The Digital Economy has radically challenged the traditional notion of Enterprise Architecture, Total Cost of Ownership, ROI and business cases. Just like the business that IT enables, the traditional “Plan, Build, Run” view of an established IT shop has been disrupted and it is for the right reasons. In the Digital Economy, technology doesn’t just support business operations, it enables the business operations. So this means that all of business disruptors and challenges directly impact of the IT capabilities.
The Digital drivers can be summarised as:
Disruptive Competition - Industry after industry has seen a digital disruptive startup challengers that are not encumbered with overheads of an established business. These new competitors are lean a fast moving with a culture that is more receptive of change. The take out for an established business is:
“Be braver and not afraid of change”
User Experience - Competing with established business means that means that a superior user experience for customer, staff and partners and the associated productivity gains will often tie breaker. What does this mean for technology?
Capability Focused - Digital Disruptors focus on the opportunity they are trying to solve and aren’t burdened with inevitable bloat of an established business. This means that they are expert at making use of other managed services and are able to concentrate efforts on automating and improving customer experience and value.
Analytics Data Driven Decisions - A highly automated and integrated digital business is also able to collect and make use of the plethora of information available from its own systems and numerous connected data sources. Utilising machine learning and specialist analytical services enrich the customer’s experience by allowing better promotions and predictive user experience.
Automation & Agility - A digital enabled business automates business processes and promotes business agility through enabled services. Modern user interfaces benefit from the easier to adapt user experience, Agile delivery practices and “test and learn” philosophies.
In response to the digital drivers, a generic technology strategy for Digital can be proposed.
Focus on User Experience
For Customers and Partners - Understand you users and what relationship they have with you. The more you know about a user, the better the experience you can present. Establish a strong identity capability which can be extended with context information, collected and derived.
Establish a user centric channel approach where cross channel technologies, seamless experience and constant measurement via labs a surveys are the norm. Establish a channel architecture based on “Mobile First” (The predominant client device) and responsive design, APIs and light weight UI frameworks. Releasing the first channel application will establish a library of APIs that accelerate the delivery of subsequence online digital channels such as online web and IVR allow call deflection.
For Staff - Enable BYOD and business mobility as a productivity aide. The modern smart workplace allows a staff member to collaborate and from more places more often.
Use Data and Analytics to enrich the decision making processes in the business. Used derived information to control campaigns, next best action and measure business performance.
Business Capability Aligned (APIs)
Technology solutions should be based on the business capabilities that bring in the income. A mature business architecture will provide a ready made catalogue of APIs and services that will aide business agility when delivering differentiated experience. For all of the supporting and common services, look for SaaS provided capability to allow the business to stay focussed on the core capabilities.
Lean Governance & DEVOPS
The pace of IT delivery needs to match the change demands of the overall business as the technology and business capability are one in the same in the Digital Economy. Speed up delivery by implementing Lean Governance, Pipeline Management and Agile delivery techniques. Challenge tradition delivery models by establishing a “Rapid” team with the sole purpose of delivery business capability in weeks, not months. Use modern light technology stacks such as full stack Javascript along with automated deployment tooling to reduce the time to deployment.
Govern initiatives against IT solution blueprints and platform roadmaps using Technical Debt as a tool to allow fast paced delivery and ongoing improvement. Refine blueprints and platform roadmaps as part of the delivery process harvesting emergent design as appropriate. Empower teams to innovate whilst maintaining architectural and design authority as part of the governance model.
Switch to a Consumption Model
On premise deployments and fixed term licensing models provide a significant impediment to changing technology and platforms as the business evolves. A consumption model provides opportunity to switch technologies and solutions as better solutions are encountered. Cost penalties with cutting short an agreement are often significant blockers to making technology platform changes and a consumption allows a more efficient way of allocating the costs associated with business operations.
Reduce TCO by leveraging Cloud Services
A SDDC (Software Defined Data Centre) is a reality with high speed connectivity and Cloud Service Providers. The concept of a zero or near to zero footprint is a reality with consumption based SaaS, PaaS and IaaS services. Cost of ownership grows and shrinks in line with the compute and network requirements.
Be Secure by Design
Modern security policies have adapted to fit a technology landscape that spans multiple cloud service providers. Understanding of the information and assets you need to protect dictates the controls applied at the perimeter and incorporated into the API layer as it is developed.