What is Enterprise Architecture Debt and how to manage it? (Part 3: Dynamics)

Previous part: Pathology

How are EA Debts evolving?

EAD of an organization is not a static concept. EAD items are created and resolved over time. We refer to the study of the typical behavior of EAD over time as the Dynamics of EAD. It reveals how EAD is created, changed, and could be managed when considered during a considerable period.

Although there is no known method for quantifying EAD for the time being, it appears to be useful for our study of the dynamics of EAD to describe changes in the hypothetical value of the total EAD of an organization over time by a 2-dimensional time graph.

The simplest conception of EAD dynamics could then be exhibited in the following diagram:

This conception of EAD is based of two wrong presuppositions:

a)???? The initial value of EAD is zero, for example at the moment of establishment of the organization.

b)???? The EAD value caused by an unaddressed changed event is a constant value over time, if it will be kept unmanaged.

The third myth about EAD dynamics comes into consideration when one believes that the EAD value could be reduced back to zero by a corrective action, as shown in the following figure.

To correct these misconceptions, we must keep in mind that

a)???? There is no organization with zero EAD, even right after its establishment,

b)???? No corrective action could reduce EAD at once, and

c)???? If there is no intervention, the EAD value tends to increase constantly.

Applying these facts makes a more realistic image of EAD dynamics:

In the absence of any corrective intervention, the EAD of the organization tends to increase, due to subsequent unaddressed change events, e.g. new strategy formulation without supportive capabilities, new business process definition without appropriate application services, etc. The constant increase in EAD finally raises it beyond the organization’s EAD Threshold, that is the level beyond which the organization could not handle its EAD properly and effectively, the “bankruptcy level of debt”! ?

To avoid exceeding the EAD threshold, it is necessary to do an architecture change cycle that lays down EAD to an acceptable level (definitely, not zero) by defining and performing corrective actions.

Since change events never stop happening, it is necessary to constantly monitor changes affecting the organization and the environment and to define and perform architecture correcting cycles.

This brings us to a smooth and continuous process of EAD-increasing changes and EAD-decreasing corrective actions over time. The overall goal of the EAD management process is to keep EAD at an acceptable level under the organization’s EAD threshold.

Next part: EA Debt Management and EA Cycles. (coming soon)