We are a group of Enterprise and Solution Architects with experience in software engineering and architecture domains. We have been members of the software development, delivery, and business transformation industries for a while, and we have discovered a gap that we feel the necessity to address. Specifically, as it stands now, Enterprise Architecture commonly fails to deliver the values that it promised.
This article will review the Enterprise Architecture field's gaps and how our flagship product, Archipeg, helps with this problem.
We interviewed employees of multiple organizations about the purpose and meaning of Enterprise Architecture. The audience included executives, technology professionals, and managers at various levels. More than 90% of the interviewees could not explain this term, let alone the benefits of practicing EA.
Nevertheless, Enterprise Architecture exists to govern digital transformation journeys that those same organizations face. Ironically, the solution to this challenging objective is right there, but nobody even suspects this is the case.
When we tried to dig deeper into the described puzzle, we realized that it is impossible to know something isolated from everything else. Enterprise Architecture has been a black box for most people who could benefit from it. This conclusion is quite logical as the EA is taught, understood, and practiced only by a few members of some enterprises. These individuals hold titles of Enterprise Architects, and they are tasked to drive digital transformations. However, due to the siloed nature of work and execution that the EA prescribes, they are perceived as "Ivory Towers" who try to do things that nobody understands or approves. Furthermore, Enterprise Architecture stands on an overly complicated, specialized, and proprietary body of knowledge. Then how can it empower and help people execute successful digital transformations?
With Archipeg, we want to give the Enterprise Architecture's power to the organizations and their employees who deal with problems relevant to EA.
While analyzing the Enterprise Architecture initiatives and deliverables, we frequently saw confusion between Enterprise and Solution Architecture fields. At times, Enterprise Architecture would deliver outcomes that qualified as Solution Architecture deliverables; in other cases, Solution Architecture would attempt to cover the Enterprise Architecture base.
There is undoubtedly a correlation between the two areas of work, which confuses many people. There are schools of thought that suggest separating the two disciplines to realize the value of each. However, seeing the limited value that these areas deliver without each other, we have decided to go a different route.
With Archipeg, we acknowledge the importance of both Enterprise Architecture and Solution Architecture, and we want to let these two disciplines work to support each other. Therefore, we want to combine the capabilities for running both these initiatives and give that power to organizations and practitioners that want to leverage this strength.
We suggest that you check out our comparison of Enterprise Architecture vs. Solution Architecture.
We spoke about Enterprise Architecture and Solution Architecture, and we have agreed that combining these two areas brings tremendous value to organizations. However, we are extremely cautious to avoid creating new kinds of silos. We want to maximize value by increasing access, openness, and transparency rather than creating another proprietary framework or a toolset that frustrates practitioners and stakeholders.
Therefore, Archipeg is for everybody, for entire organizations!
We hope you are as excited about this approach as our entire team, and we look forward to delivering the value of Enterprise Architecture and Solution Architecture to your organization.