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The concept of Enterprise Architecture is key to the successful transformation of a company. . The Enterprise Architecture describes the company (or a business unit) in terms of its processes, instead of the traditional description with an organization chart. The difference is very significant. An organization chart describes the operation in terms of the flow of authority and the formal communication channels. The Enterprise Architecture describes its processes, which are what the company does and how it does it. The processes show how the inputs from the vendors are transformed into the products and services the customers receive. Too often executives try to improve the effectiveness of a company by restructuring it, that is, by changing its organization chart. What this accomplishes is changing the way the responsibilities are assigned. It may or may not solve the problem, since the persons with the new responsibilities may carry them out better or worse than the previous ones. The only certain way of improving the effectiveness of a company is to focus on its processes and redesigning the way they are performed. A problem frequently found in process redesign projects using the traditional approach is that they focus on the process at the operational level. At that level most companies have hundreds or even thousands of processes (which are really activities and not processes). The projects using this approach become massive undertakings, consuming significant resources over a long period of time, and producing thick reports... that few people read and usually turn out to have little value. The Enterprise Architecture approach to process redesign takes a completely different perspective. Instead of focusing on the operational level, the traditional area of concern of industrial engineers and systems analysts, it focuses on the top level of the company. It defines the few "macro-processes" that describe what the company does to carry out its mission. A company's operation typically is fully represented by six to twelve of these "macro-processes". In Enterprise Architecture they are called the first-level processes. Each of these first-level processes can, in turn, be decomposed into sub-processes, which are called the second-level processes. A company typically has between sixty and one hundred second-level processes. If we were to continue this analysis by identifying the processes at the next several levels, until the operational level is reached, one would end up with the hundreds or thousands of processes (activities) previously mentioned. The Enterprise Architecture methodology avoids this problem. Once the first and second levels are defined, they are analyzed in terms of their adequacy to execute the business strategies of the company. Only those processes that are not adequate have to be redesigned. The other processes either can be left alone or improved through a total quality program. Only those processes that need to be redesigned need to be analyzed all the way to the operational level. This drastically reduces the scope of the project to improve the effectiveness of the company to execute its strategies. The organizational transformation can thus be achieved in a short amount of time. Toscano Management Consulting uses the Interactive Planning methodology to design the Enterprise Architecture of its clients. An Enterprise Architecture project has two phases:
Thus in less than two weeks the company has a fully documented Enterprise Architecture and has identified the processes that it needs to redesign to achieve its organizational transformation.-. |
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