Key takeaways
- Phase E moves from the target to how to reach it: work packages and transitions.
- It produces the first complete roadmap; Phase F finalizes it.
- Value, effort, risk, and dependencies drive how changes are grouped.
- The migration strategy can be greenfield, revolutionary, or evolutionary.
- Overall SBBs are defined here, starting from the ABBs of the domain phases.
Purpose and essential knowledge
Phase E is the first phase that faces delivery. The practitioners’ guide sets its purpose as building a set of work packages that close the gaps, each with an indication of the value it yields, the effort it needs, and the dependencies linking it to others. The aim is an “adjusted” target: as the real cost and risk of change become clear, stakeholders often revise their priorities, and the target moves with them.
The standard summarizes the phase as initial implementation planning and identifying the delivery vehicles (projects, programs, solution purchases, and so on) for the architecture defined earlier.
- Dependencies between changes, and between work packages and gaps
- Value, effort, and risk attached to each change and work package
- How stakeholder priorities and preferences shift in light of this information
Three objectives to remember
Phase E objectives are clearly distinct from those of Phase F: Phase E drafts a complete roadmap, Phase F finalizes it and makes it executable.
- Produce the first full Architecture Roadmap, drawing on gap analysis and the candidate components proposed in B, C, and D
- Decide whether an incremental approach is needed and, if so, identify Transition Architectures that keep delivering value
- Define the overall Solution Building Blocks that complete the Target Architecture, starting from the ABBs
Inputs and key steps
FURTHER STUDY · APPLICATION DETAILS
The phase consumes most of what was produced earlier: Request for Architecture Work, Statement of Architecture Work, Architecture Vision, Capability Assessment, Communications Plan, draft Architecture Definition Document and Architecture Requirements Specification, and candidate roadmap components. Information on available products, the enterprise’s planning methods, and Change Requests affecting existing programs are added.
Its steps follow a logical progression, from the change context to the roadmap:
- Determine the enterprise’s key change attributes and the business constraints on implementation
- Review and consolidate the gaps from Phases B to D, the requirements, and interoperability needs
- Refine and validate dependencies, then confirm transformation readiness and risks
- Formulate the Implementation and Migration Strategy, then identify and group work packages
- Identify Transition Architectures, then create the roadmap and the implementation and migration plan
Phase E outputs
As output, the phase updates the existing architecture deliverables and creates new planning-oriented ones. The Study Guide also lists the Implementation Governance Model among the deliverables associated with Phase E, before it is finalized in Phase F.
- Architecture Roadmap: work package portfolio, Transition Architectures, implementation recommendations
- Initial Implementation and Migration Plan, with a high-level strategy
- Architecture Definition Document extended with Transition Architectures; updated Architecture Vision and Architecture Requirements Specification
- Refreshed Capability Assessment
TERMS TO KNOW
The terms, in context.
- Work Package
- A set of actions grouped to meet one or more business objectives; it can be part of a project, a project, or a program.
- Transition Architecture
- A coherent intermediate state between Baseline and Target that delivers part of the expected value.
- Architecture Roadmap
- An ordered list of the work packages and transitions leading from Baseline to Target.
- Implementation and Migration Strategy
- The overall approach chosen for change (greenfield, revolutionary, or evolutionary) and the associated implementation method.
- Solution Building Block (SBB)
- A concrete solution component, often tied to a product or supplier, that realizes one or more ABBs.