The Main Benefits of Developing an Enterprise Architecture in a Professional School

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1 The Main Benefits of Developing an Enterprise Architecture in a Professional School Rui GOMES School of Technology and Management, Polytechnic Institute of Viana do Castelo, Viana do Castelo, Portugal and Paula FERNANDES Alto Lima Professional School Arcos de Valdevez, Portugal ABSTRACT The Enterprise Architecture is a master plan that operates as a cooperation force between the business planning features, the business operations, the information systems and the information technologies necessary for their implementation. In this paper we present the choice of the Enterprise Architecture Framework used in the development of an Enterprise Architecture applied to the Professional School EPRALIMA. We also put forward the main benefits for an organization of this dimension and domain. Those benefits were felt in the improvement of the communication process with the stakeholders, in the knowledge of how the organisation works and how it is run. Such elements also ensure the adaptability of the information systems to the operational model of the organisation. Keywords: Enterprise Architecture, EA Frameworks. 1. INTRODUCTION 1.1 Enterprise Architecture Definition John Zachman [1] defines the Enterprise Architecture (EA) as a set of descriptive representations (for instance, models) that are relevant for the description of a company so that it can be produced in agreement with the administration requirements (quality) and maintained along their useful life time (change). So the EA includes not only the information systems and technologies, but also the business that such information systems and technologies should support; it also serves to bring quality to the company and allows to manage changes in the company. The Meta Group [2] presents the definition of an EA as being the holistic expression of the key strategies of the enterprise according to business, applications and technologies and the impact these two have on the processes and business functions. Typically, it consists of company models and of current and future states of the four key components (Business Architecture, Information Architecture, Application and Global Technical Architecture). It is implemented through the Programs Management Department, and it supplies the process for exploring the opportunities of digital innovation. This definition of EA distinguishes between current architecture and future architecture which reinforces the architecture as a holistic expression. According to the American Government [3], EA is a base of strategic information assets which defines the business, the necessary information to operate the business, the necessary technologies to support the business operations and the necessary transition processes for the implementation of the new technologies in response to the changes of the business needs. This innovative vision results from the assets concept which is the base resource used to transform and to develop the information systems in relation to the changes that will be introduced in the business. Ross [4] defines EA as the organizing logic for business processes and infrastructure of Information Technology (IT), reflecting the integration of requirements and standardization of the operational model of the enterprise. The EA supplies a longterm vision of the organizational processes, systems and technologies, so that individual projects can build capabilities not just fulfil immediate needs.

2 The EA key diagrams are focused in the high level communication of the business process and by the requirements of IT to the enterprise operational model. It fails to supply the necessary detail to map out technical design or the design process of the requirements. Based on the definitions presented above, we can say that EA is a master plan which acts as a cooperation force among aspects of business 1.2 Frameworks for Enterprise Architectures According to Schekkerman [5], an effective approach to Enterprise Architectures should produce architectures that: Create and maintain a common vision of the future shared by both the business and IT, driving continuous business/it alignment; Create a holistic, end-to-end future-state enterprise architecture process that accurately reflects the business strategy of the enterprise; Build agility by lowering the complexity barrier, an inhibitor of change; Increase the flexibility of the enterprise in linking with external partners; Develop proactive organisation capable of meeting customer demands, outpacing the competition, and driving innovation; Reduce risk and prepare the company for rapid, unplanned change; Avoid the pitfalls of business-unit IT functions operating at odds with one another; Create, unify, and integrate business processes across the enterprise; Eliminate duplication of technologies in order to reduce costs; Unlock the power of information, unifying information silos that hinder corporate initiatives such as customer relationship management and e-business; Reduce the time of delivery of solutions and development cost, maximizing the technology reutilization, information and applications. To develop architectures with the characteristics