g., Internet of Things) 3. Faster competitors
Source: Gartner 2016 CIO Agenda Survey.
These opportunities and threats present CIOs with new questions that shift
the focus from how the business can operate more efficiently to what value
the business can create for its customers and stakeholders:
− How can new technologies be used to innovate the business model?
− How can the business use information and digital technology to create new
products and services to drive growth?

− Where should the enterprise focus on applying digital technology to innovate
and/or differentiate?
− How and when might technology and information innovation lead to industry
disruption?
− How might technology introduce new competitors, and where would they
come from?
At the same time, CIOs continually face challenges in execution:
− Increased complexity of business models and technology
− Expectations of shorter response times to business needs
− Responses that replace the familiar command and control with a collaborative
and coordinated approach
− New security threats (both real and perceived) as information and assets move
into the digital ecosystem, beyond the scope of traditional approaches
− Multiple parallel yet dependent initiatives and projects that must be planned
and coordinated
− The need to overcome a traditional risk-averse culture that will not accommodate
an experimental approach with fast cycles
− The need to be creative and innovative enough to manage uncertainty, with the
IT team using a new set of skills
As shown in the figure below, CIOs are increasingly caught between responding
to the opportunities and threats of digital business, and addressing challenges in
executing the enterprise’s chosen responses — all the while ensuring business
continuity.
CIOs are caught between business strategy and execution
– New channels
– New insights Business
– New technologies opportunities
(e.g., Internet of Things)
– Cyberattacks/data loss
Business
– Market disruption
threats
– Faster competitors
– Complexity
– Inconsistent security
Execution
– Lack of visibility
challenges
– Lack of skills
– Inflexibility

In dealing with this situation, CIOs are increasingly expected to fill a role beyond
just heading the IT department, broadening their responsibility to leading and
influencing the use of information and technology assets across the enterprise,
regardless of where they reside. According to the 2016 Gartner CIO Agenda
Survey, 39% of CIOs are responsible for digital business strategy in addition to their
CIO responsibilities, while 34% add innovation to their basic CIO duties, and 22%
add responsibility for enterprise change (10% are responsible for all three).
With more of a C-level leadership role than a senior-level management role, today’s
CIOs must develop a deeper understanding of the levers that influence business
performance so that they can proactively engage with their business colleagues on
how to respond to digital business opportunities and threats. To do so, they need
the following:
Options to consider when developing the digital business and IT strategies.

These are crucial for CIOs to share when discussing business model innovation
and digital business strategy with the senior leadership team. Options come
from combining deep business understanding with knowledge of the technology
innovations that will provide the most impact for the business.
Visibility into issues, especially those that affect execution, to enable

prioritization of CIO time, attention and resources. This is also important so
that CIOs can alert their business colleagues to key execution challenges, and
proactively identify responses. In addition, CIOs need visibility into enterprise
strengths and weaknesses with respect to how business capabilities and
processes should combine with information and technology.
A clear grasp of where risks can be taken and radical new ideas considered,
and where a more cautious and traditional approach is required. These
insights provide the CIO and the rest of the enterprise with “guardrails” that allow
for significant innovation while not leaving the enterprise open to threats in the areas
of cybersecurity and data loss.
Where can CIOs find support in responding to these changing expectations about
their role? For some, EA may seem like an unlikely place, but over the last five
years, the EA discipline has experienced somewhat of a renaissance. As CIOs
begin to fully address the opportunities and challenges of digital business, many
of the most successful are pointing to a resurgent EA capability as a contributor to
their success, and to the EA team as a key advisor.

A business-outcome-driven EA team can be a valuable
enabler of the CIO’s digital business agenda
“We’re only here for one thing, and that’s to serve the citizens of this city. If we
don’t understand what works for them, we’ll never get it, and therefore, enterprise
architecture is fundamental in the design process — to make sure that we deliver
what people want and need.”
Paul Arrigoni, Director Business Change and ICT, Bristol City Council
“E A is brutally important for digitalization. The digital world opens up a window on your
organization. If your organization is a siloed mess, then that’s what your customers will
see. The kind of logic and understanding that EA provides is important. If CIOs don’t
have EA on their agenda, it’s going to impact their digital space.”
David O’Brien, General Manager, Customer Engagement and Digital, Old Mutual
South Africa
The resurgence and repositioning of EA have been due in large part to a shift
among leading EA teams to a laser-like focus on business outcomes. Business-
outcome-driven EA is primarily about enabling business change and innovation,
and ensuring that the organization explores the opportunities of innovative new
technologies. This allows enterprise architects to adopt the additional role of
innovator, where EA understands and tracks new digital business technologies,
and shows where in the business design they fit and how they can transform what
the organization does (see “Seven Best Practices for Using Enterprise Architecture
to Power Digital Business” in Further Reading).
The 2015 Gartner EA Survey asked respondents how digital business will change
EA. The survey targeted enterprise architects, but a number of CIOs and CTOs
responded. Seventy percent of CIOs and CTOs said digitalization will change their
business processes and technologies, 60% said it will change their products and
services, and 49% said it will change their business models (see figures on page 14;
multiple answers were allowed for these questions). To respond to their respective
demands for digital business innovation, survey respondents told us their EA
priorities would shift over the coming two years toward the front office — first to
core renovation and business model innovation (58%), second to business growth
and strategy (34%), and third to technology architecture and integration (32%).

In what ways do you think digital business will change your organization’s
enterprise architecture?
It will change our business

processes and technologies
It will change our products
and services
It will change our business models
Expect little change
Don’t know/not sure
Other change
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70%
Over the next two years, what do you expect will be the most important
EA priorities for your organization?
Renovation/innovation
Business
Technology, architecture
and integration
Risk
Managing investments
Performance
Customers
Skills
Data
Unknown
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60%
n = 77 (CIOs and CTOs responding to the 2015 Gartner EA Survey)

Business-outcome-driven EA teams that are responding to the challenges of digital
business are shifting their focus beyond the IT organization and even the enterprise
to a more holistic perspective that crosses the business ecosystem. This entails the
following:
− Understanding the business ecosystem and the world of possible customers,

constituencies, partners and stakeholders. This broader perspective takes in
the disruptions far beyond the immediate scope of the organization (e.g., new
technologies and competitors), that could drive change and innovation. Moreover,
in digital business, a thing (i.e., a device, sensor or smart machine) can be as
much a partner as a business or person.
− Scanning the world of the possible by studying cases of startup technology

companies at the “bleeding edge” that are adopting disruptive technologies;
tracking what’s hot in new business designs and technology; and researching
what academics and business luminaries are saying about business and
technology trends.
− Creating scenarios for the future — not just assuming there is a single roadmap
and future state. Since the disruptive nature of digital technologies makes it
impossible to predict the future, and therefore multiple possible futures exist at
any one time, enterprise architects are leading the development of future-state
scenarios to support the organization’s strategy and planning efforts.
− Applying managed diversity principles to outlying information, processes,

capabilities and technologies. A managed diversity approach to EA tries to
balance the need for standards that control costs and risks, with the need for
a diversity of solutions to increase innovation, business growth and competitive
advantage.
− Enabling the distribution of decision rights for many traditional architecture

matters, thereby bringing decisions closer to the customer, citizen or market.
EA manages this by defining the guardrails that ensure security for the business,
while allowing decision-making freedom as to how things are designed and
developed within them.
“It is urgent for us to transform as an enterprise, and all our projects that move us toward
digitalization begin with the enterprise architecture team analyzing our industry and
others to see what is happening now and what will drive digitalization in the future.”
Christiane Edington, CIO, Vivo/Telefonica Brasil

