Outsourcing of Enterprise Architecture functions.. 2008 Survey findings
- Mohan Babu K (cross posted from the Managing Offshore IT blog)
During the past few weeks I got involved in an interesting activity: analysis and review of responses to the 2008 Enterprise Architecture survey that Infosys has been conducting annually for the past few years.
This year, we invited technology leaders from our client base and the global IT community to participate. 207 respondents from a cross-section of industry verticals, geographies and organizational sizes completed a web questionnaire of 24 detailed questions. A preliminary analysis of the results indicates a few trends, including:
- Enterprise Architecture is enabling business transformation [Does this surprise me?]
- EA practices continue to mature with increasing use of metrics and processes [Again no surprises on this front]
- Outsourcing of activities focused at Enterprise Architecture is an opportunity that most EA teams have not seriously considered [Now, this is interesting]
Among the new thread in this year’s survey were questions centered on Outsourcing of Enterprise Architecture functions. If you really must know, the reason for this dipstick is obvious: the debate over outsourcing and offshoring of IT functions is moot since organizations across the spectrum are already working with vendors from across the globe. However, niche areas like Enterprise Architecture are perhaps behind the curve –compared to other areas -- when it comes sourcing. This is an area I had also briefly touched on in my Book.
My colleagues and I brainstormed on the findings. One school of thought was that though the findings were surprising, we shouldn’t emphasize the discovery on Outsourcing since it may be perceived as trying to interpret data to fit our business model. I can see an argument here: we are a software service firm and our business model does centre on outsourcing and offshoring. On the other side, people like our practice lead in Europe, Sohel Aziz were equally vocal on why we should publish the finding. Sohel argued 'some of the data does indicate that organizations are not thinking of outsourcing elements of EA. If we go back 5 years, we were not thinking of outsourcing testing…now it is one of the fastest growing IT segments globally. Back then IT orgs thought they needed to do all this in-house too…. I see an opportunity to take the tactical elements of EA (such as solution architecture governance) and technology R&D out of the picture and getting that as a pay-as-you-go service. So that the EA’s spend more time on the REALLY important stuff such a business engagement.” I couldn’t have summarized it better.
For those interested, here’s a plug: My colleagues from Europe plan to be at the Gartner Enterprise Architecture Summit next week. Copies of the summary of the survey [“Enterprise Architecture Expands its Role in Strategic Transformation”] will be available at the summit. The more detailed analysis of the finding will be published online soon
Comments
Mohan and Sohel -
Having been in the EA space for roughly last 10 years, I definitely agree with the hunch for an outsourcing opportunity.
EA is an activity that occurs in organisations on an erratic basis - with little funding. This is a perfect case for not being the core business. All decision making on the basis of EA will still be done by organisations. There will need to be a great emphasis on integrity and transparency - just as in the case of testing!
Agree fully!
Rajeev
Posted by: Rajeev Arora | November 24, 2008 02:44 AM