1. Twin Cities Business Architecture Forum 1/19/2016
Target’s BA Tool Journey
Background
Our needs and basic requirements for a BA-specific tool
How we classified tools in terms of abilities, value and investment
Key challenge: circular data relationships that answer BA questions. Strategy, capabilities, projects, people, tools, etc. are related in real life, but how to adapt to an off-the-shelf tool?
Ideas on how to implement a new BA mindset, process, and tool in a way that is useful and sustainable

2. Business Architecture is new to Target…again
Prior to 2015, Business Architecture within Target was somewhat fragmented and not elevated to enterprise status
Formation: BA became centralized, part of Enterprise Strategy, mid-2015, team grew to 30+ team members
BA charge: manage capabilities supporting future strategies
Situation: BA left to define how it would operate
Complication: Our partner teams were also in the same boat
Goal: Define our processes and tools in a way that helped us plant a flag, but remain flexible to adapt to other partner teams’ evolving operations

3. Defining the need meant choosing functions and stakeholders we would support with the tool
Definition
Orchestrate collaboration
Coordinate activities between stakeholders
Map Business Capability Framework (BCF) dependencies
Relationships between strategies and capabilities
Develop roadmaps
Sequence projects for shortest time, lowest $ and least people
Create and monitor projects
Create and track projects, monitor duplication
Communicate roadmap
Manage roadmaps, tailor to inform and support decisions
Stakeholders
Process
Executives
Strategy
Planning
Business Architecture
Finance
PMO
Technical 1 6
Goals and Metrics
Prioritize new and critical work 2
Communicate
Communicate enterprise priority 7 3
Translate strategy to capability language 4
Communicate Capability Enablers 5
Prioritize current vs. new work

4. To incent broader adoption, user experience was centered on simplicity and effectiveness
Manipulate data flexibly (e.g., view by strategy, capability, technology, investment, etc.)
Fast, responsive self-service any time, intuitive, easy to use
Export data, analysis, graphs
Process
Users interact depending on role and access level
Supports decision making
What happened and why?
What will happen? What if?
What are my options to improve the outcome?
Technology
No installation and no IT support
Low cost and low barriers to learn

5. Chose to focus on ‘lightweight’ architecture tools
What are we calling a ‘lightweight’ tool?
Focused on business architecture (i.e., limited features)
Cloud-based tool with no installation or IT support
BA can set up and maintain with little technical background
What is a ‘heavyweight’ tool?  EA Tools
Supports and houses enterprise (IT applications and infrastructure), operations and process (e.g., detailed workflow) information ,and business architecture
Require classical large tool implementation (i.e., $$$, time, people)
Used and supported by multiple teams
Why a ‘lightweight’ and not a ‘heavyweight’ tool?
A lightweight tool is easier to understand, we can use most features
A heavyweight tool has many more features and abilities than we will need anytime soon

6. Mapped a variety of tools relative to our needs
Function
Definition
Orchestrate collaboration
Map Business Capability Framework (BCF) dependencies
Develop roadmaps
Create and monitor projects
Communicate roadmap
Stakeholder
Process
Executives
Strategy
Planning
Business Architecture
Finance
PMO
Technical 1 6
Create EKIs with Metrics and Goals
Prioritize new and critical current work 2
Communicate Metrics and Goals
Communicate enterprise priority 7 3
Translate strategy to capability language 4
Communicate Capability Enablers 5
Prioritize current work vs. new work

7. Mapped relationships between BA data elements
Mapped two types of relationships: associated (A) and hierarchical (H) data
Mapped how it is structured in the tool 1 2
Hierarchical relationship: one-to-one H
Association: many-to-many links possible A 1
H: L to R
BCF
Bus or Tech/Proc Org
Tech/Proc Team
Portfolio
Project
EKI
Apps
Bus Process
Capability Framework A
B/T/P Org H
T/P Team
Strategies
Entered data and relationships into the BA tool, as best as possible 2 1
Hierarchy of data
Hierarchy of data
Relationship can be seen but not defined directly
Hierarchy Element
How data is entered
Data association defined
Indirect relation, many-to-many
Sub hierarchy element
Hierarchical relationship defined
Strong, close or causal relationship, or 1-to-1

8. Visual representation of the BA relationships
Visualizing the relationship map created a structure both logical enough to be built into a tool, and understandable enough to adapt to a common BA approach 1
Decision and Action Hierarchy
Organization Hierarchy
Enterprise Key Initiatives or Strategies
Business or Technical / Process Organizations
Portfolio of Projects
Teams
Individual Projects
Applications
Translation Hierarchy
High Level Business Process
Business Capability Framework

9. Mapping the relationships in a tool helped us understand how well it would support our needs2
Data association defined
Associated or hierarchy
Relationship can be seen but not defined directly
Decision and Action Hierarchy
Organization Hierarchy
Enterprise Key Initiatives or Strategies
Strategy  Organizations
Business or Technical / Process Organizations
ResourcesOrganization Units
Strategy  Organization  [Strategy] [Elements]  Projects
Strategy  Organization Top / Child Elements
Resources  Teams  [Edit Detail]
Portfolio of Projects
Planning  Projects
Capabilities  Capability Models  [BCF lowest level]  People, Process, Technology
Teams
ResourcesTeams
Planning  Projects  Project List  Project Canvas
Planning  Portfolio
Planning  Projects  Project List  Project Canvas
Capabilities  Capability Models  [BCF lowest level]  People, Process, Technology
Individual Projects
Planning  Projects
Capabilities  Capability Models  [BCF lowest level]  Projects & Requirements VS. People, Process, Technology
Applications
ResourcesApplications
Capabilities  Capability Models  [BCF lowest level]  People, Process, Technology
Planning  Projects  Project List  Project Canvas
Capabilities  Capability Models  [BCF lowest level]  People, Process, Technology
Translation Hierarchy
High Level Business Process
CapabilitiesValue Streams
Capabilities  Value Streams  Add/Edit
Business Capability Framework
Capabilities  Cap Models Create

10. Nurturing a Business Architecture tool mindset: We are at the beginning
Recruit a tool team representing the ultimate user group
Give the team:
A vision of how BA will operate, process and tool-wise
A tool with a basic set of relationships built-in
A representative set of BA questions as part of job
A way to evaluate and document questions and needs (next slide)
A set of milestones to time-bound the effort
Leader guards the fence so team stays within scale and scope
Result: team has improved on what was given, and has reached a common view that is the key to scale to the rest of the team

11. Tool team evaluated tools based on needs and their understanding of BA at the time
Approach helps us assess tools and identify areas of training needed