Challenge
At a Federal Agency, the Enterprise Architecture (EA) program required consistent implementation throughout the Enterprise. A lack of understanding and awareness of the EA program complicated the issue. The Agency was challenged to meet the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) guidelines that require EA involvement in Capital Planning and Investment Control (CPIC). EA was not routinely included in IT infrastructure plans or investment discussions even though they retained pertinent information to ensure accurate IT investment decision making. The Agency’s tasked Galvan and Associates to assist and assure compliance, improve the visibility of the EA program, and ensure consistency with the Strategic vision for IT Investments.
Approach
Galvan and Associates worked with Agency executives to help IT bring more value through process efficiencies. The approach came from the enterprise perspective.
Galvan and Associates understood the importance of capturing the “As Is” architecture to develop the EA program. As such, Galvan and Associates analyzed the business functions at the Agency to capture the processes.
Galvan and Associates structured the fragmented processes across the Agency in the EA repository so that it is indicative of the As-Is environment. This transformed the Agency’s EA repository from one that lacked the capability to provide an integrated view of the organizations, systems, and applications into a reliable resource that can provide those views. Over 500 business functions and 340 applications were entered and validated in the Agency’s EA repository to identify redundancies and gaps in systems that support business functions.
Results
EA group became a strategic partner for the OCIO mission. The EA Governance clearly identified the roles and responsibilities of the stakeholders. EA guidance, principles, standards, and artifacts were defined and made accessible. A flow of information between the CPIC process and EA was created. Galvan and Associates developed and implemented a process at the Agency requiring EA review and approval at key milestones for an investment project.