Resource Library

This installment of StraightTalk kicks off a series on how business architecture can help an organization prepare for, respond to, recover from and build resilience for the unexpected. It's focus is on enabling response to a major incident.

What is business architecture really about? And why can it be so hard for others to understand its value and see what business architects see? This installment of StraightTalk aims to provide some context for what happens to many of us on a daily basis and why. The ideas shared here are just a start and should be considered as the beginning of a conversation for us to come together around messaging and a movement that can help fuel the adoption of business architecture.

Leveraging business architecture for prioritizing, scoping, shaping, sequencing, informing and rationalizing initiatives is one of the most common – and powerful – uses of business architecture. Smart initiative planning is critical to effective strategy execution, and leveraging business architecture for it inherently shifts mindsets in new ways that consider the bigger picture for the enterprise both now and in the future. In this installment of StraightTalk, we will explore just a few different ways in which business architecture can be leveraged for initiative planning.

In this installment of StraightTalk, we’re going to explore a sometimes overlooked but all-important domain for the business architecture baseline: stakeholders. Stakeholder mapping techniques came on the scene and matured a bit later than some of the others, so it’s a good time to revisit them and their valuable role in the business architecture.

This installment of StraightTalk explores how business architecture can be used as a framework to help us achieve goals for sustainability and doing good for people and the planet.

Silos are in many ways just inherently human, but unchecked, they can become detrimental to an organization’s success. Business architecture is uniquely qualified to break down and bridge silos, as this installment explores.

This installment of StraightTalk explores the concept of life architecture – which is all about bringing structure and intention to our own lives and personal improvement – inspired by an amazing human story.

This installment of StraightTalk describes what servant leadership is, why it is so important, and how servant-leader characteristics can help business architects to become more successful.

As we’re nearing the end of another trip around the sun, it’s a good time to reflect on our global business architecture community, the discipline and to look forward and dream. This installment of StraightTalk provides some food for thought as you do your own reflections, both individually as well as perhaps with your internal business architecture team and even your local community.

As a newer role on the scene, working in a business world ubiquitous with design, digital, agile and other emerging concepts, the way we show up as business architects matters a lot. Because everything we do and say demonstrates to others what business architecture really is, and we need to be relevant and distinguish ourselves. The success of a business architect then is not just in what we know or what we do — but in our Ways of Working (WOWs), which this installment of StraightTalk explores.

In order to compete and operate effectively, an organization must have clarity on who their customers are and what products they offer – and this must be consistently understood by every person so they know who they are serving and how they fit within the bigger picture. An organization’s business architecture is front and center to providing this clarity, which is what we explore throughout this installment of StraightTalk.

This installment of StraightTalk explores the topic of digital readiness: what it is, how we measure it, how we get there – and how business architecture can accelerate that journey.