With business outcomes in focus, EA teams are well positioned to become key
advisors to CIOs tackling the enterprise’s digital business agenda. As discussed
earlier in this section, and summarized in the figure below, EA addresses the
specific CIO needs for strategic options, visibility into execution issues and
understanding of the enterprise’s guardrails.
A business-outcome-driven EA team can be a valuable advisor

regarding the CIO’s digital business agenda

Strategic options
CIOs need:
– Visibility into emerging technologies and their potential relevance to the business strategy
– Insight into technology-enabled business and operating models for the enterprise to explore
– Ideas for where to focus the innovation efforts of Mode 2 teams (in bimodal IT, Mode 1 is more
operational and predictable, Mode 2 more exploratory and multidisciplinary)
EA addresses this need through:
– Analysis of trends and innovations in emerging technologies, business models and business
ecosystems
– Recommendations on which options are most relevant and offer the greatest potential for
the enterprise
CIOs need:
– Understanding of the gap between current and future-state business capabilities
– Visibility into execution barriers such as complexity, technical debt and redundant or
underdeveloped business capabilities
– Analysis of current and future-state business, information and technology architecture
– Recommendations on how to set IT priorities concerning the biggest business capability
gaps and areas of concern
CIOs need:
– Certainty and decisiveness on where to be flexible in diverging, innovating, experimenting and
taking risks with respect to new technologies and ways of working (as opposed to where the
enterprise must follow strict guidelines to avoid threats to security and business continuity)
– Advice on the use of guidelines and standards in the enterprise, identifying where compliance
must be non-negotiable vs. where to allow flexibility and encourage experimentation
– Analysis of the degree of risk associated with certain business model, information, and
technology decisions
When considering the role EA plays in supporting the CIO, it is especially important
to understand EA’s shift from rigid, prescriptive standards and guidelines, to more
flexible guardrails. Instead of providing a long list of guidelines for the enterprise to
comply with, guardrails communicate the broadest set of boundaries that cannot be

crossed — for example, in the areas of information privacy and cybersecurity — and
often take the form of strategic governance principles. By establishing guardrails,
EA teams allow flexibility in how to create solutions and where to apply innovation.
Guardrails also limit risk by defining the outer limits of enterprise experimentation (see
figure below). The shift from overly prescriptive guidelines to guardrails is explored
further in sections 2 and 3.
Guardrails vs. guidelines
Your digital business future

Guardrails communicate Guidelines are prescriptive,
boundaries but allow flexibility telling you:
in the chosen path: – What side of the road to stay on
– They tell you what lines – How fast to travel
you absolutely cannot cross
– What the road signs mean
– They do not tell you how to
– How to get to your destination
get to your destination
Your road to digital business
The head of EA can become a key personal advisor to

the CIO
“One of the many reasons my head of EA (the CTO) has the role is the enormous
amount of organizational credibility he has developed over the years. I have no illusions
that when I start talking about where technology needs to go, some of our business
leaders are going to go to him and ask, ‘Does this make sense to you?’”
Bill Hills, CIO, Navy Federal Credit Union
“You have to have the right relationship with your chief enterprise architect. We are
lucky we hit it off, and we have a good relationship. I think you have to give your
architect the freedom to operate in the organization. Don’t try to hierarchically manage
him or her. Chief enterprise architects need a position in the organization that enables
them to go and talk to people.”
Paul Arrigoni, Director Business Change and ICT, Bristol City Council

EA supports much of the strategic decision making of the CIO and often plays a
key role in the office of the CIO (OCIO). Moreover, CIOs are increasingly reshaping
their relationship with the EA team, using it as a collective advisor — a form of
internal management consultant — that supports organizational change and
transformation.
The research for this report shows that CIOs who engage with the rest of their
enterprise around digital business strategy often see their head of EA (or chief
enterprise architect) as a key personal advisor. In this role, the head of EA must
be a credible leader in the enterprise, having both a deep understanding of the
business and a reputation for successfully impacting business outcomes. Without
such credibility, the head of EA risks being seen as a bureaucrat rather than a
problem solver. The figure below illustrates the two-way relationship between the
CIO and head of EA.
The head of EA as a valuable advisor to the CIO

CIO provides:
– Business context – Deep enterprise

– Business expectations perspective
– Access to key CxOs – Insight into key
– Broad enterprise dependencies
perspective – Perspective on major
risks and issues
– Voice for CIO’s agenda
Head of EA provides:
By providing the following, the CIO plays a crucial role in establishing the mandate
for, and ensuring the effectiveness of, the head of EA:
Business context. As a C-level leader and member of various governance bodies,

the CIO can share a valuable, nuanced understanding of the business context. This
is not readily available in strategy material or discussions the head of EA has with
midlevel leaders.
Business expectations. The CIO can share feedback from discussions with key
stakeholders, including tacit expectations from senior business leadership.

Access to key CxOs. In many enterprise cultures, C-level stakeholders are not
easily accessible. However, their direct input into, and feedback on, business
architecture decisions can be highly valuable for the head of EA. CIOs strengthen
the contribution from their head of EA by making the necessary introductions to
C-level stakeholders, and ensuring that the head of EA is invited to relevant C-level
meetings. With these contacts, the head of EA can build direct relationships with
the CxOs.
Broad enterprise perspective. CIOs participate in discussions across most,

if not all, business units and functions. This gives them valuable insight into
enterprisewide activities and priorities, which the head of EA can use to understand
the big picture.
In addition to the deliverables described earlier in this section, the head of EA

personally provides the CIO with the following:
Deep enterprise perspective. While the CIO certainly has a broad enterprise
perspective, the head of EA can complement that with a deep perspective on
key business decisions and their implication on business capabilities, information
and technology. When regularly combined, the two perspectives can unlock
opportunities and crystallize challenges across the enterprise.
Insight into key dependencies. With the ability to take a holistic view across
business, information and technology architectures, the head of EA can highlight
key dependencies for the CIO, providing insight into what should be stopped,
started or altered based on business decisions.
Perspective on major risks and issues. A deep enterprise perspective enables

the head of EA to flag risks and issues that might be a consequence of business
decisions. This, in turn, ensures that the CIO can provide business colleagues with
strategic options and alternatives, as well as visibility into execution issues across
the enterprise.
Voice for the CIO’s agenda. The head of EA’s personal relationships with
business stakeholders who are important to the CIO mean they can be regularly
engaged in the CIO’s agenda, without the CIO needing to be in many places at the
same time.
Some CIOs still approach EA with caution based on bad experiences with overly
methodical teams that inhibited agility and innovation, but others are quick to point
to a highly valued and close working relationship with their EA team. Why do some
CIOs hesitate to invest in reshaping their EA team to be stronger, while others see
this as essential to their digital business success? The rest of the section explores
this issue.

