J. on Architecture

Architects have a natural affection for complexity. We love to play with it, order it and make models out of it. This is quite logical of course, since that is the core of our work. What we must realise though is that this complexity is not part of what we should deliver. The product of an architect is the insight on which others can base their decisions. But to provide that insight the architect needs to hide the complexity and show only those parts that are needed for the decision making.

This is not to say that the architect can dispense with the complexity. Far from it. It’s the job of an architect to maintain both the complex reality and simplified presentation in a coherent way, adding both an extra level of complexity and giving the guarantee that decisions based on the simplified presentation have the same effect on the complex reality.

An architect is essentially an advisor on matters of design. In this role of advisor you always have to ask yourself one basic question: Does it make sense?

This pertains not only to the architecture you are designing, but also to the object being created. Let me give you an example. You can design an amazing skyscraper with a sound foundation and a smart layout, but if the client wants to build it in a little village instead of a large city, you have to ask if the need for the skyscraper itself makes any sense.

Of course this is a simple example, but the point is clear. It’s better to question the ideas of your client, than to make a good architecture that is useless. In the end your client will thank you for it, because it always leads to better value for money.

In civil architecture it is custom to analyse the works of others. By studying actual buildings, architects can see for themselves what works and what doesn’t. Especially with the blueprints in hand, walking through the building can be a great learning experience.

So why don’t we do the same with IT architecture? Lately we tend to focus more and more on the process, with IT Governance being a hot topic at the moment. But I think we should also look at the result and evaluate it. Does the proposed architecture work as expected? Are there new patterns that can be identified? How can we use the best practices?

Only through reflection can you become better.

“Freedom [is] about drawing the right boundaries, not living without them.” – West Crosse, The Architect.

There are a million interrelated possibilities and choices in life, but instead of embracing this wealth, people tend to get paralyzed by it. Afraid that they will make the wrong choice and place themselves in a deadlock.

As creatures of habit we usually respond to this by choosing not to change and we can get really fierce defending this unspoken decision. The problem is that we don’t admit to this. We make plans for all kinds of changes, but when it comes to action we stick to our initial decision: No change.

This is where the architect comes in. Under the guise of creating flexibility, his job is actually to do the opposite. He makes all the obvious and logical choices for us, so that we are limited to only one or two critical choices. This gives us the freedom to make a clear decision between either left or right and then stick to that decision wholeheartedly.

An architect is often expected to lead a company into the future by making decisions on what to change and how. This is however a responsibility that lies in the hands of management and cannot be delegated to an architect or anyone else for that matter.

The management of an organization has the duty choose a direction and to translate this direction into specific changes which have to be made within the organization. This is easier said than done, especially because a substantial part of the changes will nowadays take place in the virtual world of ICT. This is a world that has little tangible elements, while having very real costs attached to it.

To be able to make sound decisions and concrete plans in this situation, management will need insight. Insight in the current situation and an understanding of the size and impact of the changes that will have to take place, once a specific direction has been taken. It is this insight that the architect can provide to management.

But how does the architect come to this insight? By getting the required information form the organization itself. To have a proper sense of direction, management will need to make it’s vision and strategy explicit. The architect can help in this process by facilitating workshops for management where they can come to an unequivocal description of that vision and strategy. After this step it’s the architect’s job to learn the state of the current organization and identify the parts that need change in both the business as well as the supporting ICT. This too is something that he cannot think up himself, but what he must distill from interviews and documentation.

When all this information is put into one big picture, management gains full insight, into the possible direction of the organization and the resulting changes that need to be made. They are then able to make sound decisions, which the architect facilitated with his clear picture.