Differences between Business Context and Business Architecture

The concepts discussed in topic 6 are not particularly clear in many aspects.  Grasping the understanding of the differences between business context and business architecture proved challenging.  The articles by Gartner provided a definition of business context as providing a method to articulate the business strategy, while the business architecture is focused on producing the business dimension to enable the architecting of the business.

Simply put, business context is just that, a context for understanding the business strategy.  A context is essentially a way to provide the information so that it can effectively establish business value.  The business architecture is more involved in that it is used to validate the overall enterprise architecture and ensure the enterprise technology architecture is appropriate.

Gartner cautions that the terminology is an area where this discussion can easily become a problem and to prioritize that all groups are using the same terms and understand what they mean prior to having any meaningful discussions.

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Understanding Enterprise Business Architecture to Realize Your Future State

Gartner defines EBA as the part of the EA process that describes requirements, principles, and models the future state, the current state, and the guidance necessary to flexibly evolve and optimize business dimensions to achieve effective enterprise change.  The major dimensions of EBA include people, financials, organizational structures, and process.

In order to effectively realize a future state, Gartner recommends that it’s critical to understand where EBA fits into your overall EA efforts.  To be effective, the recommendation is to apply the same business context to EBA as would be applied to any other area or Enterprise Architecture viewpoint.  Starting with a broad approach to Enterprise Business Architecture can enable an understanding of the key dimensions more effectively (people, financials, organizational structures, processes).

Gartner is attempting to provide a framework for looking at EBA in the context of “how do we do business”, which will ultimately meet the goals of Enterprise Business Architecture.  The challenges with this discussion are making sure that the context is appropriate and the organization is properly aligned to understand the “business context”.

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The Essence of Business Architecture

One of the articles by William Ulrich provides a perspective on the essence of business architecture.  The industry definition of business architecture is a “blueprint of the enterprise that provides a common understanding of the organization and is used to align strategic objectives and tactical demands”.   This common understanding is valuable in that it provides a clear goal of business architecture and can enable a common “conversation” to understanding the goals and objectives of both business architecture and business architects.

The challenge of business architecture and this article is that the area of business architecture appears to be one that many organizations are likely to be prone to struggle.  The understanding of what should and should not be part of an EBA and how the EBA should be utilized successfully is still a challenging one.

Organizations that are attempting to pull together these conversations should either be committed organizationally with a complete EA function or be prepared to simplify some of the difficult conversations that this topic may be likely to create.