Skeptical CIOs are not benefiting from EA’s resurgence
“E A had no focus on the current platforms — instead it focused on understanding

future-based trends and was a very reactive organization. Now we have flipped EA to
be proactive.”
As with many IT disciplines, considerable effort has been put into evolving EA
over the past 15 years to be more consistent, effective and focused on business
outcomes. Frameworks, methodologies, best practices and tools have all been
introduced to help the enterprise take advantage of EA. However, many CIOs have
had a bumpy ride when it comes to their EA teams. For all the promise of EA,
CIOs often point to a time in their career when dealing with EA meant frustration,
unrealized expectations, high costs and lack of measurable impact.
When viewed from the perspective of a Hype Cycle, EA has spent the past few
years emerging from a deep Trough of Disillusionment triggered by too much of an
inward focus on EA frameworks and processes (see figure below).
EA’s journey through the Hype Cycle
Expectations
2002
The Open Group
Architecture Framework
U.S. Department of (TOGAF) v8 Enterprise
Defense Technical Edition Digital-business-driven EA
Architecture Framework
for Information Process-driven EA
Management (TAFIM)
1994
Zachman Framework 2014

for Enterprise Gartner introduces
Architecture and Vanguard EA
Information Systems Business-outcome-driven EA
Framework- 2011
Architecture
driven EA Gartner introduces business-
1987
outcome-driven EA
Innovation Peak of Trough of Slope of Plateau of
Trigger Inflated Disillusionment Enlightenment Productivity
Expectations
Time

EA through the decades
1980s – 1990s: Framework-driven EA
EA frameworks evolve to help organizations develop their complex business

models, with the emphasis on a complete and logical representation of the
enterprise. While helpful, this was somewhat disconnected from the outcomes
driving the organization. It was also hard to see how the frameworks could apply
to real-world problems.
1990s – 2000s: Process-driven EA
The focus of development shifts to the processes of EA and how to apply them —
an improvement but still lacking a clear link to real-world problems. EA at this
stage largely equated to technical architecture and often developed a reputation
for bureaucracy and disengagement from the challenges of daily execution.
2010s – 2020s: Business-outcome-driven EA
The focus of EA shifts significantly, becoming more flexible and using EA models
and practices to deliver business outcomes. Understanding the business and its
needs has become crucial, with business and information architecture central to
the effort. EA supports the execution of business strategy and aligns IT resources
and efforts to do the same.
Present – 2020s: Digital-business-driven EA
Today successful digital strategy requires a highly collaborative, customer-centric

approach. EA practices include new models to support digital business strategy
development, ranging from customer journey maps to lean startup. EA also
supports the innovation process. As innovative ideas develop and mature, EA
facilitates their transition to mainstream processes and systems.
Again, CIOs who are not engaging with their EA teams, or not investing in
developing an EA capability, undermine their ability to meet digital business
expectations. And IT organizations without a formal approach to EA — that is, a
thoughtful design for how business capabilities, information and technology will
work together to achieve long-term business success — risk spending all their
time putting out fires. They also risk building a dangerous amount of technical and
architectural debt, which leads to complexity, high costs and slow deployments.
Skeptical CIOs should begin by carefully considering their perceptions of EA and

comparing these to an emerging EA reality. Use the tool on page 22 to assess your
own experience of EA. Do you still have a negative perception of the EA capability
in your enterprise, or have you had exposure to business-outcome-driven EA?

Check the box that reflects your experience.
Negative perception My experience New EA reality
EA = technical architecture Negative New Business-outcome-driven EA

perception reality comprises three viewpoints:
business, information and
technical. A core value is
the ability to combine the
viewpoints into a holistic
perspective for the enterprise.
EA = ivory tower Negative New The highly collaborative EA

perception reality team involves a wide range of
stakeholders across business
units, IT and other entities in
the business ecosystem.
EA = restrictive standards Negative New The EA team focuses on the

perception reality minimum level of principles, policies
and standards necessary for
operating model components to
work together. This approach
supports agility while minimizing
cybersecurity threats and potential
data loss. The team increasingly
considers how and where it can
loosen standards even further to
facilitate innovation.
EA = slowness Negative New The EA team embodies lean

perception reality thinking by thoughtfully designing
how the organization moves from
strategy and goals, to business
outcomes. It leverages EA models
and perspectives to arrive at better
decisions in less time, with
reduced waste.
EA = bureaucratic overhead Negative New EA can be a catalyst that

perception reality coordinates stakeholders and
supports decision making, by
highlighting the greatest barriers
to execution and providing a
foundation for enterprise agility.

In summary, to get the most out of their EA team, CIOs must ensure that it is
business-outcome-driven and positioned to support strategic options. The team
must also provide visibility into issues, establish enterprise guardrails and be able to
collaborate with players across the business ecosystem. With these building blocks
in place, the EA team can become a valuable advisor regarding the CIO’s digital
business agenda. Sections 2 and 3 explain what business-outcome-driven EA
teams do (see figure below) and how the CIO can build and manage one.
An effective EA team is business-outcome-driven

CIO advisory
Strategic options

2. The EA team provides the
CIO with a holistic approach to
bridging strategy and execution
With their holistic view across business, information,
technology and solutions, enterprise architects provide a set
of deliverables that bridge the gap between strategy and
execution. To achieve results-oriented business outcomes,
the EA team collaborates with key subject matter experts
across the enterprise.
The EA team offers CIOs a holistic perspective across

diverse viewpoints
Successful EA teams balance innovation and execution by understanding the
organization’s strategy, goals and targeted business outcomes. From here they
identify the future-state business capabilities needed to support the strategy, and
what needs to change across people, processes, information and technology to
deliver the business capabilities. EA teams also define the roadmaps that support
the development and delivery of the project portfolio.
The focus and deliverables of EA change as EA moves from being business-

capability-centric to being technology-and-information-centric. The value comes
from orchestrating individuals and groups through this process and providing
them with the modeling and analysis needed to support decisions, along with
mechanisms and governance for decision making.
As illustrated in the figure opposite, the multidisciplinary EA team provides a

holistic view from diverse viewpoints, including business, information, technology
and solutions.

“E A is about joining up different business processes with technology, bringing it all
together in the digitalization of our business and our interactions with the customer.”
Anonymous CIO
“Enterprise architecture is able to go in and describe what our business doesn’t

necessarily focus on — where a particular application intersects with other
applications across the credit union. This gives us understanding and the ability
to explain how interrelated the whole organization has become. It is shifting the
conversation to integration of information and to the need for our organization to
start considering information as a whole corporate asset, rather than as individual
departmental assets.”
Business-outcome-driven EA provides a holistic view across

diverse viewpoints

CIO advisory
Business-outcome-driven enterprise architecture
Cloud Information IoT
Business Technology
Security Mobility
Solutions
…
…
Business architecture focuses on creating deliverables that guide people,

processes and organizational change in response to disruptive forces (economic,
societal, political, market, technology, cultural and competitive), toward desired
business outcomes. This architecture is crucial when developing a digital business
strategy, due to the need for innovative thinking in relation to potential business
models and new business capabilities. Enterprises with a strong business
architecture capability that is integral to the EA team are better able to execute on
their business strategy, because they have a clear understanding of the strategy
and its impact on business, information and technology.
2. The EA team provides the CIO with a holistic approach to bridging strategy and execution 25
Information architecture identifies the information (often more extensive than
the data in the organization’s systems) needed to support the business model.
Importantly, it also explores opportunities from integrating new sources of
information — for example, from operational technology (OT) and the Internet of
Things (IoT) — to drive business growth and gain competitive advantage.
Technology architecture defines the technologies used by the organization and

how they fit together, along with the supporting standards and policies. Effectively,
EA takes the role of “guardian of the future technology landscape.” As digitalization
increases, EA will provide crucial support to CIOs in answering the following
questions:
− How do we ensure that our technology investment and roadmaps remain

aligned?
− How do we provide a layer of abstraction between core legacy systems and all
the innovation we want to plug in on top?
Solutions architecture refers to the EA activities of creating deliverables that guide

