Setting up to succeed

It seems bleedingly obvious, but setting up to succeed is truly the most important thing, and something I have personally not paid enough attention to in the past. Whether that be because:

• I want to dive straight into problem solving,
• need to absorb so much information in a short space of time,
• or because I prefer the problem and technology aspects to the people side.

Understanding the people dynamics in an organisation is the only way you can help both the decision makers and the delivery teams make informed and impactful decisions.

Chapter 5 ‘Corporate Context’ of Technology Strategy Patterns by Eben Hewitt covers this topic
Chess and the Art of Enterprise Architecture Gerben Wierda talks of the failure of Enterprise Architecture most of which can be related back to Enterprise Architecture not knowing its place in the world and as such not setting up for success.

So what can we practically do to address some of the challenges, and how do we make sure that we are reminded to be aware?

Some simple tools and techniques we can leverage.

• Create a day 1 checklist
• Stakeholder motivation
• RACI
• organisation dynamics and reporting
• Stakeholder mapping centred on you and your role
• Manual of me
  

Understanding what your actual role and requirements are; not what it said on the job advert, letter of engagement etc.

Day 1 checklist

These can be useful to produce as you engage on different types of projects and activities and can help ground your thinking and take some of the stress out of starting a new piece of work.

• Define your context – who what why when
• Define the information you are likely to need
• Identify who in the organisation can provide this information
• What steps do you need to take

Context

• Who am I reporting to, what are their expectations?
• Who do they report to and are they aligned?
• Who reports to me and what are their motivations?
• What are the outputs expected from me or my team? are they SMART
• Who is the sponsor (follow the money) for the outcomes im responsible for

Information

Depending on your role and the context there could be various pieces of information required (I recommend creating templates for different types of engagement and points in the life cycle)

• Business Capability Map and/or Value Chain
• Is there an architecture view of the enterprise, when was it last updated
• Is there a CMDB, you can access? Is it linked to an architecture repository or tooling
• What is the current portfolio of initiatives and at what stage is each initiative
• Architecture decisions and other associated documentation
• Current IT assets and costs with projected spend
• Current budget for architecture who is the budget owner
• Are there existing Architecture Principles?

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