referred previously, Schekkerman proposes a holistic approach in scope, based on the planning, business operations, information systems and technologies which are all required for carrying out any EA plan. Because both Governments and industrial organizations have been giving considerable relevance to EAs and because their development is complex, it has been of general concern to present frameworks which can support them. cooperation, guided by alignment, value, dynamics, to have normative results and no prescriptive. For the development of this EA, several frameworks have been proposed, being a Framework defined as a communication model that supplies: - one or more meta-models for the description of EA; - one or more methods for the design and evolution of the EA; - a common vocabulary for EA; - and, eventually, reference models that can be used as templates or blueprints for the design of EA and evolution. The components of an EA Framework should be applicable to a wide range of corporations and government agencies. Many classic EA Frameworks were primarily focused on software architecture rather than on global architecture without considering the first 2 rows of the Zachman's Framework. This does not happen with the most recent frameworks which emphasise the business. In our opinion, EA Frameworks should include the first 2 rows of Zachman's Framework. In our study, we compared the following frameworks: Extended Enterprise Architecture Framework (E2AF) [6], Enterprise Architecture Planning (EAP) [7], Federal Enterprise Architecture (FEAF) [8], Treasury Enterprise Architecture (TEAF) [9], The Open Group Architecture (TOGAF) [10], Zachman Framework [11], Joint Technical Architecture (JTA) [12], C4ISR [13] and DoDAF [14]. We found out that (1) some of these frameworks considered several layers and different architecture visions (EA2F, Zachman); (2) the majority of them presented, the business, data, applications and technological architectures as components of the EA; (3) some of them emphasised actual and targeted architectures (FEAF); (4) some of these presented reference models (TOGAF); (5) and

3 others included methods for the development of EAs with different levels of assistance (EAP, TOGAF). We can then conclude that although architecture frameworks provide different means of describing the architecture of an enterprise and raise a significant participation of the stakeholders, they should also consider the value chain of the company, the alignment, the mapping and the performance measure. The next section of our work starts by describing the research method and the case study, and then by analysing the results of the development of an Enterprise Architecture according to the Enterprise Architecture Development (DAE) [15]. 2. CASE STUDY Considering the stated advantages (see section 1.2) of having an EA implemented in an organization we develop an EA in a professional school in northern Portugal. We wanted to find out which were the main benefits for the organization by using an Action Research methodology. 2.1 Research Method Olesen and Myers[16] employed action research in their investigation of the relationship between the introduction of groupware into an organization and the consequent changes in individuals' work habits and the structure of the organization. The reason they give for adopting action research is that "it enables a researcher to intervene in the organization while at the same time generate knowledge about the process." (p. 321). Their research perspective was interpretive which allowed them to concentrate their research on how individuals attempted to make sense of the specific situation. As Olesen and Meyers, we employ a five-stage action research cycle comprising the following stages: 1. Diagnosing: identify the research question 2. Action Planning: determine the actions to be undertaken to address the research question 3. Action Taking: conduct and monitor the planned actions 4. Evaluation: determine if the actions have addressed the research question 5. Specifying Learning: document the knowledge obtained by conducting the project 2.2 Development Phases In this section, we describe the phases, critical points and main benefits of the EA that we developed Diagnosis The selected organization was EPRALIMA a professional school in Arcos de Valdevez. This because the researcher was a consultant there. She verified that the administration of the school had identified an urgent need for structuring and implementing an effective and efficient Information System capable of dealing with the fast and innovative changes which had recently occurred in the Portuguese Educational System concerning this level. The number of students enrolled was much higher than it had first been predicted and so the Information System Management should meet the demand of the market where it acts not only in a concurrent way but also in time. Due to time limitations of the project coordinator, we did not develop all the EA components nor implement all the identified systems Action Planning Framework Selection The choice of the framework was primarily based on stakeholders and domain. One of the main uses of the EA descriptions is communication with all the stakeholders. The architectural visions of the architectures should