2.9.4 Next Steps

Investing in Enterprise Architecture is a significant and measured investment decision for senior management. However, there is much information and support for institutions to improve awareness of Enterprise Architecture and to support its introduction and effective use.

In 2008, JISC funded a twelve month pilot programme of projects to explore the applicability of Enterprise Architecture. The findings gave further weight to the argument for Enterprise Architecture and the report Unleashing EA: Institutional Architectures and the value of joined up thinking is available at http://www.jisc.ac.uk/media/documents/techwatch/jisctsw_ea_synthesis.pdf

Part of JISC's role is to facilitate inter-institutional activities and in relation to EA there are two key initiatives:

  • The International e-Framework Initiative

    • The framework, which receives significant funding from JISC, has been established to help higher education and research take advantage of the opportunities offered by the service-oriented approach

  • JISC InnovationBase

    • More recently, JISC has funded the InnovationBase (IB) - a 'knowledge repository' that holds information on how higher education institutions function, in particular their work processes, roles, systems/applications and various artefacts that support these. The IB has been developed as a complementary service to the e-Framework, providing a high level view of the lifecycles of business processes within HE. Its development is being managed by the IB Development Team (split between Manchester University and University of Southampton), who are part of the wider JISC Community Engagement Team (CET) The IB is seen as having the potential to offer HE staff working on Enterprise Architecture with a convenient way to share models and to work together on architecture-related issues

  • JISC Enterprise Architecture (EA) Practice Group

    • The JISC Enterprise Architecture Practice Group is a new network for practitioners and managers from higher and further education institutions who are using, adopting or interested in the Enterprise Architecture approach to support strategic change and improvement. Its aim is to help institutions and their Enterprise Architecture champions move more rapidly and successfully in 'doing EA', by sharing knowledge, experience and challenges from real projects.