managing a portfolio of solutions in response to disruptive forces, and achieving
targeted business outcomes. Solutions include systems (e.g., applications,
technologies, processes and information), shared infrastructure services and
shared application services. The goal of solutions architecture (sometimes called
“enterprise solutions architecture”) is to provide guidance on how an individual
solution, or a portfolio of solutions, must support future business requirements.
This work addresses application characteristics such as usability, maintainability,
versatility and robustness (see “The Distinction Between Enterprise Architecture
and Application Architecture Makes a Difference to Business Outcomes” in Further
Reading), and sets solution boundaries and business-outcome-driven expectations.
In addition to these more traditional viewpoints, the growth of digital business is

driving enterprise architects to take on critical activities associated with emerging
technology and business trends, such as big data, IoT, mobility, security, cloud
and OT. The most effective enterprise architects understand and embrace the
aspects that make these technology trends unique, and they provide overall EA
guidance. Their additional viewpoints may include security, mobility, big data,
cloud computing, OT and IoT architectures, which are increasingly important as
organizations recognize these trends as having as much impact on business and
information as they do on technology. Though this shift requires EA practitioners to
evolve their focus beyond traditional EA efforts, the latter cannot be forgotten.
The exact mix of the diverse viewpoints will depend on the enterprise and the
business outcomes it is driving. Many enterprises emphasize certain elements of
EA as more valuable — for example, using business capability modeling as the link
between business and IT.

In our discussions with CIOs, we found several organizations that had moved their
traditionally supported solution (i.e., single solution) architecture outside the purview
of the EA team. Solution architecture (not to be confused with the “solutions
architecture” discussed previously) aims to bring multiple viewpoints together
and define a single solution for a specific initiative or project. It is an architecture
because it uses standard patterns and repeatable designs. Due to the operational
focus of solution architecture, it is increasingly handled by teams other than EA,
often sitting with application architecture in the execution arm of the IT organization
(e.g., with the application development or project delivery teams).
This is a logical move, as it frees up the rest of the EA team to focus on the big
portfolio picture and long-term perspective, without being pulled into continuous
firefighting and operational issues. Regardless of where the solution architecture
team is located, the EA team must frequently engage, support and communicate
with it, providing regular coaching and advice on how to ensure that solution and
application designs align with the big picture.
A note on EA in larger enterprises

Larger enterprises will often be organized around business processes or business
units, and some are geographically spread out. The operating model will depend
on the organization’s strategy in response to competing needs: the need for local
responsiveness and the need for global efficiency. The most challenging issue for
any organization is to balance the two.
For many organizations, the move to standard shared services, and common
business processes and technologies, has been underpinned by EA. Ideally,
local services should also be developed and delivered in a standard way. This
allows local services to become global at a later date and facilitates the sharing
of innovations and best practices. In essence, EA creates a common way for the
business to work and collaborate.
Individual EA teams should have both local and global responsibility, developing
the EA deliverables needed by their part of the organization, and contributing to
global EA deliverables. Some organizations will have a central EA team, but the
governance model should ensure participation and involvement by the local teams.
As one CIO put it, “Good architecture is what you do with people, not to them.”
The EA team creates deliverables to bridge the gap
between strategy and execution
“At a given point in time, the EA team provides us with a view of what we have in the
current technology landscape, and then maps that to the target technology landscape.
They’re constantly looking for opportunities to introduce new capabilities, simplify
the current estate and reduce cost. It’s an ongoing process. You always want to be
reviewing your portfolio for those three things: capability improvements, simplification
and cost reduction.”
“We’re going through a hybrid cloud, infrastructure consolidation project. The focus
from EA is on our service design. As we shift across the different businesses, we’re
moving some things to the cloud and consolidating what remains in our own data
centers. EA provides us with different options for implementing this convergence in
the most effective way.”
Anonymous CIO
Successful EA teams create the deliverables needed to support the decision

making of business and technology leaders across the enterprise. They provide
different deliverables for different phases of activity — for example a “business
outcome statement” to clarify the organization’s strategy, goals and business
outcomes; business capability models to create a future-state vision and priorities;
and analysis of barriers to execution, to support programs. Which deliverables
the organization needs depends on the business outcomes it is driving and the
execution process it has defined.
Many organizations will create additional deliverables based on their business

outcomes — for example, using customer profiles and roadmaps to support
customer initiatives, or device ecosystem models to support an IoT strategy. The
EA team can also use different architectural views to provide analysis that supports
decision making, such as impact analysis, risk analysis and strategic option
analysis. In many ways, a reshaped EA team can provide the organization with a
form of internal management consultancy.
While the EA team develops many key EA deliverables, it does not do so alone and
must orchestrate them. For example, it often makes sense for teams across the
enterprise to develop the architecture they need — the infrastructure team develops
the infrastructure architecture, the security team develops the security architecture,
etc. The core EA team coaches and mentors these efforts, which are integrated
into the overall EA framework.

To summarize, effective EA teams focus on actionable deliverables that address the
CIO’s key needs for strategic options and visibility into issues such as execution.
They also provide guidance on putting technology and information to the best use,
and guardrails that clarify where the enterprise has flexibility, and where it needs
to comply with tighter principles (e.g., in security and privacy). The figure below
highlights the key EA deliverables that help CIOs bridge the gap between strategic
business opportunities and threats, and the corresponding challenges in execution.
Key deliverables enable the CIO to bridge the gap between strategy
and execution

Strategic options
EA provides CIOs with:

− Signature-ready recommendations on decisions concerning business capabilities, information
and technology
− Business outcome statements clarifying the enterprise’s strategy and goals
− Customer profiles and journey maps
− Future-state models of business, information and technology architectures
− Potential business model innovations
− Technology evaluations
− Device ecosystem models
− Business ecosystem analysis

− Assessments of current-state business, information and technology architectures
− Analysis of redundancies in business capabilities, information, technologies and services
− Analysis of barriers to execution

− Strategic architecture principles
− Technology design and usage patterns, and associated recommendations
− Security and information privacy
− Tools and methods for analysis and decision making outside of EA
− Degree of flexibility and risk-taking allowed to support agility and innovation in Mode 2
projects (in bimodal IT, Mode 1 is more operational and predictable, Mode 2 more exploratory
and multidisciplinary)
The EA team must forge partnerships across the
enterprise and the business ecosystem
“The EA team has become part of everything that we do in IT, including our informal
discussions and formal meetings. Previously we had specific meetings and
engagement activities only for EA, but we found this an unnecessary limitation.”
Louise van der Bank, CIO, AfriSam
In its highly collaborative endeavors, the EA team adds business value throughout
the execution process — first by providing the deliverables needed to support
stakeholder decision making, and then by orchestrating stakeholder involvement
and interaction. This is done formally through the governance model and informally
through EA’s daily work with stakeholders. The EA team must be able to create
and maintain relationships with its stakeholders, which is why strong business
and behavioral competencies of team members are so critical to success (see
figure below).
The relationship between EA and its ecosystem stakeholders and

collaborators has four key elements

CIO advisory
Consultation and insight
Guidance and coaching
Standards and principles
Exploration and foresight

Consultation and insight — using the architecture to provide analysis and insight
to support stakeholders in their planning (e.g., providing an impact analysis for a
proposed new business strategy, creating options to achieve a particular business
outcome)
Guidance and coaching — helping stakeholders use or develop EA deliverables