supply information to the stakeholders. The different types of visions should thus satisfy the different stakeholders interests so that the EA becomes a tool of Communication. The knowledge of the different "frameworks" will not only allow to select the one which uses the most appropriate concepts and approaches to the resolution of our problem but also to identify the limitations of the selected Framework so that it can be filled out with the use of other frameworks. According to the analysis of different frameworks and to Ross's orientations [4] we suggest that the selected framework should emphasise the following principles: - the application domain (Government/industry, small/large companies); - 4-component types of architectures: Business, Information/Data, Applications and Technology;

4 - focused on the operational model; - centred on behaviour and not just on processes; - indicate a methodology, which has already been applied to small companies, for the development of the architecture. Therefore, we applied the DAE method[15], that is completely supported by both Enterprise Architecture Planning (EAP)[7] and Meta Group[2], and clues of practical character resulting from previous work that had been carried out in several Portuguese small companies. Moreover, the development of the operational model was added during the Business Architecture phase Execution of the Planned Actions We now summarise the main phases and the results of the DAE method: The "Initiation" phase had the purpose of preparing and ensuring the conditions for the success of the project. We started by establishing the Mission and the Vision of EPRALIMA. This was followed by the mobilisation of the organisation for the subsequent phases of the project. To mobilize the organization, several meetings were held during which staff was made aware of the importance of this project to structural change. The whole organisation should be involved in order to optimize the main aim of the organisation which was to supply quality teaching /training. In addition to this, the administration issued a memo. In this phase, we concentrated on operational processes such as the development of the Educational Plan, the organisation of classes and forms, the teaching and assessment, and student employment management. The organizational areas focused on the management of educational needs, administration and pedagogical management of the courses as well as placements to ensure high quality education. The Academic Registry was also a relevant area to the effective information management in EPRALIMA. A Strategic-Operational Summary followed this phase. The main changes that were identified are listed bellow and had to do with management improvement of the educational offer according to local demand; - online submission of all applications issued by the Educational Department of the Portuguese Education Ministry; - reorganisation of the original EPRALIMA Information System because it had been developed without an integration plan of the various information sources; - checking the EPRALIMA Information Systems in order to determine if it followed the strategic objectives; - improvement of the internal communication plan of EPRALIMA; - effective delivery of the information to the internal and external customers of EPRALIMA; - identification of the main changes that are to be introduced in EPRALIMA. These include the overall requirements of the information systems and technologies necessary to support the proposed changes; - keeping a record of all existing Information Resources and technological infrastructures available at EPRALIMA prior to the project; - compiling an Information Systems Manual with al the new tools and applications. In the third phase - Business Architecture - the business processes are organised into 2 types: - Operational Processes - those directly linked to the execution of the services provided by EPRALIMA; - Support Processes - those that directly give support to the operational processes and guarantee the internal operation of the organization. Moreover, we give a description of these processes by defining for each one of them: the inputs and the outputs; the main activities; the functions/structures that execute and/or are involved in each one of the activities; the documents and/or means that are necessary to the execution of each activity; the records produced in the execution of each activity; the performance indicators of the process; and the business rules and improvements that are be introduced. This was followed by the Current Technologies and Systems phase in which we characterized the current situation at EPRALIMA concerning the infrastructure of information systems and technologies. Then, in the Data Architecture phase- we first described the business entities and

