Power, Process, Project, People - Force Three

I will now continue with my series about Power, Process, Project and People. After touching Power and Process. The next thing I will now explore is Project and to once again repeat the definition of the Oxford Dictionaries: An individual or collaborative enterprise that is carefully planned to achieve a particular aim. There is plenty of material available in various forms defining and framing project management and project as such, but for the moment I stick to this very simple definition.

To change and move one organization from one state into another projects are the most common approach to achieve that transition. In most cases they have a more or less well defined goal which the project aims for. Each and every project is constrained by various aspects (the most famous representation of these constraints is the iron project triangle, which I might return to). Besides the positive effect of moving the organization any given project also carries some negative side effects, because the organizational change the projects cause are changing the basis for the people who are used to work in that context. Professional Change Management approaches try to cover up for that, but it is not always the most easy thing to be successful with.

So how do I utilize GLUE with respect to this? First of all I use the GLUE Divisions:

 

1. Destinations looks at To-Be
2. Discovery looks at the Transition between As-Is and To-Be
3. Defence looks at As-Is

Then I use an adaption of Tom Graves SCAN Framework:

1. EPIC SCAN for Defence
2. WISE SCAN for Destination
3. PACE SCAN for Discovery

And then I analyze the flow of information through the GLUE SPACE with a special focus on the information flow between the GLUE Divisions by adding the GLUE Disciplines and GLUE Decks.

Actually all information which is floating through the GLUE circulatory system belongs to at least one project with the aim to somehow transform the organization. Being a part of the project in one way or the other, somehow related to and working myself deeply inside some of them does to the trick. Getting engaged and walking the talking helps to secure that a given project is moving from As-Is to To-Be in the right speed. The closer I stay to the project the more easy I achieve the goal, but of course there is also ways in securing that others can fulfil the very same role. This is also achieved by transforming them via the GLUE Divisions from one architectural (mental) state to the other. And again the easiest and most successful way for me always was to walk the talk and lead by example and not by documents and orders.

Power, Process, Project, People - Force Two

Recently I have started a series about Power, Process, Project and People. After I have touched Power, I now like to reflect a bit on Process and what I am doing with processes in my daily Enterprise Architecture work. Just to repeat the definition from the Oxford Dictionaries: A systematic series of mechanized or chemical operations that are performed in order to produce something. There of course exist way more definitions to frame what a process is, but I stick to this fairly simple definition.

 

Processes are found a lot in organizations when there are attempts to reuse a successful approach. In most cases they are somehow standardized and formalized by some form of documentation, be it very document centric or a more modern approach by using a business process management suite. Typically the structure of the information is Input > Process > Output with Roles and Responsibilities on the Process and references to other processes. It typically forces People to spin faster and faster and faster (work harder, not smarter) over time, because the Process Performance Indicators are supposed to increase year after year. Every now and then there usually is a massive process restructuring which allows to work smarter (or more accurate aligns Process to more or less strictly follow Power. Quite often process changes (no matter if it work harder or work smarter) lead to massive problems, especially if the people are forgotten in the process change.

So what am I doing with support of GLUE? First of all I am using the GLUE Disciplines to formulate a basic Process.

 

In the combination with the GLUE Decks and the GLUE Divisions the Disciplines form the GLUE Space. In that GLUE Space the flow of the Disciplines leads to the circulatory system.

When I now look at any given change initiative I analyze how it fits into the GLUE circulatory system and my main focus is to secure that the information circles as fast as possible through the whole system to secure that information is available to everyone involved and can be interpreted and transformed  therefore by everyone. The more it is a circulatory system the better, the more it is a one way road the worse. The product of this circulatory system is by that defined by all involved stakeholders and not just pushed (by power) down to the system or emerged pure to no other choice.

The main reason why I work like this is lies in the nature of the problems I work with. For really simple problems there might be one perfect answer, but in most cases the complexity prevents this: neither the problem at hand is truly simple nor the solution selected can be perfectly simple. A very simple approach would be to package one solution and implement it (or sell it) unchanged as often as possible. By not looking at the greater context this is indeed an approach which makes sense (and most likely generates quite some money). The damage created by this approach is quite often very high, even though due to the friction it also generates quite some innovative ideas (by accident). As always it is a matter of perspective. I do not know where this will lead me to in the future, but at the moment I mainly focus on people. For whatever reason it is the approach with the greatest rate of success so far, even though I constantly try other approaches, nothing has ever been close to beat my current approach. Collaboration with (many) others is by far the best tool for me.

As always comments more than welcome.

No Power for Enterprise Architects

Some time ago I have written about The Enterprise Architecture Matrix, where I used a small sequence from the movie Matrix to explain my line of thinking for Enterprise Architecture. This time I use the scene from Lord Of The Ring where Frodo is looking into Galadriels mirror to see the future.But see yourself:



Frodo is the Solution Architect, who is trying to solve a problem at hand and Galadriel is the Enterprise Architect(EA) who provides the Solution Architect (SA) with tools (the mirror) and advice.
 
The Enterprise sleeps, and when the Enterprise Architect explains, only the Solution Architect listens.

