My presentation for Open Group London #ogLON enterprise-architecture conference, October 2013 Classic enterprise-architectures seem to focus mainly on IT and replicable IT-based processes. By contrast, many business-contexts such as healthcare, recruitment, education, customer-service and retail, all need to emphasise 'mass-uniqueness' - individual difference or uniqueness at scale. This slidedeck explores some of the themes and techniques that can be used to develop enterprise-architectures with appropriate balance between 'same' and 'different'.

1. the futures of business
Same and different
architectures for mass-uniqueness
Tom Graves, Tetradian Consulting
Open Group London, October 2013

2. Hi.
(let’s not bother with the PR-stuff?)

3. It begins with a pin, perhaps…
CC-BY Creativity103 via Flickr

4. …or maybe some dust?
CC-BY storebrukkebruse via Flickr

5. But perhaps better start with
a much-argued question:
What is
enterprise-architecture?
Maybe more to the point –
why enterprise-architecture?

6. Why enterprise-architecture?
– it’s because
things work better
when they work together,
on purpose

7. Why enterprise-architecture?
…which implies further questions:
•Things – what things? and who decides?
•Work – ‘work’ in what sense? what work?
•Better – ‘better’ for what? or who? who decides?
•Together – what kind of ‘together’? how? why?
•On purpose – who chooses the purpose? for what?
One place to look for clues is in the enterprise’s
balance between same and different…

8. Into practice…
(Each ‘Into practice…’ section
provides a brief moment to explore
implications of the preceding ideas.
Use the text on the slide to guide
a quick review of related design-themes
in your business-context.)

9. “What’s the story?”
A quest for productivity

10. Let’s go back to an earlier time…

11. there’s not much technology…

12. maybe some of it a bit strange…

13. everything made by hand…

14. everything different, unique…

15. almost nothing standardised…

16. until this guy, in this book…

17. looked at how pins were made…
CC-BY Creativity103 via Flickr

18. applied it to other industries…

19. via sameness…
CC-BY toktokkie via Flickr

20. more sameness…

21. a lot more sameness…

22. then applied to work itself…
Richard Arkwright’s Cromford Mill
CC-BY-SA CaptainScarlet via Wikimedia

23. mass-sameness…

24. mass-sameness…
CC-BY aleutia via Flickr

25. mass-sameness…
CC-BY Vlima.com via Flickr

26. mass-sameness everywhere.
CC-BY-SA MysteryBee via Flickr

27. Why sameness?
the real value of sameness
is that it’s easy to scale
and easy to make efficient
- creating huge productivity

28. But there’s a catch…

29. the differences
never went away…

30. and if we pretend
that everything
is sameness…

31. we court disaster…

32. Into practice…
In what ways do your systems
depend on sameness?
What would happen
if the sameness wasn’t there
to depend on?
What happens with anything
that won’t fit those expectations?

33. “What’s the story?”
There’s always an
exception…

34. What name in your system?
Typical UK-style name-structure for database:
•Title (mandatory: select from picklist)
•Forename (mandatory: 30 characters max)
•Middle-name (optional: 30 characters max)
•Surname (mandatory: 30 characters max)
•Suffix (optional: select from picklist)
Easy, right? – well, let’s take a real example…

35. What name in your system?
UK-style name:
•Mr Pablo Diego Ruiz

36. What name in your system?
UK-style name:
•Mr Pablo Diego Ruiz
Full legal birth-name:
•Pablo Diego José Francisco de
Paula Juan Nepomuceno María
de los Remedios Cipriano de la
Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y
Picasso

37. What name in your system?
UK-style name:
•Mr Pablo Diego Ruiz
Full legal birth-name:
•Pablo Diego José Francisco de
Paula Juan Nepomuceno María
de los Remedios Cipriano de la
Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y
Picasso
You probably know him as:

38. Driver’s licence, please?
Real simple, right?
The same for
everyone, surely?
Hensel twins’ driver-licences >>
Hmm… maybe
not so simple
after all?

39. Driver’s licence, please?
In the car: Two drivers behind
the wheel, each legally liable
On the flight: One ticket, one seat,
two passengers, two passports

40. What keeps executives awake at
night?
And here’s a real case
from my own consultancy-work
in enterprise-architecture…

41. Executive #1: PR
disasters
Government department
(in social-work sector)
Real (if unofficial) business metric:
Number of days
between bad headlines
in the newspaper

42. Executive #1: PR
disasters
Real newspaper headline:
Department fails again!
Ten life-critical incidents
in just one suburb
still not resolved
in 2½ months!

43. What actually happened?
Answer: architecture of the
enterprise

44. Executive #1: PR
disasters
Moral of this story:
Every automated system
needs an option for manual override

45. Into practice…
What exceptions are there
that could break
your current systems?
How do you find out about them
before they break your systems?
What workarounds would you need
to keep your systems going?