5 the respective relationships, and then drew the CRUD matrix. In the Applications Architecture phase, we identified two types of applications. One for supporting activities and business processes (Table 1) and the other for backing the administration of the following business entities: inquiries, courses, application forms, students, classes and forms, absences, summaries, teachers, timetables, noncurricular activities, grades, placements, examination contents and employment opportunities. After having identified the applications, we determined the relationship among them and described the purpose (i.e. synthesis of the application objectives). Application Handling of inquiries Selecting areas of study/courses Advertising the Educational Offer Managing students application forms Registering students Grouping into classes Managing Subjects/Modules Registering teachers Creating timetables Registering summaries of the lessons Registering absences Managing non-curricular activities Registering assessment Managing placements Managing examination papers Managing diplomas Managing employment opportunities Objective Diagnose the educational needs and process inquiries Define areas of study and submit course applications Select marketing strategies Process application forms Register successful applicants Assign classes and forms Process subjects and modules of the courses Process and select teachers Define students' timetables and teachers Register summary of the supplied modules Register absences Define and register non-curricular activities Process grades Record placement coordinators and results Define and evaluate contents of examinations Record and issue diplomas Process employment opportunities and keep track of graduates Table 1- Support Applications of the EPRALIMA business processes Figure 1 shows the key elements, which support data and application architectures, obtained in the Technological Architecture phase. - IT Board - Decides how the information technologies will support the business priorities. - EA Committee Responsible for the promotion and the approval of the EA design and maintenance. - IST Engineering Division - Responsible for the development of the EA. Figure 1- Technological Architecture The Model of Governance was our last phase. We found out that if EPRALIMA decision process was to be successful, the decisions could not continue to be centralized in just one person. This would be a limitation to innovation and so a new governance structure was created with the following members: Evaluation The evaluation of the current project was based on inquiries and individual interviews aimed at identifying the main benefits for EPRALIMA. All members of staff had to complete an inquiry and then be interviewed by the researcher of this study. The results showed that: 1. Both the Administration and other decisionmaking members of staff at EPRALIMA, were

6 actively involved in the implementation of the business modelling; 2. Communication improved considerably among the stakeholders at all levels; 3. The identified applications were said to be more suitable for the actual needs of EPRALIMA; 4. The proposed governance model would be determinant for the success of the EA and for the future IS management at EPRALIMA. The limitations of this project, which were mainly due to time limitation and lack of skilled staff capable of developing an EA, led the researcher to propose a second phase for the current project. Therefore, in our Business Architecture phase, we only dealt with the operational processes and left the support process for the next phase. 3. CONCLUSION We found that, despite the limitations of this study, adaptability of the information systems to the operational model of the organisation is the main benefit of developing an EA for an organization of this type and dimension. According to the characteristics and the potential of the EAs described earlier in point 1 and to the analysis of the results of the EPRALIMA case study, we found that (1) the administration was actively involved throughout the whole implementation of the business modelling; (2) communication was improved among stakeholders at all levels; (3) and the governance model was interestingly identified as a key factor in the success of both the EA and the IS management. [4] Ross J., Weill P., Enterprise Architecture As Strategy, Harvard Business School Press, [5] Schekkerman J., How to survive in the jungle of Enterprise Architecture Frameworks, Trafford, [6] Extended Enterprise Architecture Maturity Model SM; E2AMM v.2.0; Published IFEAD, 2004 [7] Spewak, Steven H., Enterprise Architecture Planning, New York: John Wile&Sons, [8] The Federal Enterprise Architecture Framework, Version 1.1., US CIO Council. [9] The Treasury Enterprise Architecture Framework, Version 1.0., US Dept. of the Treasury [10] The Open Group; TOGAF, Version 8.0 [11] Zachmam, J. A., and J.F. Sowa, Extending and Formalizing the Framework for Information Systems Architecture, IBM Systems Journal, 1992 [12] Joint Technical Architecture (JTA); version 4.0, (Defence Infornation Systems Agency), USA. [13] C4ISR Architecture Framework; Version 2.0, DoD, US 1997, USA. [14] US DoD Architecture Framework; Version 1.0, DoDAF. [15] Vaz Velho, A., Arquitectura de Empresa, 2004, Centro Atlântico [16] Olesen, K., & Myers, M. D. (1999). Trying to improve communication and collaboration with information technology: An action research project which failed. Information Technology and People, 12(4), REFERENCES [1] Zachman, John, Enterprise Architecture: The issue of Century, Database programming and Design, March, [2] Meta Group Enterprise Architecture Boot Camp 2000, Vincent DiGennaro, The Enterprise Architecture Conference, Meta Group And DCI, San Diego, March, [3]