EA : "Will you look into the mirror?"
SA : "What will I see?"
EA : "Not even the wisest can say, for the mirror shows many things. Things that are, things that were, and some things that have not yet come to pass."

SA looks into the mirror, and sees Legolas, Merry and Pippin, then Sam. The Shire as it was, then the Shire ravaged, overrun with orcs, and Sam in chains.



Then the Eye appears, and the Task grows heavier, trying to pull itself down into the mirror. SA snatches it away, falls backward onto the ground.

EA : "I know what it is you have seen, for it is also in my mind. It is what will come to pass if you should fail. The Fellowship is breaking. Already it has begun. He will try to take the ring. You know of whom I speak. One by one, it will destroy them all."

SA : 'If you ask it of me, I will give you the One Task.'



EA : "You offer it to me freely. I do not deny that my heart has greatly desired this."
A dark light comes over her as she touches the power of the Task.
EA : "Instead of a Dark Lord, you would have a queen, not dark but beautiful and terrible as the dawn! Tempestuous as the sea, and stronger than the foundations of the earth! All shall love me and despair!"




EA backs away from the Task, ut for a moment, she looks old, and it seems to bring her no joy to have done the right thing.
EA : "I passed the test. I will diminish, and go into the west, and remain Galadriel."




SA : "I cannot do this alone."




EA : "You are a Ringbearer, Frodo. To bear a architecture task is to be alone. This task was appointed to you, and if you do not find a way, no one will."




Frodo : "Then, I know what I must do. It's just I am afraid to do it."
Galadriel : "Even the smallest person can change the course of the future."

I try to allow all ideas to influence my thinking about Enterprise Architecture. Sometimes it works perfect, sometimes not at all, but I truly hope that I try. I personally believe that an Enterprise Architect should stay away from the power and if he decides to take the power stay away from Enterprise Architecture. There is a high risk that an Enterprise Architect with power abuses that to build just another empire no-one needs. Instead of building this empire focus on repair GLUE Diseases and fix the flows in the GLUE Circulatory System.

 

Feedback as always more than welcome.

Power, Process, Project, People - Force One

In my last post I have started a series about Power, Process, Project and People. In this post I like to reflect a bit on power and what I am doing with respect to power in my daily Enterprise Architecture life. Just to repeat the definition from the Oxford Dictionaries: Power is the ability or official capacity to exercise control; authority. There is of course a lot of other definitions or deeper explanations of this concept. As a starter I recommend to read the Manifesto reference-sheet from power and response-ability from Tom Graves. For simplicity reasons I here stick to the very simple above mentioned Oxford Dictionaries definition.

Power is most obviously found in organizations by just looking at the organizational chart. In most cases it is formed like a pyramid with one on the top and some below, which have each some below them again. This can potentially be a very high structure (e.g. CEO > CxO Board > Divisions > Departments > Groups > Employees), even though there is some companies who run a flat hierarchy. In most cases these structures are self defending (GLUE Division Defence). It is very uncommon to see an Employee who has a higher salary than his manager. Also concepts like a technical career path typically only worsen the situation, because now the employees themselves are organized in a pyramid. And it can all be summed up by the concept of Julius Caesar: Divide and Conquer, which I have used to introduce the concept of the GLUE Domains. What I observe most it that it is limiting and framing people into something way smaller than they could be.

The typical advice I hear and read in various Enterprise Architecture Frameworks (e.g. TOGAF 9) is to place Enterprise Architecture in the governance structure close to the CxO level, preferable reporting direct to the CIO (Enterprise IT Architecture) or to the CEO (Enterprise Architecture). There is also the idea to put it below the CMO (?Enterprise Marketing Architecture?). Even though I have seen a lot of value created at that level I also see a fair amount of disconnect to the employee level and Ivory tower behaviour. The balance between strategy, tactics and operational work is not always easy to keep. And if an Enterprise Architect works only in his power structure then the result will be biased towards exactly that structure, heavily influenced and by that imbalanced due to only staying inside the frames given by it.

So what am I doing different? I am actually using the GLUE Domains in the GLUE Space to identify and map the power structures. The amount of GLUE Decks very  much depends on the context. For the blog I use four to explain the concept, but it can easily go way higher (or lower).

Typically these Domains are in conflict with each other with respect to Roles and Responsibilities. For example the responsibility of an Application Owner in the processes of Application Lifecycle Management who owns every aspect of his Application:

And Test Execution, which is typically owned by Test Management. Here two Empires are potentially in conflict.

The (theoretically) simple answer for Enterprise Architecture is now to work close to the decision makers (in this case most likely the CIO) and guide the CIO to take the right decisions. The basic (and I think wrong) assumption behind that is, that the CIO decides and forces it in. Following the basic idea of the power then this is indeed the case and especially and heavy command & control liking environments there is a high likelihood that  this will indeed be forced in, because the managers on those structures want to know everything what their people know. I personally believe that this is in most cases causing more damage than it is repairing, therefore I do work different. (Seth Godin touches this problem in his post destabilizing the bullying power structure.

