I am also trying to fit it in with Stafford Beer’s methodology of defining the “System in Question, and drawing recursions of it’s elements.

I use the Business Model Canvas as a elaborations of the VSM, and I am now looking at how you have extended the model to deal with service viability.

This is a long article and it will take me some time to digest. Thanks for writing it.

“One of the most worrying aspects for me is no mention of purpose (not the same as vision)” – I’ll admit I’m confused here. The way I structure vision is that it is the driving purpose, so I don’t see any difference. (In the extended-Zachman, ‘Why’ is then the driver for the view looking ‘upward’ in the layering, and ‘How’/'What’ is the driver for the view looking ‘downward’.) What have I missed?

Some of the distinctions are truly puzzling – but horses for courses. We all arrange and label things in our own peculiar way.

One of the most worrying aspects for me is no mention of purpose (not the same as vision) in the extended-Zachman map, or elsewhere for that matter. I find it hard to believe in a model when something so fundamental is omitted. Maybe it’s covered and I’ll see it when I read the article again in the morning. Or is it a case of Stafford Beer and “the purpose of a system is what it does”? and therefore not worthy of mention?

Enough of my reflex reactions. Thanks for making these ideas available to us. I will reflect and reconsider.

Jack

You make some really good points that have got me thinking. In particular I think you are right about TOGAF/Archimate. While I do really like aspects of Archimate (and I think you do it a bit of a disservice, there are some quite good aspects of the business layer), the layers below “business” are entirely IT focussed exclusively. Your point about architecture lacking a centre is a good one, and one I will need to think on more.

Doug

Thanks for mentioning my tweet. But I think it is good to mention some other quotes I’ve tweeted because your interaction with Ron Tolido reminded me of something:

“Agile = shortcutting the process (cheating legally to win) ” Alistair Cockburn

“The best laid business models are overturned by a kid in a dorm room, more now than ever” Steven Levy

“Orville Wright Did Not Have a Pilot’s License”

And here I will add another one from Albert Einstein:
“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them”

The common thing we, as architects, must learn from these quotes and from the “A city is not a tree” article is that if you want to really change things you will need diversity and evolutionary mechanisms like hacking and agile (both based on learning by doing). The role of central control and therefore architects & designers is becoming less and less important…

So architecture has to change. And for that we can lot from how BIM has changed the world of building/construction architecture:
“BIM changes how architecture is done by demanding a process that considers a project’s whole system and entire life cycle up front and requiring a team synergy to design it.”
Source: http://www.di.net/articles/archive/redefining_way_we_make_architecture/

But even with BIM it is good to remember that: ‘If you know where it’s going, it’s not worth doing.’ Which is a quote from Frank Gehry, the man who was one of the first architects who knew that architecture had to change. And by changing his way of doing architecture he became one of the “founders” of BIM.
You always need creative people who can think and act like artists. Tom, I guess that is what makes you truly special, and that is also the reason that I’ve compared you already a few times with Frank Gehry

I fully agree with Jerome that there is a long way to go. Standards drag behind by nature. Too many views and practices have to get aligned to evolve to something that is understood by sufficient disciplines and stakeholders to get accepted. In my view the BAWG and the Business Forum both have achieved a lot by taking this battle on. The alignment of the vocabulary of business biased viewpoints and IT biased viewpoints have been largely aligned. However, not everybody will appreciate it, if one does not want to take the same viewpoint as the profession of business architect. That viewpoint links to what we believe the challenge is. And I believe that challenge is related to implementation of a business strategy, logic and the adoption of new technology. The business architect needs a continuous insight in how these relate to each other, and how over time these potentially evolve. He is in the sweetspot of strategy implementation and guarding the business value of programs. Some will call it business consultant, although that role is often lacking technology savviness, others enterprise architects. However, the enterprise architect in a traditional viewpoint has a technology biased focus. Therefore the new role is justified to be brought alive. Professionals from both sides may take this role, because of either their experience or education. However, we have to understand that this role is different from the classic (dangerous ) business consultant or enterprise architect. The contribution of the business forum and BAWG is now that they have aligned the vocabulary and now clearly described what role is needed to prevent the high failure rate of strategy implementations. The summary of this view can be read in the IEEE paper “Defining the Business Architecture profession”, PID1964443, 5-7 September 2011.

My 2 c’s

To correct myself!……

The problem is in the work that needs to happen BEFORE TOGAF. That is where PEAF fits.

So we cannot say “How can we get TOG to eat it’s own dog food???” because the food it needs to eat is not in TOGAF!

It would be more correct to say “How can we get TOG to eat (aka apply) PEAF to itself”

And we all know the answer to that question!

I suspect it would be less difficult to perform nano-engineering using a planet!

Yep – Well done for exposing this in very direct and constructive way.

All it needs is for TOG to amend the slides – 10 minutes? But I wonder how long it will take – if ever!

Ho Hum. You and I and the others in the minority will continue to expose this information (for we are architects after all and thats what architects do).

NOW – something profound just hit me……

It is very very very interesting in that what is happening here is exactly the same type of thing that happens in organisations which is one of the fundamental problems that EA (well PEAF does!) addresses…. That of governance upwards…

It’s like people working at the project level seeing the strategy above them being fatally flawed but not having the influence to get that message up to the strategy level to change it.

We (you me and the rest of the minority) are the people working at the project level (outside TOG as individuals) seeing the strategy above them (as defined by all TOG members) being fatally flawed but we do not having the influence to get that message up to the strategy level to change it – TOG.

In projects., “proper” EA Governance (as defined in PEAF) – allows this to happen by exposing the Enterprise Debt being created and providing that information up to the strategy level for appropriate decisions to be made – at that level. But that only works if the bounding organisation has already changed to allow that to happen. EA allows us to make those changes.

Regarding TOG and their “view” of EA we will never get them to change and listen to what we are saying because TOG first needs to change to allow that to happen.

Now, after elation at finding a profound correlation, I’m depressed. It’s the same depression (aka frustration) felt by massive numbers of people working in projects all over the world – knowing something is wrong (with the system – system being he system of change they work within) but not being in a position to change it, and being ignored by those that are in a position to change it (indeed that is their duty and job but they do not realise it)

The people that can see the problem (and therefore the solution) have no power to implements it.

The people that do have the power to implement the changes cannot see the problem – Indeed seem to actively ignore the problem – are therefore are not interested in the solution.

This is the fundamental cultural problem that “proper” EA addresses….

People “at the top” (management) not only “should” listen to people “below them” (workers), they should actively seek out their views. It should be their duty.

People “at the bottom” (workers) should not only be encouraged to expose problems to people at the top” (Managers) they should be mandated to do so. It should be their duty.

This is the classic cultural change that Deming (and the Japanese) were talking about, and it is why I see Deming so useful for EA. (Deming = Quality of Operational efficiency. EA = Quality of Transformational Efficiency – see the “Demming and TQM vs Zachman (et al) and EA. Two sides of the same coin?” discussion on linkedin at http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Demming-TQM-vs-Zachman-et-36781.S.90307147?qid=f7c6d7aa-5736-49fd-9a75-a4e818e39d67&trk=group_most_popular-0-b-ttl&goback=.gmp_36781

So. The question is how do we apply EA to TOG to transform it into and organisation that treats the input of one voice with a massively important message with the same importance as inputs from large commercial organisations (e.g. consultancies) ??????

If TOG cannot apply “true” EA to itself, how can people treat them as leaders in the field???

How can we get TOG to eat it’s own dog food???

This is such a great post. I know that it’s a theme that you continue to thump home. I’m going to recommend this post to people if a discussion ever comes up.

Anthony