EA Practice at a Glance | |
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Year formed | 2013 Initially, Reorganized in 2017 |
Submitted by | Maher Shinouda (uwaterloo.ca), Strategic Architect |
EA team is located in | EA function sits in the Portfolio Management/Portfolio and Strategy group within Information Systems and Technology (IST). EA is under the management of Strategy and Portfolio. |
Roles on EA team | Lead Enterprise Architecture practice and activities |
Narrative | Currently, EA practice is focused on Application, Technology, and Security architecture within the IST department. The EA interacts with all groups, teams, and SME at various levels within IST and other departments and business units across campus. EA is led by the Strategic Architect working collaboratively with various stakeholders to develop and document enterprise architecture. |
Maturity |
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Maher Shinouda, Strategic Architect
The architecture practice started in 2013, aligned with IT strategic planning work and an IST reorganization.
The EA work is mainly within IST. The EA focus is within the work and context of IST. The scope of practice has been focusing mainly on Application, Technology, and Security architecture.
The Enterprise Architecture function sits in the Portfolio Management/Portfolio and Strategy group within Information Systems and Technology (IST), at the University of Waterloo. The EA focus is within the work and context of IST. The Enterprise Architecture function is led by the strategic architect and it is under the management of Strategy and Portfolio.
The EA interacts with all groups, teams, and SME at various levels within IST and other departments and business units across campus. EA is led by the Strategic Architect who works collaboratively with various stakeholders to develop and document enterprise architecture.
We have recently adopted a specialized EA tool, erwin EA agile, to capture and store architecture information and artifacts.
We have developed various architecture artifacts and diagrams of current and future state architecture on various projects. Some EA work started to be presented to high level ERP committees where the value is being discovered.
Currently, we are working on an application inventory as part of our IST Strategic Plan to capture basic information about all applications with which IST supports, maintains and/or interacts. At a later phase we will be capturing more detailed information about these applications and the integration and interface points they have with each other.
We are taking a pragmatic approach to grow our maturity. Starting with projects (e.g. implementation of a product) and moving towards subject areas (e.g. Identity and Access Management) where significant change is occurring, is our current approach, with a focus on applications, technology and security. Flexibility in our EA practice allow us to quickly respond to urgent needs and changes. As the EA practice matures, we will be looking for various opportunities at different levels where we can be successful.
We have been engaged in various projects within the IST unit to define and develop current and future state architecture. We have developed and documented the EA roles and responsibilities related to programs and projects and it is now published in our website.
We use Erwin EA tool to develop and store EA information and artifacts. We also use SharePoint and TeamDynamix software to store EA artifacts related to programs and projects.
These are some of the challenges that we have been encountering:
EA is currently involved in a number of projects: