Think big, start small
To drive successful transformations with Enterprise Architecture (EA) as the foundation, it’s crucial to maintain a broad vision. However, achieving this vision often requires a series of smaller, manageable steps.
The guiding principle is: “Think big, start small.” Starting too ambitiously can overshadow the immediate benefits, as teams can easily become bogged down in technical details, losing sight of the strategic direction.
If you’ve explored digital transformation as a result of enterprise architecture, you may have noticed that the definition of digital transformation can vary.
More importantly, success heavily depends on how EA is implemented. High failure rates are common when EA is not managed effectively.
At the heart of a digital-first approach is imagination. To realise a truly digital architecture, we must move away from traditional paper-based or static models and embrace a dynamic, interactive system.
The journey starts with the most well-understood and high-impact use cases, then expands as we gain momentum.
The key to success is balance: think expansively about the possibilities, but take incremental, impactful steps to get there.
Get the order right
The acceleration of Enterprise Architecture needs to precede digital transformation to establish a solid understanding of dependencies, business architecture, governance, and risk.
Without managing structure and value, your digital transformation can become unnecessarily expensive.
By building your enterprise architecture business-centric and incrementally, you can accelerate digital transformation and reap benefits along the way rather than stockpiling them for the end. Viewing digital acceleration through the lens of enterprise architecture can offer several advantages from day one: better integration of tech with business, improved alignment between business and IT, increased transparency to risk and employees, and comprehensive documentation of the as-is state.
In practical terms, the “think big, start small” mentality for enterprise architecture simplifies delivery. The big picture is provided by the charter and practice-based enterprise architecture, but the “start small” is propelled by the short-cycle delivery of smaller improvements. It might not feel like much at first, but the effects are immediate: tasks become smoother, employees feel relieved, and results start to improve. Besides, understanding all the architectural improvements justifies what you want to develop and helps integrate architecture review processes into business processes. Planning and designing bigger processes without some agile iteration from short-cycle delivery steps to the next is often difficult.
There are many frameworks to choose from in the world of enterprise architecture, but the simple advice is to get the overall ambition and think big, look a few years ahead, and then outline a short-cycle approach for onboarding new use cases, people, and processes to enable faster digital transformation.
To accelerate digital governance and enterprise architecture, follow these five steps:
- Plan Ahead: Begin your journey at the most convenient spot. Once the bigger perspectives are identified, find a convenient use case for the first improvements that can make an immediate difference. Identify the future operating model and the first task is to pinpoint those spots.
- Align Modern Tooling with Approach: Embrace new technologies and involve your team in the process. Different roles should staff the core change team. Instead of defending old approaches, look for modern and responsive tooling that can scale governance and processes. Ensure that your development iterations align with tooling to avoid obstacles to getting work done faster.
- Don’t Rush Design & Development: Stakeholders may want innovation integrated quickly, but it requires dialogue and discussions about who will update the information. If no one will keep the information updated after going live, leave it out. Ensure there is ample time for design and development before configuring to ensure scalability post-build. Embrace the future way of working and don’t rush the design phase.
- Learn from Others: Digital acceleration is an iterative process and often similar across companies. Use technologies that are continuously updated and upgraded with better functionality. Many enterprise architecture functions don’t compete in the market, so adopting common practices can make the process faster, simpler, and cheaper. Don’t try to reinvent EA by yourself—learn from others; or learn it via us:)
- Think Big, Start Small: Digital acceleration of enterprise architecture is essential. Keep an eye on the big picture and align internally on the role you take. Plan and collaborate to lower risk, manage processes and applications, and solve IT-to-business alignment. Adopt existing practices and start small to focus on onboarding and delivery.
The main takeaway is that digital collaboration in enterprise architecture is similar everywhere, but to accelerate it, start with many smaller increments where more users benefit from the architecture in every sprint.
Embracing this mentality will bring you closer to successful digital acceleration and enable digital transformation as an outcome of enterprise architecture. We can guide you in practice, tool choice, and help you scale enterprise architecture.
Let’s connect if you require assistance in converting from a low-maturity into a future-oriented data-driven architecture practice. Book your free advisory session here.
