How bad is your enterprise condition?

I've compiled 10 questions that might help you to get an idea about your enterprise condition:

 

1)      Is your organization has any blueprint or matrix of all running systems, how they communicate one with each other and which technology they are using?

2)      Can you show me a matrix of professional user groups, their requirements and systems that address those requirements?

3)      Do you have mapping of all of your enterprise data, how data being grouped and by how data is being accessed?

4)      When you start a project do you have blueprint, which you have to follow, for the type of the application you up to start with?

5)      Is there a formal stage in the project life cycle were system architecture is being checked against the enterprise architecture.

6)      If you have any question or problem regarding architecture do you know whose job is to help you?

7)      Is there a clear list of all technological tools and services that your system might use or you can use whether technology you want?

8)      Do you have duplicate application or data?

9)      Is there a clear development methodology in your enterprise?

10)  Do you know of more then 10 technologies (development tools, operating systems, Databases, ERP tools, etc’) used in your organization?

 

9-10 : call me or leave me your contact details I WANT TO LEARN FROM YOU.

7-8 : I guess you are running EA for a while.

5-6 : you just start an enterprise architecture effort. Be aware from EA pitfalls so your effort will come to it end.

1-5 : read about Enterprise architecture. You need to go through such a process.

 

Published Thursday, January 27, 2005 11:07 PM by nattYGUR

Comments

# re: How bad is your enterprise condition?

Thursday, January 27, 2005 4:57 PM by Michal
I won't enclose my details because I don't want to lose my work, at least until I won't find another. But what I've seen in last 7 months at my current employer is so revolting, I just have to share.

My employer is the biggest software development company in my country. It lives mostly on governement contracts and on software for very big companies (in financial, insurance, energetics and similiar markets), often connected with governement. It employs about 2000 people, more than 1000 directly involved in production tasks.

My position is 'senior software developer' but I haven't written here a single line of production code yet. My tasks up to now are focused on 'product evaluation' - I have to try and analyze obscure application servers, integration platforms, accounting suites - it is called here 'research'.

But you know what? All technical decisions happen on higher management level. Developers are forced to use immature, buggy products for task, for which these products are not suitable. And those developers are in most cases completly clueless, so they even can't protest. My work is absoluely pointless, I have responsibility (!) to create presentations that will please the management idiot who has choosen that particular solution.

I have seen here probably the one and only solution where over 500KB reports in HTML are generated by batch processes on IBM mainframe and then uploaded by FTP to Windows machine where they are printed (using IE) and sent to customers. (Customers in this case are all people in my country - this process is used for generating error reports for statements in national social assurance system!)

I have seen 'integration solution' where SAP XI integration platform worth thousands of $$$ is used for sending 20-30 XML communicates a day. But these communicates are very special: they are based on standarised CIM, which makes a simple query with two parameters into 200 KB of XML. Why? Because 'we are serious company and we follow standards'. Yeah.

It is a serious company where nobody knows what he has to do.
It is a serious company where people are managed by clueless, technology-ignorant people employed because of family connections.
It is a serious company which cannot manage it's own network, which have 7 internal intranet sites, 3 un-synchronized internal phone books and where you have to ask fiend do they know somebody in company who knows particular products - because noone at higher level knows who knows what.
It is a serious company who hires an excellent .NET developer and gives him a job programming ABAP and developing Graphtalk solutions.
It is a serious company where a developer can be handed 10 CDs with installation of SAP Enterprise Portal and asked to 'check if it can be used to manage and flow 30 TB of documents a year'.

About your questions:

1. Is that supposed to be a joke? ;-)
2. Not in this year. And decade.
3. Data? You mean all those hunks of information in Lotus Notes databases, ASP.NET applications, legacy applications, in files on employees hard drives etc? You mean they can be grouped? Accessed - sure. If you know who you should ask, he or she probably will give you access. Without authorisation ;)
4. Another bad joke ;)
5. Formal stage? In project life cycle? Architecture? Enterprise architecture? I'd rather say that there are informal conversations about potential solution, imposed by management, where developers try to understand how to apply, let me think a good examle, a pencil for painting walls or a brush for signing a contract?
6. Yeah. It is mine job.
7. Yeah. It contains one product that particular manager heard about last week.
8. Duplicate, triplicate, any-licate you like.
9. Yeah. Hack & hide. Blame someone else. Get more money (governement always pays). Repeat process.
10. I could name more than 20 technologies used in my room where there are six of us.

The more I read about enterprise architecture, the more I think about it, the more I learn - the more I am wondering how it is possible for this company to exist and still make money. This company doesn't have a clue how to emply an enterprise architecture at its own ground, how can it bring success to its clients? Every few months there is a big media scandal about 'another project screwed by my company'. And it still gets new contracts. Makes me wonder - when you don't know WTF is going on, probably it is all about money. But this in turn makes me sad.

Can you learn from me?
Probably you can.
You can learn from me what company you should stay away from.

I'm seriously looking for a new job. It even can fall into 1-5 category. No, it is not a painful cry for a job - I almost have a very nice one - I'm discussing details at the moment. If it won't work, I will drop my current job anyway and go into freelance consulting. I have enough.

# re: How bad is your enterprise condition?

Thursday, January 27, 2005 5:25 PM by Michal
"where you have to ask fiend" - of course I meant "where you have to ask friends"

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