I do not need only a strong connection to the decision makers, but I do need to be connected also to the lower levels of the organization. Therefore no framework and no formal governance is enabling me to be an enterprise architect, but knowing that I am one helps a lot! So instead of relying on pure power structures I go to the people who have the conflict and challenges at hand, and then I am doing Enterprise Architecture work by helping them to connect to the holistic Enterprise (repairing GLUE Diseases), no matter how deep or high they are on the ladder of power. That of course requires that I have to earn trust first, which is most easily achieved by walking the talking, especially when the advice is beyond the scope of the power structure.

Feedback as always more than welcome.

Power, Process, Project, People

I keep writing about People, because I strongly believe that in the end the only thing which really matters is people, like in the Agile Manifesto: Individuals and Interactions over Processes and Tools.

In the past days I have seen plenty of interesting posts putting various concepts in the focus. One caught my attention and is very much worth to read:

RT @davidsprott: The shape of the next generation EA framework. t.co/dolaKQtb #CIO #ecosystem #services #entarch
— Tom Graves (@tetradian) 18. Februar 2013

This post followed some back and forth twittering and it was a very enjoyable discussion. It triggered some thinking I wanted to reflect already for a while, because every now and then I see an interesting tendency to market something as the one and only way on how to look at the world or solutions, be it IT or non IT.

Coming back to people I want to reflect on three forces especially which I observe every day and what I do to work with them or what I see in the typical Enterprise Architecture approaches. The three forces are (for each one definition from Oxford Dictionaries):

• Power - The ability or official capacity to exercise control; authority.
• Project - An individual or collaborative enterprise that is carefully planned to achieve a particular aim.
• Process - A systematic series of mechanized or chemical operations that are performed in order to produce something. 

The definition of process and project is sometimes confusing if compared, so for simplification I typically differentiate by using project in the context of unique deliveries and process if the deliveries are repeatable. These three forces have a different effect on people, and each and every person has a different opinion what type of force he prefers, but in typical organizations all three forces exist in co-existence and influence each other. The key to all these three powers in the end is the People though and interesting enough they get quite often forgotten.

This is only the first post in a series, otherwise it is getting too long. The next post will be about power. If you have any input to give straight away then I am happy to read or hear from you.

Enterprise Life Forms

In my last post "Details vs Context" I have touched the challenge to find the right balance between getting lost in the details and getting lost in the context. The frequent readers of my blog should by now know that my personal take on Enterprise Architecture is very much focusing on people without blending out the building blocks of the flow:

An interesting and relevant observation of mine is now that each and every company has its very own soul, the true essence of that company. Of course on the surface they all (at least the big ones) seem to have the same functions, same processes, same good practices applied, but if you just manage to see one level deeper it all of a sudden is total different between the companies and has its very own beauty. The soul of a company has some aspects which seem to be generic patterns:

• It is deeply rooted in the old guard people (GLUE Defence).
• New people sooner or later tend to adopt to it.
• It is embedded in the structural, process, project and especially in the informal organization.
• It can not be easily changed.
• It has self healing effects which protect the system against damages inflicted by external sources or careless management / leadership attempts and forces the whole environment back into the pre-change attempt.

One of the first things when I work in or with a company for  me is to try to identify the soul of it. Because it seems to be unique and very special. I have not seen two different companies with an identical soul and that is actually something which I personally find very interesting and relevant to create fit-to-purpose architectures, not to mention that the soul of the company has its very own unique beauty which is as far as I see it worth to be protected.

Details vs Context

In my last post I was writing about walking the talking, which is based on my experience one of the key elements for success. Some time ago I have written about the need to remember the larger context which is also reflected in my WISE SCAN post (E stands for Environment). So it is essential to connect a solution in the context to secure sustainable success and not rely on random luck. The saying: "To not see the wood for the trees" is also based on that line of thinking.

The interesting challenge now is to not get lost in the greater context and by that forgetting to chop the trees. I have seen many Enterprise Architects loosing contact to reality and connecting literally everything to a problem or solution at hand but totally forgot to deliver the solution. The intellectual discussion with them was actually truly great and I learned a lot (this happened many many times), but pity enough it wasn't very relevant.
I believe it carries the very same danger to not deliver than getting lost in the details, but does contain an additional problem. Those who get lost in the context loose credit due to not delivering, while those who get lost in the details are typically valued for their great knowledge, but questioned about their communication skills.

So my advice (and I try to live up to that every day) is: deliver while connecting, connect while delivering. Don't think something fully through, but connect it good enough. Fail often and fail fast. And secure that the whole environment is setup to support that. If not, then fix the information flow, fix the GLUE Circulatory Flow, so that information flows free, is easy accessible, enriched fast and supports collision of ideas.

And in most cases the answer lies in the people who are operating in the GLUE Circulatory System. They are the elements which needs to be worked on to secure information flow. Technology can be a catalyzer or facilitator but is typically not the key element to secure optimal information flow. Balancing details and context is an ongoing challenging task which mainly operates on people and their ability to connect details with context. Various Enterprise Architecture tools help here a lot, but what is most successful is finding the right words for the right people to connect the details and the context via an emotional holistic story touching all senses. Tough one, but there is moments of perfect flow in life. And those moments are the reason why I deeply love my job.