Key takeaways
- The Board coordinates without absorbing every stakeholder’s decision rights.
- Enforcement, relief, and target change are governed responses.
- EA capability can itself be the subject of ADM work.
A representative body
The Architecture Board brings together skills and interests needed for architecture coherence. Depending on the enterprise, global, regional, or local levels may exist. It supports principles, reuse, compliance, coordination of sub-architectures, and escalations. Its membership should address relevant issues without assuming that architects alone hold all decision rights.
Appropriate stakeholders should approve decisions within their authority. A target review checks scope, upstream constraints, validated facts, views addressing concerns, and understanding of benefits, risks, and limitations. The Governance Log retains decisions and follow-up information.
Decide and improve the practice
In response to non-compliance, governance may enforce the target, grant a justified dispensation, or change the target through established mechanisms. Consequences should be assessed and recorded. The ADM can also improve EA capability itself: define objectives, gaps, organization, repository, processes, and a roadmap, then govern implementation.
- Clarify decision rights and escalation paths.
- Assess exceptions instead of leaving them implicit.
- Monitor the value and maturity of architecture practice.
TERMS TO KNOW
The terms, in context.
- Architecture Board
- Body coordinating and governing architecture.
- Dispensation
- Justified permission to depart from a requirement in a defined context.