(e.g., running a business capability workshop for a business area, helping an
internal IT team develop its reference architecture)
Standards and principles — guiding decision making in the organization; helping

certain stakeholders develop their own standards and principles; and consistently
looking to provide as few standards and principles as possible, preferring to define
guardrails that allow more flexibility in execution
Exploration and foresight — defining the future-state model (a key element of

EA), which requires that the EA team work with stakeholders but also identify
opportunities for innovation by applying its own understanding of the business
model and innovation technologies (e.g., when collaborating with other teams
focused on digital business innovation)
As illustrated in the figure below, the EA team’s relationships fall into three
categories.
A business-outcome-driven EA team has three kinds of relationships

with the rest of the enterprise and its ecosystem
Outside-in Business Solution Inside-out

relationships stakeholders architecture relationships
Digital
business PPM
team Consultation
and insight
OCIO
BPM
Standards Guidance
and EA and
Customers principles coaching Suppliers
Exploration
and foresight
Competitors
Partners
Stakeholders The crowd
Outside-out
relationships
Outside-in relationships look at EA from the perspectives of the customer and
the business. They include key business stakeholders, digital business teams and
the OCIO (which has an outside-in orientation to begin with).
Inside-out relationships originate with the internal IT team and include important
partnerships with teams such as business process management (BPM) and
program and portfolio management (PPM).
Outside-out relationships focus on business ecosystem players beyond

enterprise borders. They include interactions between the EA team and customers,
partners and even competitors. These relationships may be unfamiliar to many EA
teams but are crucial to success in the digital age. EA teams new to working with
business ecosystem players should follow these recommendations from “Seven
Ways to Build Your Business Ecosystem for Greater Impact on Business and IT
Planning” (see Further Reading):
− Don’t sit and wait for the business to come to you with an ecosystem strategy.
Instead, add value by opening the dialogue with the business. Engage with
business and IT leaders, helping them develop new insights and realize and/or
articulate their business strategy.
− Don’t try to take on the entire business ecosystem at one time. Focus efforts
iteratively, starting with parts of the business that are critical to near-term strategy,
or where the greatest potential for business impact resides — for example, in the
supply chain or with key partners.
− Get creative. Layer in business capabilities, decision analysis, impact analysis,

business processes, etc., on top of your business ecosystem, to uncover new
analytical opportunities. Look for opportunities to leverage the models and
frameworks you have (such as your information architecture), and add in new
models (such as business capabilities, decision analysis and impact analysis) as
you need them.

When setting up an EA practice, the CIO needs to enable the relationships outlined
in the figure below.
Key relationships to enable when setting up an EA practice
Role Relationship
CIO As the primary sponsor and driver of the EA practice, the CIO must have a clear
sense of ownership.
OCIO Fully exploiting digital business innovation requires a strong partnership between
the EA team, OCIO (or equivalent cross-functional management team) and any
digital innovation team (see “The New Mission of Your Office of the CIO” in
Further Reading).
An EA team might start as part of the OCIO, especially if the EA capability is

immature and needs management attention to become established. When
such a team matures enough to stand alone, it reports directly to the CIO.
Regardless of the EA team’s organizational position, EA is most effective
when closely partnering with the OCIO to support senior leadership.
PMO Starting with the business strategy, EA moves to the roadmaps and projects
needed to support it. At the roadmap stage, the EA team begins handing over
responsibility to the PMO, which must have confidence in the roadmaps. A lack
of collaboration between these two teams creates confusion within the business
and IT.
Relationship Many CIOs have created the role of relationship manager to work with key
managers business stakeholders — representing IT in the rest of the business, and the
rest of the business in IT. EA should work closely with relationship managers
to provide a holistic perspective on business, information, technology and
solutions. This perspective will be vital as the managers advise key business
stakeholders on how to achieve targeted outcomes.
IT executives With EA touching on all the areas of the IT organization, the EA team should
have good working relationships with members of the senior IT leadership team,
and try to involve them in the governance model.
Business Good relationships with business executives enable EA to drive business

executives outcomes. Rather than be hidden behind relationship managers and other
functions when dealing with business issues, the EA team must cultivate a
direct relationship with the relevant business stakeholders.
To summarize, when responding to digital business opportunities and threats, CIOs

increasingly rely on a business-outcome-driven EA team that creates actionable
deliverables in collaboration with key teams across the business ecosystem. CIOs
who do not yet have such a team in place can follow a clear path toward reshaping
and reinvigorating their outdated EA team. The following section takes up five
critical success factors that CIOs must consider when reshaping their EA team.
3. Utilize five critical success
factors to reshape your EA team
Building a successful EA team requires a focus on measurable
business outcomes. It also requires a shift from prescriptive
guidelines to more permissive guardrails. Furthermore, CIOs
must ensure that their EA teams have the right set of skills.
Critical success factor 1: Shape your EA capability

around measurable business outcomes
An EA practice is not “one size fits all.” It must be thoughtfully designed based
on specific business outcomes, the approach and deliverables varying with the
outcome. For example, an outcome related to engaging customers through new
channels with a new mobile app will require a lightweight and flexible approach to
architecture. In contrast, an outcome related to ensuring regulatory compliance will
require a more structured and formal approach.
The business outcome sets out the mission, objectives and KPIs for the EA
practice. Focusing EA on specific business outcomes is also a way for the CIO to
ensure that the practice always does the right things and delivers business value.
When starting or restarting an EA practice, it is often pragmatic to concentrate on
one business outcome, or no more than a few. This allows the practice to not only
deliver value but also gain valuable experience and create a success story that fuel
EA’s development.

“Our approach is not to drive something where the business doesn’t understand what
it’s delivering and why it exists. From the beginning, it has been important to make
sure that our business understands the value of what the EA team can provide.
“ If our business colleagues interact with the EA team, they do not interact with
them because they are enterprise architects. They interact with them because they
understand the benefits the team provides.”
Given your organization’s EA focus, consider the viewpoints it takes in (see the
figure and discussion on pages 25 and 26), as well as the “running order” (where
you will begin to focus and how this will evolve). Then identify business outcomes
and the contributions of your EA practice (see figure below). With all this, you can
set clear expectations for the EA team and ensure that it is delivering value.
Where to look for measurable business outcomes that can reshape your
EA capability
Run the business Grow the traditional Transform into a

business digital business
Business outcomes – Maximize the efficiency – Maximize business – Maximize revenue and
(examples) and effectiveness of impact and reduce risk impact based on new
business operations from investment digital channels and/or
– Reduce operating risks – Maximize business digital products and
– Increase the ability to growth services
identify the business – Maximize capital – Maximize long-term
opportunities with efficiency and business growth
maximum impact effectiveness through business
model innovation
– Analyze duplication in – Assess the – Create future-state

EA contributions business capabilities, opportunities and models of business,
(examples) information, impacts of growth information and
technologies and initiatives technology
services – Facilitate the planning architectures
– Identify costs, risks, and prioritization of – Evaluate emerging
constraints and initiatives technologies
impacts within the – Develop impact and – Conduct a business
business operating risk assessments ecosystem analysis
the model – Develop change that identifies
roadmaps opportunities and
threats
3. Utilize five critical success factors to reshape your EA team 35

