Chapter Five

IT/IS Strategic Alignment

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
 Learning Outcomes
• Understand the concepts of business alignment and
IT/IS alignment from both an academic and
practitioner perspective
• Understand the concept of the value of business/IT
architecture (re)alignment
• Appreciate the key frameworks/approaches for
architecture-driven modernization of IT architecture
• Develop a practical approach to supporting
organizations to achieve symmetry in their IT/IS
alignment endeavours.

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
 Business Alignment
Linking and configuring the strategic elements, key
organisation systems, processes and structure in
such a way that their implementation achieves the
organisation's shared vision and results beyond
expectations (Strategic Alignment Inc, 2007).

Or Simply put - "functional integration.”

Why?
to improve business processes, reduces
operational costs, and promotes real-time
visibility in business performance.

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
 SHORT HISTORY:
3 era model
1 2 3
Focus

Operational Management Business

Efficiency Effectiveness Competitiveness
Strategic
Contribution

Information
Data MIS
Systems
processing

INDIRECTLY DIRECTLY

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
Strategic Information Systems
• Systems that share information with customers
and/or suppliers;
• Systems that facilitate improved integration of
internal processes;
• Systems that enhance the development of
products and services;
• Systems that provide executive management
with relevant strategic information.

– Ward and Peppard (2003)

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
 Three Central Arguments
• Organisational performance depends on
structures and capabilities that support the
successful realization of strategic decisions.
• Alignment is a two-way process, where business
and IS strategies can act as mutual drivers.
• Strategic IS alignment “is not an event but a
process of continuous adaptation and change”
(Henderson and Venkatraman 1993).

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
Definitional Elements of IT/IS Alignment
• Strategic and intellectual
• Structural
• The informal structural
• Social dimension
• Cultural dimension

Issues of:
1. Level of Alignment
2. Measurements

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
 Key Business Benefits
• Organisational agility

• Operational efficiency

• IT cost reduction

• Risk management

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
 Enterprise Architecture (EA)
• an attempt to define a future state of the
organisation, in which both the business
functions and the Information Systems
(IS) functions of the business are
integrated and optimised for the ultimate
good of the organisation.

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
 The Zachman Framework

The Zachman Framework is a schema, which represents the

intersection of two classifications, the first being the six basic
interrogatives (What, How, Where, Who, When, and Why),
The second being six distinct perspectives, which relate to
stakeholder groups (Planner, Owner, Designer, Builder,
Implementer and Worker).
The intersecting cells of the Framework correspond to models,
which, if documented, can provide a holistic view of the
enterprise.
The Zachman Framework is also an ontology - a theory of the
existence of a structured set of essential components of an
object for which explicit expression is necessary and perhaps
even mandatory for creating, operating, and changing the
object.

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
For use with Strategic Information Systems Management
by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF)
• TOGAF 8 is based on four architectural pillars:
– Business (or business process) architecture which defines the
business strategy, governance, organisation, and key business
processes of the organisation;
– Applications architecture which provides a blueprint for the individual
application systems to be deployed, the interactions between the
application systems, and their relationships to the core business
processes of the organisation;
– Data architecture which describes the structure of an organisation's
logical and physical data assets and the associated data
management resources;
– Technical architecture or Technology architecture, which describes
the hardware, software and network infrastructure, needed to
support the deployment of core, mission-critical applications.

• TOGAF Version 9 covers:

– The Enterprise, Culture, and Stakeholders;
– Architecture Creation;
– Architecture-based Transformation;
– Architecture Realization;
– Architecture Management and Governance.
For use with Strategic Information Systems Management
by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
Developing an IT/IS Strategy

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
Achieving Alignment

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
IT/IS Alignment Health Check

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
 Practitioner Challenges
• Business Context
• Scope
• Level of Depth
• Hypotheses and Anticipation
• The Human Dimension
• Flexibility and Pragmatism

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning
 Been & Going?
• Technological Era (60s and 70s)
• Nexus Era (70s, 80’s (mid))
• Impact Era (mid 80’s, 90’s)
• Fusion Era (mid/late 90’s and now?)
– Innovation, Value, Benefits,
• Plexus/Complexity era?
– CAS; co evolutional, governance, eco …
– Why - We know we are all now connected –
economically, technically and socially. But being
connected is not sufficient. We also have to
infuse intelligence into our systems and ways of
working. The world has become flatter and
smaller. Now it must become smarter.

For use with Strategic Information Systems Management

by Kevin Grant, Ray Hackney and David Edgar
1408007932 © 2010 Cengage Learning