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Changing Principles



In EA, architecture principles set a framework for making architectural decisions.  They help to establish a common understanding across different groups of stakeholders, and provide guidance for portfolios and projects.  Michael Durso of the LSE gave a good introduction to the idea in a webinar last week for the UCISA EA community.

Many organisations take the TOGAF architecture principles as a starting point.  These are based on the four architectural domains of TOGAF: business, information/data, applications, technology/infrastructure.  These principles tend to describe what should be done, e.g. re-use applications, buy in software rather than build it, keep data secure.  See for example the principles adopted at Plymouth University and the University of Birmingham.

Recently though, I encountered a different way of looking at principles.  The user experience design community tend to focus more on how we should do things.  E.g. we should start with user needs, use iterative development, get feedback from users, and so forth.  The UK Government Design Principles are an excellent example, often adopted by other organisations.  Our new Principal gave us another - all projects must include at least one student.
Our UX team leader and I put our heads together and looked at how we could learn from each other.  My take away was to add two new sets of principles: User Experience and Ways of Working.

By now, the number of principles was starting to become rather overwhelming.  Ideally, I'd like a few, powerful ideas that people will remember.  I was inspired by the way that Jim Phelps at the University of Washington presents just a few simple concepts.  Rather than those all the work we have already done, I have grouped all the TOGAF-style principles (including those in the new groupings) into a few strategic themes.  Our statement of principles now says:
Our services will be Strategic, User-centred, Data-driven, Reliable, Scalable, Secure and Sustainable.
I think this is easy for people to remember, and the detailed work behind each theme will provide appropriate guidance for people to use as they make decisions in their portfolios and projects.

Comments

. said…

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