Research shows that when starting or restarting an EA practice, an organization
is better off starting small and growing, concentrating on one business outcome
and working with a business area or executive open to the opportunities of EA.
This way, the practice can learn how to best apply EA to the organization, gradually
building a success story through growth and cycles of continuous improvement.
Critical success factor 2: Draw on a toolbox of industry

frameworks to structure your EA team’s efforts
When building an EA team, the first principle is to understand how the organization
moves from strategy and goals to business outcomes — in other words, the
strategy execution process. What are the steps? Who is involved? What will they
do? What modeling and analysis do they need? If this process isn’t clear, work
with your stakeholders to define it as you define your EA practice.
With the execution process defined, you can look at how EA will support each
step and what models and analysis it needs. Our research shows that it is better
to see an EA framework as a toolbox. Begin the execution process by creating a
framework for your organization that draws on elements of standard frameworks.
Take care to treat your framework as a means to an end — that is, business-
outcome-driven EA. Do not become obsessed with the framework itself.
DEFINITION
An enterprise architecture framework defines the components of an
organization, from business to technical, showing how they relate and interact. The
aim is to provide the organization with a toolbox of models and processes that will
enable it to quickly develop its enterprise architecture.
Common frameworks include The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF),
the Zachman Framework, and the Federal Enterprise Architecture Framework.
There is no perfect framework. Each has strengths and weaknesses, and must be
tailored to meet the needs of the organization, often by including other models such
as business capabilities.
Many powerful tools are available to support the EA practice (see “Magic Quadrant
for Enterprise Architecture Tools” in Further Reading), and their capabilities and
costs vary greatly. We have found that it is best to get an EA practice up and
running, in a manner that suits your organization and delivers value, before
considering an EA tool. At that point, you will be able to clearly define the “use
cases” of your organization and what a tool would need to do for you.

Critical success factor 3: Shift from formal to informal
governance
“We demand rigidly defined areas of doubt and uncertainty!”

From “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” by Douglas Adams
“We have had a formal architecture review board for some years, but we have to
change it quite a lot to incorporate our more iterative, agile approach to delivery. We
now have a day-to-day element of governance and assurance. Our senior enterprise
architects are constantly talking with their IT service colleagues and also with our
suppliers. We try and push decisions as far down the chain as possible.”
Gavin Beckett, Chief Enterprise Architect, Bristol City Council
Effective EA teams apply lean thinking. By looking at the enterprise’s business

outcomes and execution process, and applying thoughtful design, they can
eliminate the usual waste and confusion. They want only enough architecture
to support the organization’s efforts — not so much that it is difficult to change.
Striking the right balance depends on the business outcomes being driven.
Avoid architectural debt
CIOs have been concerned for some time with “technical debt” — the costs to the
organization (not merely monetary) of poor design, defects, insufficient testing, poor
technical strategy, etc. These costs limit future options and must be “repaid” at
some point. “Architectural debt” refers to decisions made with too little or too much
architecture; they, too, limit options and must be repaid. The amount of architecture
needed varies with the domain — core systems, for example, require more than
innovative mobile apps. Some architecture is always needed, so CIOs and their EA
teams must take care to define the minimum requirement.
One CIO observed that “if you don’t have any architecture, you end up with slums.”
The idea is to have architectural principles, policies and standards that allow the
organization to work collaboratively, with agility, while limiting architectural debt.
Regularly review these elements to ensure that you have the right ones and that
they add value. Drop those that are no longer useful, and add new ones where you
have gaps.
Guidelines, standards and the guardrails discussed in sections 1 and 2 are applied
through the EA governance model, which is a subset of IT governance. This model
is designed to clarify accountability and provide the focal point for agile and efficient
decision making. Thus the governance model reflects the business-outcome-driven
and highly collaborative nature of EA.

Many leading EA organizations have developed an informal approach to governance
that supplements their formal model and includes a center of excellence (COE) for EA
(see figure below). Since EA affects individuals, teams and departments across the
enterprise, CIOs should try to involve these stakeholders in the conversation about
EA. This builds understanding of EA while providing opportunities for others to share
a wide range of ideas and suggestions.
An EA center of excellence can supplement formal governance in many

business-outcome-driven EA practices
BU BU BU BU
Alignment through: Governance through:

– Shared business goals EA center of excellence – Coaching
– Compliance with – Mentoring
guardrails – Collaborating
IT infrastructure IT application
and operations development
The EA COE itself should concentrate on initiatives and business outcomes,

serving as a forum for diverse stakeholders — not only updating them on the EA
effort but also giving them a voice in it. Meanwhile, the EA team provides coaching
and mentoring to stakeholders and collaborators working with EA deliverables.
Alignment with the EA team and the rest of the enterprise is crucial to the success
of the COE. It needs a clear focus and direction to avoid unnecessary debates and
being distracted by non-value-adding work. Like the EA team, the COE staff must
be grounded in key business outcomes, and the rest of the enterprise must agree
to operate within the aforementioned guardrails.
Larger organizations often create a design authority that reviews and helps develop
solution architectures for initiatives and projects. Take care in setting up this role,
since it can be perceived as an unhelpful police department. The authority should
be involved early in the design process, acting primarily as a coach but also guiding
development of the appropriate solution and working with the EA review board to
resolve issues.

Critical success factor 4: Extend your EA team beyond
traditional architecture skills
“The folks in enterprise architecture have to be change agents. They have to be out
there with the IT organization, but also out there with the business partners to help
implement changes.”
“We work with external partners both from the process as well as the EA point of view.
Originally we secured them to help with establishing our capability. Today we are still
bringing in their services, but primarily to assist our own team.”
It is one thing to hire people with the title “architect” on their CV, quite another to find
enough of the right people — with the skills to create a business-outcome-driven EA
team. This represents a crucial challenge for CIOs looking to create or renovate their
EA team, which the CIOs interviewed for this report confirmed.
The industry has a number of good EA accreditation programs, but the challenge
is not training in EA methodologies and skills — it is finding people with deep
subject matter expertise in business models, the business ecosystem and the
use of information across the business. This knowledge is typically gained from
experience rather than training.
For many CIOs, this means bringing together subject matter experts from other
roles in the enterprise and “upskilling” them in the discipline of EA. Dr. Ariffin
Marzuki bin Mokhtar, Director of Health Informatics at IJN (National Heart Institute)
in Malaysia, describes such an approach to building up the institute’s EA capability:
“When we tried to train our IT group to do business and information architecture,

we found it difficult because the specialization and uniqueness of the business
environment was beyond the expertise of IT, which has traditionally focused on
‘keeping the lights on,’ providing services and managing security. Instead, we took
some of our doctors and nurses and taught them the language of architecture
and IT, following IASA Global’s [formerly known as the International Association
for Software Architects] certification path in enterprise architecture. We then
created our cross-functional EA team of business and IT professionals, including
these subject matter experts in part-time roles. Consisting of 10 people, the team
is less than 1% of our total staff and includes some medical staff and business
administrators. It was easy to get buy-in from the nurses and doctors for this kind
of training, because it raised their qualifications and influence.”

