What it’s Like to Work as an Enterprise Architect
Imagine there is a fleet of boats who are all supposed to be heading to a specific, magical island paradise called “Target State”. The King believes this island is where everyone’s hopes and dreams can be realized.
Imagine that each boat has a captain who thinks he knows the destination and how to get there, but in reality has no idea because the island is too far away and the navigation system is broken. So, the captains just focus on keeping the boats in the water and moving them forward; regardless of wether or not they’re pointed in the right direction.
Imagine also that the only mode of communication between boats is for someone to stand on the deck and yell at nearby boats, but some boats are so far from each other. that they don’t even know about each other’s existence.
Okay, now imagine you are in a helicopter that can fly high enough above the boats that you can see all of them and you can also see the magical island destination. You have a megaphone and you can fly down near enough to each boat to give the captain of that boat guidance. But sometimes while you are guiding the captain of a certain boat, the captain of another boat dies suddenly and is replaced with a new captain who doesn’t even know you exist and who decides the previous captain was all wrong. Also, there are some captains who either don’t believe you or just forget everything you said as soon as you fly to another boat.
You spend all your time verifying that the island is still where its supposed to be and that all the boats know what to do to get to there.
Sometimes, the King changes his mind and decides all boats need to go to a different island. So, you have to make sure to re-align all the boats.
That’s what it’s like to work as an Enterprise Architect.
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Bill Sourour is a professional Enterprise Architecture consultant; owner of Arcnovus Inc. and a most viewed writer in Enterprise Architecture on Quora.