46. “What’sof theory
A bit the story?”
on uniqueness…

47. …dust is everywhere…
CC-BY storebrukkebruse via Flickr

48. ‘Cantor Dust’
Start with everything-different

49. ‘Cantor Dust’
Find an area of sameness
within all of that uniqueness

50. ‘Cantor Dust’
Within each remaining block of difference,
find another region of sameness

51. ‘Cantor Dust’
Within each remaining block of difference,
find another region of sameness

52. ‘Cantor Dust’
Within each remaining block of difference,
find another region of sameness

53. ‘Cantor Dust’
Within each remaining block of difference,
find another region of sameness

54. ‘Cantor Dust’
Repeat the same process
all the way to infinity…

55. no matter how far down we go,
there will always be uniqueness…
…and every one of those
apparent ‘samenesses’ we found
is also different from every other…
- uniqueness in the sameness…

56. Into practice…
How much at present do you design
against uniqueness?
If uniqueness is a fact of nature,
is trying to design against it
even a viable option?
Should you design for uniqueness?
If so, how?

57. “What’s the story?”
Uniqueness
– how and why

58. What is mass-uniqueness?
Mass-uniqueness
is uniqueness at scale
– where difference
or uniqueness
is a central fact
of the work itself

59. Mass-uniqueness
Some everyday examples:
•Healthcare – unique needs, Hickam’s Dictum
•Customer-service – unique needs, ‘long-tail’
•Clothing – fashion, body-types, shapes, sizes
•Education – every student is different, unique needs
•Information-search – unstructured, natural-language
•Farming – weather, micro-climate, soil-types
•City-planning – topography, geography, particularity

60. A spectrum of uniqueness
standardised
customised
unique

61. standardised…
CC-BY-NC-ND actiononarmedviolence via Flickr

62. customised…
CC-BY-NC-SA Doctress Neutopia via Flickr

63. customised…
CC-BY-NC-SA Doctress Neutopia via Flickr

64. unique…
© Courtesy of 3D Systems

65. unique…
© Courtesy of 3D Systems

66. uniqueness…
© Courtesy of 3D Systems

67. uniqueness makes it something to celebrate…
© Courtesy of 3D Systems

68. Into practice…
How much mass-uniqueness
exists in your business-context?
How much do you already design
for that uniqueness?
How do you support
the required uniqueness at scale?

69. “What’s the story?”
A question of perspective

70. Perspectives and journeys
Service-delivery is a journey of interactions
where ‘inside-out’ (the organisation’s perspective)
touches ‘outside-in’ (the customer’s / supplier’s perspective)

71. Outside-in…
“Customers
do not appear
in our processes,
we appear in
their experiences.”
Chris Potts, recrEAtion, Technics, 2010
CC-BY Fretro via Flickr

72. Stakeholders in the enterprise
A stakeholder
is anyone
who can wield
a sharp-pointed
stake
in your direction…
CC-BY-NC-SA evilpeacock via Flickr
(Hint: there are a lot
more of them than you
might at first think…)

73. The role of narrative
Narrative and story
help us to identify
the exceptions
and uniquenesses…

74. The usual EA view
Process
Technology
People
CC-BY-SA xdxd_vs_xdxd via Flickr

75. Stage
A narrative-oriented view
Stage
Stage
Stage
Stage
Actor
Scene
Scene
Stage
Actor
Scene
CC-BY-SA xdxd_vs_xdxd via Flickr

76. Into practice…
What changes
as you shift the perspective
from inside-out to outside-in?
What do the narratives tell you
about uniqueness in your business?
What do you need to change
to make best use of this?

77. “What’s the story?”
SCAN – making sense
of uniqueness

78. Order and unorder
“Let’s do a quick SCAN of this…”

79. “We have a rule for everything!”
CC-BY bobaliciouslondon via Flickr

80. Hmm… let’s do a quick SCAN of this…
CC-BY bobaliciouslondon via Flickr

81. Take control! Impose order!
“Insanity
is doing
the same thing
and expecting
different results”
(Albert Einstein)
ORDER
(IT-type rules do work here)

82. Order and unorder
“Insanity
is doing
the same thing
and expecting
different results”
(Albert Einstein)
“Insanity
is doing
the same thing
and expecting
the same results”
(not Albert Einstein)
ORDER
UNORDER
(IT-type rules do work here)
(IT-type rules don’t work here)

83. Same and different
A quest for certainty:
analysis, algorithms,
identicality, efficiency,
business-rule engines,
executable models,
Six Sigma...
An acceptance of
uncertainty:
experiment, patterns,
probabilities, ‘designthinking’, unstructured
process...
SAMENESS
UNIQUENESS
(IT-systems do work
well here)
(IT-systems don’t work
well here)

84. Theory and practice
THEORY
What we plan to do, in the expected conditions
What we actually do, in the actual conditions
PRACTICE

85. Sensemaking guides decisions
algorithm
guideline
rule
principle
Different types of decision-guides apply in each ‘domain’

