Mike Rosen becomes Part of the Architectural Thinking Association's Leadership Team!

I am Chief Scientist at Wilton Consulting Group, providing advice to IT and business leader and architects on using architecture for digital transformation and improved decision making. I’m also a Founding Member and VP of the Business Architecture Guild. Prior to returning to consulting, I was Global Research Vice President for Strategic Architecture at industry analyst firm IDC. I’ve worked with over 100 enterprises, from small to large, in numerous industries and 10 different countries to create transformation strategies, implement enterprise solutions and create or improve their architecture programs. I’m into my 40th years in IT as an advisor and technical leader architecting, designing, and developing software applications and products, including roles as CTO, chief architect, product architect, technical leader, and developer for commercial middleware products from IONA, BEA and Digital.

Why am I involved with Architectural Thinking?

Architecture is a critical aspect of enterprises today as they try to move forward in the new digital economy. But, architecture still suffers from the stereotype of “high level, not relevant, waste of time and money”, and in many (or perhaps most) cases, it is still organized and practiced in the ways that created and promoted that stereotype. For the past 15 years I have been saying that “creating architecture provides no value. Value is only realized when architecture is used to influence decisions”. So, as we shift our focus from architectural creation to architectural delivery in order to create actionable and defensible work products, we must also ensure and maintain architectural integrity and expand the value of architecture by continuously building a usable architectural knowledge base. This requires us to understand, preserve and apply important architecture principles in new ways. In other words, to think architecturally.

Some of the Things That I Do

• Published books in 1997, 2001, 2008
• Have a quarterly column on digital transformation on BPTrends.com
• Teach classes in Business Architecture, Enterprise Architecture, BizOps, and Digital Transformation
• Present at IRM’s Enterprise Architecture Conference, Business Architecture Innovation Summit, and BBC
• Adjunct Research Advisor on architecture for IDC
• Board of Directors of Business Architecture Guild and FEAPO (Federation of Enterprise Architecture Professional Organizations)
• Fractional CIO and Fractional Architect
• Ski, hike, climb