The Enterprise Architecture Practitioners' Conference at Lisbon was a conference
organized by enterprise architecture practitioners, for enterprise architecture practitioners, and for those
directly involved in the management and oversight of enterprise
architecture.
In it, members of The Open Group and non-members alike came together to share insights and perspectives on
best practices in enterprise architecture, and the key issues and challenges that
enterprise architects, and executives overseeing
enterprise architecture, face
today.
Summary
The conference underlined the continuing role of The Open Group Architecture Forum in providing a
truly global forum in which Enterprise Architects from all sectors of the industry can come
together to discuss best practice in Enterprise Architecture, hone their skills,
find new ways to solve problems, share experiences, and learn from each other.
The agenda for this Enterprise Architecture Practitioners' Conference covered
72 individual presentations, structured into a plenary, plus ten streams across up to
four parallel
tracks.
The event provided a wealth of current case study and tutorial material,
summarized below.
The presentations referenced below are freely available only to
members of The Open Group and conference attendees. A Proceedings CD-ROM
containing all
the presentations made available at the Lisbon Enterprise Architecture Practitioners
Conference is available for purchase by members and
non-members alike.
Day 1: Conference Plenary
The conference plenary - which featured a number of important
presentations - focused on the use of enterprise architecture
for the effective support of business innovation and the creation of real
business value.
Plenary#1: Enterprise Architecture as the Key to Business Innovation
Welcome Address Allen Brown, President & CEO, The Open Group
Enterprise Architecture as the Key to Business Innovation Sam Ceccola, Deputy CTO, Office of the CTO, BEA Systems, Inc. Sam
delivered the keynote
address, where he discussed the convergence of enterprise architecture
and SOA in leading the way to business innovation. He presented
an Enterprise Architecture and SOA lifecycle model, explaining how
this kind of EA/SOA convergence is required to drive down IT
maintenance costs and enable innovation.
Enterprise Architecture @ Sonaecom Dr. Luís Filipe Reis, Executive Director & COO, Sonaecom Dr. Reis presented a case study on how his company is leveraging an
enterprise architecture to align IT systems with business goals and strategies.
As a result of Sonaecom’s cutting- edge EA initiative, the company
has simplified its IT organization, enabled faster attention to
customers, and improved overall operational efficiency.
Using Enterprise Architecture to Exploit Constraints and Enable
Innovation Terence Blevins, Branch Chief & Lead Architect, Air Force
Operational Support Enterprise Architecture, The MITRE Corporation Terrydelivered a
compelling presentation on the “Architecture” of enterprise
architecture. He outlined the why's, what's, who's, and how's
of EA, stating that an understanding of all four is critical to
getting the most from your organization’s enterprise architecture.
He also discussed the importance of re-using architecture principles
and keeping track of your EA successes.
Plenary#2: Future Technology and Enterprise Architecture - Agent
Technologies
The Boundaryless Enterprise Peter Evans-Greenwood, CTO, Capgemini (Australia) Petergave the
first of two presentations on the theme of "Agent
Technologies". Peter's presentation showed how an
“automate, extend, network” approach to enterprise architecture is
required to achieve real-time business planning and
decision-making.
Smart Automation: Extending the Reach of the SOA Platform Fergal Somers, Chief Product Architect, Capeclear Fergal
discussed how smart automation can be used to extend the reach of your
organization’s SOA platform. He highlighted three steps to
building a smarter SOA: build smarter services; put humans in the SOA
loop; and take humans out of the loop. Both Peter Evans- Greenwood and
Fergal Somers advocated the use of Agent Technologies in achieving a more
agile enterprise.
Plenary#3: Evolving the Architecture Discipline in-line with Business
Demands
The Role of EA in Organizational Governance and Self Awareness Dr. Jose Tribolet, Professor of Information Systems, Instituto
Superior Tecnico (IST), Technical University of Lisbon (Portugal) and
President, Institute for Computers and Systems Engineering (INESC) Dr. Tribolet gave a lively presentation in which he
discussed the role of EA in “organizational governance and
self-awareness”, and how the availability of real-time information
and human communication affect information design.
Enterprise Architecture in Public Administration: Time and
Space Challenges Luis Vidigal, Instituto de Informatica do Minstério de
Financas (Portugal) Luispresented on the unique complexities involved
with EA within government. He explained that these different
challenges stem from the fact that enterprises live under a single
brand, whereas public administration supports multiple brands.
Maximizing Enterprise Architecture for High Performance Leif Arne Rones, Enterprise Architecture Lead for EMEA,
Accenture Leifpresented on maximizing enterprise architecture for
high performance. In his presentation, he examined the
characteristics of IT within repeatedly, high-performance businesses
– not surprisingly, “standardized IT” was atop his list of
success criteria.
Closing Address Allen Brown, President & CEO, The Open Group
The conference streams at Lisbon provided experience-based insight into the approaches and
methods that have proved most effective for developing architectures around the
world.
The various conference streams delivered innovative viewpoints,
practical insights, and case study presentations by a diverse range of EA
professionals from both vendor and customer organizations.
These streams took a highly practical, hands-on approach, combining presentations and
discussions on best practices with interactive workshops, case study reviews, and
demonstrations of the latest tools.
Moderated Discussion: Standards Directions for SOA Moderated discussion on what is needed from consortia and
standards bodies to enable optimum development of SOA.
How Organizations Deliver an Actionable Enterprise Architecture
through the Pragmatic Application of TOGAF Alan Burnett, Director of EA Professional Services EMEA,
Telelogic (UK)
Discussion: Semantic Interoperability and the UDEF
Outputs
The presentations, tutorials, and workshops at the meeting, and the associated
discussions and panel sessions, all provided participants with a wealth of
experience-based insight into current best practice in enterprise
architecture, from leading
experts and practitioners around the world.
Participants at this unique event were able to:
Participate in highly practical workshops and tutorials teaching best
enterprise architecture practices
Review case studies from organizations who have put theory into practice, and learn from
them what works and what doesn't
See demonstrations and presentations on leading tools supporting open architecture
methods
Network with leading architecture experts, vendors, and peers in the
enterprise architecture field
Next Steps
This Ninth Enterprise Architecture Practitioners' Conference was a great success,
confirming the global need for this unique series of events.
The next Enterprise Architecture Practitioners' Conferences will be held in
London, UK (30 November - 1 December 2006), in association with
Architecting-the-Enterprise Ltd. and San
Diego, USA (29 - 31 January 2007).
Are you interested in presenting or participating at London, San
Diego, or other future Enterprise Architecture
Practitioners' Conferences? Contact John
Spencer, Director of The Open Group Architecture Forum.
