I remember as a young child coming from a ‘non-sports obsessed’ family, I didn’t know what a yorker was, didn’t know what ‘LBW’ meant, or why Dennis Lillee or Geoffrey Boycott were such legends. I was ill equipped to join in on those all-important schoolboy conversations – the Monday morning autopsy of the weekend’s sporting events. Similarly, 30 years later, enterprise architecture presented me with the same dilemma.
Architects are Made, Not Born
As a talent management consultant for an architecture consulting firm I am often asked what I look for in an up and coming architect and my first answer is usually: at least a few years’ experience in the discipline as well as formal training. However, after an 18 year career in talent management and psychometric interpretation, with 8 of those in architecture, it has become glaringly obvious to me (call it intuition or experience) that there are a few fundamental skills that have been evident in those I have noticed early on in their careers and which I now hold up as a comparison when interviewing junior architects.
Architecture for the Masses: A New Approach
It might seem counter-intuitive to see established institutions like MIT, Harvard and Stanford jumping on board the MOOC bandwagon – in case you’ve just crawled from under a rock that’s Massive Open Online Courses; the wave of technology innovation sweeping across the Higher Education and Training sectors. After all – these education mega-brands have long been regarded as bastions of exclusivity, patronised by the world’s best, brightest and most privileged. Why would they decide to give away their courses for free?
Well – they’re not the only ones getting on board…
EA Effectiveness – ONE Measure that Matters
Today I saw on one of the Linked-In Architecture Forums a variation on the classic question of measuring Enterprise Architecture value and effectiveness. The member wrote: “……..So what are the most useful ways in which you have measured the effectiveness of architecture efforts/outcomes in organisations you have worked for”?. Of course this elicited a stream of predictable responses and suggestions relating to levels of compliance, investment alignment, productivity improvement, sourcing effectiveness, blah, blah, blah.
The Open Group APAC Conference Highlights
Well the dust has settled now with the conclusion of The Open Group ‘Enterprise Transformation’ Conference held in Sydney, Australia for the first time on April 15-20. Enterprise Architects is proud to have been recognised at the event by The Open Group as being pivotal in the success of this event. A number of our clients including
Craig Martin’s Open Group Conference Plenary
Craig Martin’s Open Group Conference Plenary slide pack and on demand live stream video here. The presentation focusses on using business motivation models, strategic scenario planning and capability based planning techniques to provide input into the strategic planning process. It will also highlight some of the output examples from engagements.
Getting Started with Business Interoperability – A Common Language
For years I have seen organisations struggle to achieve Business Interoperability and waste resources time and time again arguing semantics. In my opinion the root source of this struggle is not having a common language.
6 Essential Questions to ask when Designing Products and Services
How to identify which customer needs, if serviced, will provide value to your customer AND to your business
Organisations striving to be customer centric, at some point in time, will be faced with the task of identifying customer needs that must be serviced in order for the business to grow and out do their competitors. If you have a long customer needs ‘wish list’, the biggest challenge is justifying which feature is worth implementing and will provide the highest value to your customer and your business.
Optimising Business Capabilities and Performance
Later this month, The Open Group’s first conference in Australia will focus on “How Does Enterprise Architecture Transform an Enterprise?”
As a prelude to the event, Briefings Direct recently interviewed CEO Hugh Evans and Craig Martin, Chief Operations Officer and Chief Architect at Enterprise Architects. The interview was conducted by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.Listen to the podcast here: