What's your definition of business architecture?  Here's ours:^[1]

a structural representation of a business solution as it relates to creating business value and achieving business goals

We think that business architecture always involves some amount (often pervasive) of organizational transformation, even to the point of building a completely new business solution from scratch.  Since organizational transformation is inevitable, there's really no need to mention it in the definition.

Like most practitioners, by 'business architecture' we mean a blueprint.

Actually, blueprint doesn't completely align with the dictionary definitions of architecture.^[2]  You can take your pick from the alternatives in the following table, but not one of them refers directly to a representation of something being built.

Dictionary Definition	Topical Focus	Definition
1	art and science	the art or practice of designing and building structures … in accordance with principles determined by aesthetic and practical or material considerations
2	structure	formation or construction whether the result of conscious act or of growth or of random disposition of the parts … e.g., architecture and function of the cerebral cortex
3	specific result	instance of the exercise of the art or science of architecture … architectural product: architectural work … e.g., the mansions which comprise the entire architecture of the Square
4	method or style	a method or style of building characterized by certain peculiarities of structure …

The first definition in the table highlights principles.  Any viable approach to business architecture must enumerate its principles and adhere to them closely.  That's not just so much talk.  The approach must provide proper thinking tools so that you can consistently act in accordance with the principles.

Do most current approaches to business architecture provide such thinking tools?  I think not.  If they did, they would feature:^[3]

• Business policies (in the context of business strategy), business rules, and decision engineering.  Those things represent the intellect of the organization and the fundamental answer for the question why.


• A carefully-factored approach whose component models cover each of the facets needed to communicate effectively with all the different audiences engaged with, or affected by, a business solution.

The third definition in the table refers to architecture as an art or science.  That's what architecture students go to universities to learn, and what professional architects practice daily.  Who today really thinks of business architecture as an art or science?  It should be — and it probably will be eventually — but I don't think we're really even close.

Let's face it.  Many techniques currently offered for 'business architecture' aren't even really about the business.  They're about — what else — IT's view of the business.  That's definitely not business architecture.

What should business architecture be about?  Architect can also be used as a verb (from the dictionary, to plan and contrive as an architect).  Too bad "architecting" doesn't roll off the tongue as easily as "designing" or "modeling."  After all, architecting business solutions is exactly what business architects should be doing daily.

For further information, please visit BRSolutions.com      

References

[1]  From the newly-released second edition of our book Building Business Solutions:  Business Analysis with Business Rules (by Ronald G. Ross and Gladys S.W. Lam), 2015.  http://www.brsolutions.com/b_building_business_solutions.php  

[2]  Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary  

[3]  These are the two basic principles of BABusinessSpeak™, the Business Rule Solutions, LLC (BRS) methodology for (a) creating a business architecture to model a business capability, and (b) producing business requirements.  BABusinessSpeak is comprehensively detailed in the newly-released second edition of our book Building Business Solutions:  Business Analysis with Business Rules.  

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