86. Guidelines for design
order
unorder
analysis
experiment
(knowable result)
(unknowable result)
plan
actual
fail-safe
(high-certainty)
Waterfall
(‘controlled’ change)
safe-fail
(low-certainty)
Agile
(iterative change)

87. Why we need people…
What is always going to be
uncertain or unique?
What will always be ‘messy’?
(‘Messy’ – politics, management, wickedproblems, ‘should’ vs ‘is’, etc.)
Wherever these occur,
we’re going to need human skill…

88. Machines and people
order
unorder
(rules do work here)
(rules don’t work here)
fail-safe
safe-fail
(high-certainty)
(low-certainty)
analysis
experiment
(knowable result)
(unknowable result)
Waterfall
Agile
(‘controlled’ change)
(iterative change)
MACHINES
PEOPLE

89. misapplied difference
- ‘special cases’ creates inefficiency
misapplied sameness
creates failure-demand
– a key cause of waste…

90. Into practice…
Trying to apply rules to everything,
or to automate everything,
will cause your system to fail.
How do you identify the right balance
between sameness and difference?
How will you avoid inefficiency,
or failure-demand?

91. “What’s the story?”
Balancing sameness
and uniqueness

92. Find the right fit!
Taylorist-type models
tend to assume that everything
is a machine to ‘control’…
people will often
relate to machines
as if they’re other people…

93. Wrong and right…
order
unorder
(rules do work here)
(rules don’t work here)
CC-BY justin pickard via Flickr
PEOPLE
as MACHINES
CC-BY andré luís via Flickr
PEOPLE
as PEOPLE

94. Right and wrong…
order
unorder
(rules do work here)
(rules don’t work here)
CC-BY-SA MysteryBee via Flickr
MACHINES
as MACHINES
CC-BY-SA izzard via Flickr
MACHINES
as PEOPLE

95. How we really think…
CC-BY Brett Jordan via Flickr

96. Mapping the context-space
Use context-maps such as SCAN
to identify
what may or must change
what is or is not certain
how these vary over time
and what to do with each

97. A surgical example…
before
patient identity
patient
condition
theatre
booking
equipment
plan
verify identity
surgery plan
surgical-staff
availability
consumables
NOW!
action-records
certain
family
behaviour
pre-op
complications
change of
emergency
theatre-availability
action
uncertain

98. A surgical example…
before
patient identity
theatre
booking
equipment
plan
we need to be certain
about all of these
verify identity
consumables
NOW!
action-records
certain
uncertain

99. A surgical example…
before
patient
condition
we expect
(and plan for)
uncertainty
about these
surgery plan
surgical-staff
availability
change of
theatre-availability
NOW!
certain
uncertain

100. A surgical example…
before
we don’t expect
these to happen,
but we need
contingency-plans
and guiding-principles
for all of them
family
behaviour
pre-op
complications
emergency
action
NOW!
certain
uncertain

101. Into practice…
How would you map the right fit
for each type of context?
How would you ensure you don’t
treat people as machines
or machines as people?
How will you manage
the inherent uncertainties?

102. “What’s the story?”
Uniqueness, change
and governance

103. Balancing the spectra…
sameness
uniqueness
high-probability
standardised
low-probability
customised
high-dependency
reusability
low rate of change
unique
low-dependency
bespoke
high rate of change

104. Architectures and governance
We need architectures
that express that balance
between sameness and uniqueness,
and other trade-offs across the space…
…and governance
to guide relative-positioning
and changes over time
between backbone and edge

105. Architectures for change
BACKBONE
EDGE

106. Into practice…
What do you need, to balance
sameness and difference
certainty and uncertainty
across your whole business-context?
What architectures
do you need for this?
What governance do you need
to manage their changes over time?

107. Same and different
Some key take-aways, I hope?
•Many industries depend on mass-uniqueness
•Sameness and efficiency are important, but
over-focus on sameness can fail, lethally
•Uniqueness is inherent and unavoidable
•Need ‘just enough sameness’ to support scale
•Work with uniqueness, not against it

108. “What’s the story?”
Thank you!

109. Further information:
Contact:
Tom Graves
Company:
Tetradian Consulting
Email:
tom@tetradian.com
Twitter:
@tetradian ( http://twitter.com/tetradian )
Weblog:
http://weblog.tetradian.com
Slidedecks:
http://www.slideshare.net/tetradian
Publications:
http://tetradianbooks.com
Books:
• The enterprise as story: the role of narrative in enterprisearchitecture (2012)
• Mapping the enterprise: modelling the enterprise as services with
the Enterprise Canvas (2010)
• Everyday enterprise-architecture: sensemaking, strategy, structures
and solutions (2010)
• Doing enterprise-architecture: process and practice in the real
enterprise (2009)
Image-credits: Slides 64-67 courtesy of 3D Systems:
http://www.bespokeinnovations.com/
Other photo-images via Flickr or Wikimedia, as shown on each slide