In addition to searching for possible information management and technology
experts to train in the EA discipline, CIOs who are reshaping their EA team must
be creative in finding the right business-minded people to balance it out. The figure
below offers tips on this and other aspects of EA team building.
Building an EA team: Tips for getting started
Approach Description
Outside-in jump-start CIOs often start by partnering with an external supplier to gain
knowledge and experience in EA capabilities. The consultants then
slowly hand over EA responsibility to an internal team, which includes
people with a business background.
Outside-in recruitment Since EA is about driving business change and transformation, it can
be likened to an internal management consultancy. Business-facing
roles, especially in business architecture, require a strong combination
of business and behavioral skills, so many CIOs are recruiting from
management consulting firms to fill them.
Inside-in cross-pollination As in the IJN example on page 39, CIOs are building enterprise
architecture teams by recruiting business experts from within the
enterprise and training them in EA skills. When these experts join experts
in information and technology, each individual’s strengths fuel the
cross-functional team, leading to a holistic EA approach.
Remember that EA is about more than business skills. Though the nature of
technology architecture has changed in recent years, understanding it is still an
important quality of an EA team. The trend toward outsourcing has created a need
for technology architecture to integrate a portfolio of IT services in supporting
the business. At large companies, lead vendors often help define the technology
architecture. Moreover, enterprises increasingly expect domain teams to develop
their own architectures as part of the overall effort.
Technology architects must understand the technologies, but they concentrate

more on providing a holistic picture of the technology landscape, working with
vendors and domain teams to show how it all fits together to support the business.
They need to partner closely with business architects to ensure that the technology
base supports business capabilities that enable the business strategy.
The EA team’s mix of business savvy, behavioral competencies and strong

technology skills provides the diverse views so crucial to effectiveness, with the
exact mix of individual skills depending on the organization and the business
outcomes it desires. As with any team, the richness of skills and the ability to
collaborate drive success. The figure opposite lists the key competencies EA
teams need to stay relevant in the digital age.

Key competencies for an EA team in the digital age
Business and information
Understanding the business

organization, politics and culture
Understanding the business

ecosystem
Business model innovation
Understanding global/local
business differentiation
Behavioral
Knowledge of customer
behaviors, needs and Strategic thinking
expectations
Conceptual thinking
Having a broad network of
business relationships Creative and innovative thinking
Business acumen Results orientation
Leading business change Leading, inspiring and building

trust
Digital business literacy
Influencing and persuading
Expertise in the relationships,
dependencies and flows of Collaboration/teamwork
information Technical
Resolving conflicts and problems
Knowledge of social and Understanding existing systems
ecosystem data Adaptability and technology
Knowledge of operational Coaching, delegating and Designing and developing

technology (OT) data developing solutions
Understanding how to access Openness to learning Applying models, tools and

and use both open and dark data methods
Risk taking
Revenue-centric creativity Integrating solutions
Decisiveness
Social analysis Designing modular architectures
Accountability
Tracking of emerging trends Understanding digital and
Communicating, listening and emerging technologies
Analogous industry assessment information gathering
capability Applying lean startup/agile
Out-of-the-box thinking methods
Knowledge of data from the
Internet of Things Creative solution building Gamification

Critical success factor 5: Follow these steps to create
an EA renaissance in your enterprise
Gartner’s experience and the research for this report reveal eight steps (depicted
in the figure opposite) for developing a successful, business-outcome-driven
EA practice:
1. Define the EA opportunity. Begin with the threats and opportunities of

digitalization, and consider the execution challenges that could hold the enterprise
back from responding. Is the enterprise too complex? Is information not as
accessible as it needs to be? What business capabilities will have the greatest
impact on digital business success? Do not start with building an EA capability;
first identify one or two critical issues for the enterprise, and then explore how EA
can be applied to help resolve them.
2. Shape your EA vision and gain buy-in. Clearly articulate your vision of how
EA will help the enterprise address its most critical issues. When seeking buy-
in, communicate your vision from the outside-in (i.e., “customer first”) so that it
clearly links to business outcomes. Initially target early adopters — the areas of the
enterprise open to new approaches such as EA — and aim to deliver results early.
3. Hire your head of EA and develop the team. Choosing the right “employee
No. 1” for the EA team is vital to success. Be sure that you can trust your head
of EA to build credibility with your business colleagues and follow your business
model. Work with this leader to develop an EA team that can provide a holistic
perspective.
4. Identify and act on quick wins. Identify a small set of business outcomes to
be first out of the gate. Deliver results quickly and communicate regularly. Create
a success story around EA that links to pragmatic results rather than standards,
processes and frameworks.
5. Define your EA methods, guidelines and guardrails. Apply lean thinking to

your EA discipline. Put in place just enough methodologies and guidelines (i.e., err
on the side of too few rather than too many). Clearly define guardrails that give the
enterprise as much flexibility as possible to explore, yet show the lines not to cross.
6. Engage stakeholders and refine the EA practice. Look for what works and
does not work, and where opportunities to improve exist. Do this regularly and
include key stakeholders in the discussion. Make EA a collaborative effort that
supports your stakeholders, peers, and IT and business leaders in making the
right decisions. Ensure that your business and IT leaders feel a sense of shared
responsibility for the success of EA.

7. Identify measurable business outcomes and deliver on them. Ensure that
everything you do with EA is clearly linked to a high-priority business outcome.
Measure EA success based on how it contributes to each outcome, not on
activities such as producing reports, defining and enforcing standards, and
evaluating technologies, which are only a means to an end. Start by concentrating
on a small number of business outcomes. As you accumulate experience and
successes, add business outcomes and broaden your approach.
8. Support digital strategy and build digital business capabilities. Whether

you are ramping up or renewing an EA team, focus on the digital business
strategy and make sure the EA team knows every detail. If you are still developing
the strategy, EA should be positioned to contribute as much value as possible to
the effort. If there is no strategy at all, consider using the EA team to promote the
need for one and to facilitate the process. Identify the business capabilities critical
for success and the biggest gaps between where the business needs to be and
where it is today.
The CIO’s roadmap to an EA renaissance
Engage
Gain buy-in from stakeholders
Shape your senior stakeholders and refine EA
vision for EA Identify and deliver
on measurable
Define the business outcomes
Identify and act
opportunity Hire your
on quick wins
for EA head of EA
Support digital
strategy development
Build your digital

Define methods, business capabilities
Develop guidelines and
the team guardrails

Conclusion
The emerging reality of digital business engenders opportunities, threats
and challenges. To address them, CIOs are turning to a reshaped, business-
outcome-driven EA team. In reshaping their EA team, CIOs must be proactive to
ensure the right focus and skill set for meeting expectations and realizing EA’s full
potential. Our interviewees offer some final thoughts on the EA team as the CIO’s
new digital business advisor:
“The two biggest barriers were making sure that the business understood EA, and
that the IT team recognized EA’s value and would involve it when things needed to be
done. As CIO, it’s important for me to persist and continuously ensure that we have
EA on the agenda and that people are not allowed to bypass the process.”
“When we develop a new function, rather than impose it on the organization, we

generally introduce it gradually, highlighting the key benefits. This allows the organization
to make its own assessment of the value. If the initiative succeeds, then I’m not the
only one at the table saying, ‘We need more of this.’”
“I have colleagues in another council who tried to set up enterprise architecture a
while back. They spent about a year looking at all the frameworks and talking about
what to do. Before they actually did anything, they got shut down. The point is that
it’s not enough to have a basic understanding at the top level. Once you develop
some interest, you’ve got to find two or three things that you can immediately make
an impact on, and then you’ve got to keep repeating that. This is how you earn the
credibility you need.”
Gavin Beckett, Chief Enterprise Architect, Bristol City Council
“First, CIOs need to understand EA themselves. Second, they need to understand

that you can’t have a city without a city plan. EA is critical to creating synergy. The
EA team must understand what the experience needs to be for the customer, and
what business processes are needed to enable this. Finally, EA must stay practical
in terms of governance, standards and execution.”
Anonymous CIO

