Towards a Generic Evaluation Model for Enterprise Architecture

Abstract

During the past few years, enterprise architectures (EAs) have become one of the major interests of both business and information technology (IT) practitioners and academics. It has been suggested that EA is an approach for controlling the complexity and constant changes in the organization’s business environment. Research has mainly focused on the development and modeling of EAs, while the quality aspects of EA have only recently gained attention, especially in the form of EA maturity models. These models have been developed to provide a means to evaluate the stage – and the quality – of the organization’s EA. While most existing maturity models seem to be domain-specific, this study aims at developing a more generic evaluation model for EA usable in private sector organizations, regardless of their lines of businesses. The generic evaluation model is based on the combination of the potential critical success factors for EA, defined in the previous steps of the project, and the maturity stages. The initial generic evaluation model for EA was trialed in three organizations. The experiences and needs for improving the evaluation model derived from these cases are also represented.