No abstract

The challenge of IT management is today considerable. In industry, the organizational role of the Chief Information Officer (CIO) has been promoted as the owner of these challenges. In spite of a general acceptance of the problems associated with the responsibilities of the CIO, very little academic research has been conducted on the issues and constraints of this role. In order to address these shortcomings, this article presents the results of a survey in which Swedish CIOs have prioritized their most important concerns. In academia, a response to the IT system management challenges has presented itself in the discipline of Enterprise Architecture. The article argues that the CIO role is the primary stakeholder of Enterprise Architecture, so his/her need for decision support should guide Enterprise Architecture research and framework development. Therefore, the article presents a brief review over how well two existing Enterprise Architecture frameworks address the surveyed concerns of the CIO. Results from the survey indicate that the three highest prioritized concerns of CIOs are to decrease the cost related to the business organization, to improve the quality of the interplay between the IT organization and the business organization and to provide new computer-aided support to the business organization. The comparison between the CIOs' prioritization and the foci of the frameworks shows some discrepancies. The largest disharmony lies in the lack of decision support for issues related to the IT organization. Furthermore, support for ex-

No abstract

This reference model for IT management responsibilities covers the most important aspects when modeling, analyzing and evaluating enterprise architecture, EA. The reference model can be employed to support IT management in their quest to make well-informed decisions, e.g. to derive architectural principles in order to obtain a proper scope for EA activities, measure the status of the current EA, follow up changes committed, and evaluate alternative EA scenarios. The model is based on extensive literature studies and has been tested in a series of empirical studies.

Enterprise architecture, EA, is an established approach for the modelbased and holistic management of IT. The scope of EA is however wide and the predominant EA frameworks suggest the creation of broad and detailed models. IT management cannot control all areas spanned by the present frameworks for EA models. In order to ensure well-informed decisions, IT management has a series of questions that need to be answered. This paper proposes an assessment framework that can be used to identify relevant questions for assessments of EA and EA scenarios, within the areas of EA that IT management can control. Three top dimensions in the proposed framework are presented: IT organization, IT systems, and Business organization. The framework further includes sub dimensions for identifying questions. An application of the assessment framework, as it was applied to assess EA scenarios in a power company, is also described.