Further Reading
Gartner Executive Programs reports

“Digital Business Transformation: Turning the Digital Dream Into Reality,” 2015
No. 10, G00292285; Nielsen, T. and Meehan, P.
“Building the Digital Platform: The 2016 CIO Agenda,” 2015 No. 9, G00292133;
Aron, D., Waller, G. and Weldon, L.
“The New Mission of Your Office of the CIO,” 2014 No. 9, G00272386; Weldon, L.
and Schulte, A.
“Flipping to Digital Leadership: The 2015 CIO Agenda,” 2014 No. 7, G00270826;
Aron, D., Waller, G. and Weldon, L.
“Bimodal IT: How to Be Digitally Agile Without Making a Mess,” 2014 No. 5,
G00268866; Mesaglio, M. and Mingay, S.
Further Reading 45
Core research
“Follow the Leaders: Digital Business Is a Big Opportunity to Evolve Your EA
Practice,” 3 July 2015, G00272411; Blosch, M., Burton, B. and Walker, M.
“Toolkit: Workshop for Identifying the Business Capabilities Critical to Your Digital
Business Success,” 27 May 2015, G00273963; Weldon, L.
“Outlining an Approach to Bring Your Own Apps,” 11 May 2015, G00274944;

Dulaney, K. et al.
“Three Steps to Help CIOs Anticipate and Respond to Digital Disruption,” 21 April
2015, G00260156; Weldon, L. and Rowsell-Jones, A.
“An Enterprise Architect’s Guide to Using Lean Startup to Design Innovative New
Offerings,” 9 April 2015, G00274445; Blosch, M. and Burton, B.
“Three Fundamental Ways Strategy Is Changing in the First Digital Decade, and
How CIOs Should Respond,” 2 April 2015, G00257873; Weldon, L. and Cole, J.
“Use Digital Business Design Principles to Guide the Development of Digital

Services,” 20 February 2015, G00272409; Blosch, M. and Burton, B.
“Toolkit: Develop a Vanguard Enterprise Architecture Team to Support Digital

Business,” 23 December 2014, G00264364; Blosch, M., Burton, B. and Mok, L.
“Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Architecture Tools,” 30 September 2014,

G00263193; Brand, S.
“Seven Best Practices for Using Enterprise Architecture to Power Digital Business,”
20 May 2014, G00263326; Blosch, M. and Burton, B.
“Seven Ways to Build Your Business Ecosystem for Greater Impact on Business
and IT Planning,” 10 February 2014, G00260466; Blosch, M.
“The Distinction Between Enterprise Architecture and Application Architecture

Makes a Difference to Business Outcomes,” 2 January 2014, G00258458; Blanton, C.
and Altman, R.
“How to Manage Support Using Gartner’s Managed Diversity Model,” 10 October

2013, G00257885; Dulaney, K. and Doheny, R.
“EA Practitioners Must Focus on Outcome-Oriented Deliverables,” 10 February

2012, G00230669; Burke, B. and Burton, B.

About Gartner
Gartner, Inc. (NYSE: IT) is the world’s leading information technology research and
advisory company. We deliver the technology-related insight necessary for our clients
to make the right decisions, every day. From CIOs and senior IT leaders in corporations
and government agencies, to business leaders in high-tech and telecom enterprises
and professional services firms, to technology investors, we are the valuable partner to
clients in approximately 10,000 distinct enterprises worldwide. Through the resources
of Gartner Research, Gartner Executive Programs, Gartner Consulting and Gartner
Events, we work with every client to research, analyze and interpret the business of IT
within the context of their individual role. Founded in 1979, Gartner is headquartered
in Stamford, Connecticut, USA, and has 7,600 associates, including more than 1,600
research analysts and consultants, and clients in 90 countries.
About Gartner Executive Programs

Thousands of CIOs and IT executives worldwide receive customized advice
and participate in peer exchange opportunities through the membership-based
offerings of Gartner Executive Programs. Members enjoy personalized Gartner
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communities of their kind.
The individual and team programs created specifically for the way the CIO works
equip members with the tools and knowledge they need to deliver exceptional
results for their organizations.
For more information, visit gartner.com.

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Entire contents © 2015 Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Reproduction of this publication in
any form without prior written permission is forbidden. The information contained herein has been obtained from
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2015 REPORT NO.

The CIO’s New

2. The EA team provides the CIO with a holistic approach to bridging

Would you prefer less paper?

2 The CIO’s New Digital Business Advisor: A Resurgent EA Team

Lee Weldon Marcus Blosch

4 The CIO’s New Digital Business Advisor: A Resurgent EA Team

A business-outcome-driven EA team is a valuable

The EA team provides the CIO with a holistic approach

6 The CIO’s New Digital Business Advisor: A Resurgent EA Team

Business Business Execution

Business-outcome-driven enterprise architecture

Cloud Information IoT

To produce deliverables, EA must take a highly collaborative approach. The

Utilize five critical success factors to reshape

An effective EA team is business-outcome-driven

Business Business Execution

8 The CIO’s New Digital Business Advisor: A Resurgent EA Team

New digital business expectations demand a new type

1. A business-outcome-driven EA team is a valuable advisor to the CIO 9

CIO opinions of the biggest digital business opportunities and threats

Top 3 digital business opportunities Top 3 digital business threats

1. New channels 1. Cyberattacks/data loss

2. New insights 2. Market disruption

3. New technologies (e.g., Internet of Things) 3. Faster competitors

Source: Gartner 2016 CIO Agenda Survey.

− How can new technologies be used to innovate the business model?

10 The CIO’s New Digital Business Advisor: A Resurgent EA Team

At the same time, CIOs continually face challenges in execution:

− Increased complexity of business models and technology

− Expectations of shorter response times to business needs

CIOs are caught between business strategy and execution

1. A business-outcome-driven EA team is a valuable advisor to the CIO 11

Options to consider when developing the digital business and IT strategies.

Visibility into issues, especially those that affect execution, to enable

12 The CIO’s New Digital Business Advisor: A Resurgent EA Team

1. A business-outcome-driven EA team is a valuable advisor to the CIO 13

It will change our business

It will change our business models

Expect little change

Don’t know/not sure

n = 77 (CIOs and CTOs responding to the 2015 Gartner EA Survey)

14 The CIO’s New Digital Business Advisor: A Resurgent EA Team

− Understanding the business ecosystem and the world of possible customers,

− Scanning the world of the possible by studying cases of startup technology

− Applying managed diversity principles to outlying information, processes,

− Enabling the distribution of decision rights for many traditional architecture

1. A business-outcome-driven EA team is a valuable advisor to the CIO 15

A business-outcome-driven EA team can be a valuable advisor

Business Business Execution

Visibility into issues

16 The CIO’s New Digital Business Advisor: A Resurgent EA Team

Guardrails vs. guidelines

Your digital business future

Your road to digital business

The head of EA can become a key personal advisor to

1. A business-outcome-driven EA team is a valuable advisor to the CIO 17

The head of EA as a valuable advisor to the CIO

Business Business Execution

2. The EA team provides the CIO with a holistic approach to bridging

− How can new technologies be used to innovate the business model?

− Increased complexity of business models and technology

− Expectations of shorter response times to business needs

− Understanding the business ecosystem and the world of possible customers,

− Scanning the world of the possible by studying cases of startup technology

− Applying managed diversity principles to outlying information, processes,

− Enabling the distribution of decision rights for many traditional architecture

“E A had no focus on the current platforms — instead it focused on understanding

“Enterprise architecture is able to go in and describe what our business doesn’t

− How do we ensure that our technology investment and roadmaps remain

− Get creative. Layer in business capabilities, decision analysis, impact analysis,