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How Smart, Connected Products Are Transforming Competition

Information technology is revolutionizing products. Once composed solely of mechanical and electrical parts, products have become complex systems that combine hardware, sensors, data storage, microprocessors, software, and connectivity in myriad ways. These smart, connected products – made possible by vast improvements in processing power and device miniaturization and by the network benefits of ubiquitous wireless connectivity – have unleashed a new era of competition. Smart, connected products offer exponentially expanding opportunities for new functionality, far greater reliability, much higher product utilization, and capabilities that cut across and transcend traditional product boundaries. The changing nature of products is also disrupting value chains, forcing companies to rethink and retool nearly everything they do internally. Smart, connected products raise a broad set of new strategic choices for companies about how value is created and captured, how to work with traditional partners and what new partnerships will be required, and how to secure competitive advantage as the new capabilities reshape industry boundaries. For many firms, smart, connected products will force the fundamental question: What business am I in? This article provides a framework for developing strategy and achieving competitive advantage in a smart, connected world.

An integrated conceptual model for information system security risk management supported by enterprise architecture management

Risk management is today a major steering tool for any organisation wanting to deal with information system (IS) security. However, IS security risk management (ISSRM) remains a difficult process to establish and maintain, mainly in a context of multi-regulations with complex and inter-connected IS. We claim that a connection with enterprise architecture management (EAM) contributes to deal with these issues. A first step towards a better integration of both domains is to define an integrated EAM-ISSRM conceptual model. This paper is about the elaboration and validation of this model. To do so, we improve an existing ISSRM domain model, i.e. a conceptual model depicting the domain of ISSRM, with the concepts of EAM. The validation of the EAM-ISSRM integrated model is then performed with the help of a validation group assessing the utility and usability of the model.

A measurement model to analyze the effect of agile enterprise architecture on geographically distributed agile development

Efficient and effective communication (active communication) among stakeholders is thought to be central to agile development. However, in geographically distributed agile development (GDAD) environments, it can be difficult to achieve active communication among distributed teams due to challenges such as differences in proximity and time. To date, there is little empirical evidence about how active communication can be established to enhance GDAD performance. To address this knowledge gap, we develop and evaluate a measurement model to quantitatively analyze the impact of agile enterprise architecture (AEA) on GDAD communication and GDAD performance. The measurement model was developed and evaluated through developing the AEA driven GDAD model and associated measurement model based on the extensive literature review, model pre-testing, pilot testing, item screening, and empirical evaluation through a web-based quantitative questionnaire that contained 26 different weighted questions related to the model constructs (AEA, GDAD active communication, and GDAD performance). The measurement model evaluation resulted in validated research model and 26 measures: 7 formative items for AEA, 5 reflective items for communication efficiency, 4 reflective items for communication effectiveness, 2 reflective items for each on-time and on-budget completion, and 3 reflective items for each software functionality and quality. The results indicate the appropriateness and applicability of the proposed measurement model to quantitatively analyze the impact of AEA on GDAD communication and performance.

Becoming a Digital Organization: The Journey to Digital Dexterity

As the digital age unfolds, executives face new strategic choices about how to take advantage of fast-moving technology innovations. Prior research showed that value comes not simply from adopting digital technology, but from using technology to transform the way a company does business. But while the term digital transformation is much in vogue, relatively less attention is paid to the design of the organization that must fulfill the chosen digital strategies. New digitally-enabled possibilities for designing, organizing, and managing productive work challenge leaders to make choices about how to operate (organizational design choices) as well as what to produce (strategic choices). This paper builds on interview and survey data from over 150 organizations to develop a model of digital organizational design. We identify a core set of organizational characteristics (including mindsets, practices and resources) that underpin enterprise development of Digital Capability to improve customer experience, internal operations or employee engagement. We introduce the concept of Digital Dexterity, the sustained organizational ability to rapidly adapt and self-organize to take advantage of emerging digital possibilities, and show that these same organizational characteristics are associated with digital dexterity. We argue that in a digital economy where technologies continue to improve exponentially, digital dexterity is the hallmark of a true Digital Organization. In order to build an enterprise for long term digital advantage, executives need to cultivate the unique set of characteristics of a Digital Organization that collectively enable both Digital Capability and Digital Dexterity.

On the Role of Enterprise Architecture in Enterprise Integration

In the current business era, it is crucial for an organization to understand the rapidly changing environment of today. To swiftly respond to the changing environment, an organization must provide enterprise integration (EI) not only internally, but also externally, with its customers and suppliers. Many approaches and technologies have been proposed to facilitate EI – however, due to its complexity, integration has remained a continuous challenge in organizations. One of the major integration obstacles is maintaining architectural descriptions of the organization. Architectural descriptions, or Enterprise Architecture (EA), provides a comprehensive view of all the organizational entities and their relationships to achieve an organization’s strategic goals. Many studies have referred to EA as a solution to facilitate EI in organizations. However, developing EA is not easy to achieve. This PhD dissertation aims to facilitate integration projects by approaching EA obstacles from a social and organizational perspective. The main research question is What is the role of EA and its obstacles in EI? A qualitative and interpretive research approach is applied in this dissertation. The data was collected through interviews with practitioners from 17 large organizations and analyzed using the Grounded Theory method. The study first investigates the EI obstacles and identifies EA maintenance as a major obstacle in EI projects. After identifying the EA obstacles, the dissertation further investigates them to understand the issues in EA development that prevent EA from being efficient. By investigating the obstacles in EA development, this research shows that if not addressed properly beforehand, the obstacles follow EA through the development process. Most of the identified obstacles are social and organizational issues. The results indicate a ‘lack of communication and collaboration’ as the root obstacle in EA development that can address most of the other obstacles. Revisiting the data from a communication and collaboration point of view, the results reveal ‘organizational culture’ and ‘clarity in EA development process’ as additional causes of the lack of communication and collaboration in EA development. Furthermore, ‘personnel’s distrust’ and ‘organization loses its competitive edge’ are identified as additional effects of the lack of communication and collaboration in EA development. Finally, this study provides some recommendations to facilitate EA development for researchers and practitioners.

Beer’s Viable System Model and Luhmann’s Communication Theory: ‘Organizations’ from the Perspective of Meta?Games

Beyond the descriptions of ‘viability’ provided by Beer’s Viable System Model, Maturana’s autopoietic theory or Luhmann’s communication theory, questions remain as to what ‘viability’ means across different contexts. How is ‘viability’ affected by the Internet and the changing information environments in a knowledge?based economy? For Luhmann, social systems like businesses are coordination systems that do not ‘live’ as viable systems but operate because they relieve human beings from environmental complexity. We situate Beer’s concept of viability with Luhmann’s through analyzing the way that ‘decisions’ shape organizations in an information environment. Howard’s (1971) meta?game analysis enables us to consider the ‘viable system’ as an ‘agent system’ producing utterances as moves in a discourse game within the context of its information environment. We discuss how this approach can lead to an accommodation between Beer’s practical orientation and Luhmann’s sociological critique where the relationship between viability, decision and information can be further explored.