IS Architecture
A structured IS at the service of a corporate strategy
Fact
Following a street survey of 50 people, 100% of the respondents have no notion of IS architecture.
Realization
31 Information Systems. This is the number of our achievements over 3 years old that are currently operational. In 2021, as a result of health conditions, 11 new IS were implemented in only one year.
What is information system architecture.
In computer science, architecture refers to the general structure inherent in a computer system, the organisation of the various elements of the system (software, hardware, human resources, information) and the relationships between the elements. This structure is the result of a series of strategic decisions taken during the design of all or part of the computer system, through the exercise of a technical and industrial discipline in the computer sector, also known as architecture, and whose leader is the computer architect.
(Source : Wikipedia)
The objectives of the information system architecture.
The objective of the architecture is to provide a consolidated view of the IS and to propose a coherent plan to align infrastructure, applications, functional modelling, business needs and company strategy, while taking into account the existing situation.
Successfully implement your information system.
Our mission is to define or develop the technical architecture of your information system while respecting the policies of the information system management (DSI), the security rules (RSSI), the technical coherence framework and the search for performance and productivity, taking into account current and future business needs.
These tasks are therefore very varied and complex.
Our first activity is the design of technical architecture scenarios and the support of projects in the choice of solutions. The architect who intervenes within your company must be able to master the infrastructure foundations (datacenter, cyber security, exchanges, data, etc.) and must verify and analyse the technical impacts of the new solutions as well as their coherence with the entire IS. He/she will also ensure that the files are examined in accordance with the company’s technical consistency framework and will centralise all of these productions in technical architecture documents (DAT).
Continuity of evolution
Enterprise architects play a key role in this transformation process because they have visibility into the entire organisation and how it operates, and they understand how an IT system can lead to both business success and failure.
Enterprise architects are able to assess the impact of constant business change on the IT environment and its impact on the business, customer experience, and market share. This assessment capability can significantly improve the transformation process. In addition to this capability, they are the custodians of a streamlined and agile IT system, which should enable companies to develop new and innovative projects.
However, with the imperatives of transformation (business, business plan, technical, relationship with the ecosystem…), the agility of companies is paramount. This agility is materialised in concrete requirements for the Information System: designing an IS at a given moment is no longer enough! The main challenge is to be able to make it evolve and rationalise it according to the appearance of new needs, constraints, innovations, etc.
The challenge of Information System architecture is fully in line with this context and this strategic objective. A preamble to any approach is to make a clear distinction between the Information System and the IT System! The Information System must be part of a functional and more sustainable vision than the IT architecture.
Making a success of its transformation
With their increasingly critical role within companies, information systems have become much more complex in recent years: successive additions of application bricks, widespread use of SaaS applications, point-to-point interfaces, etc.
It is therefore becoming difficult for companies to have a global vision of the information system and to ensure real coherence in its structuring and development. The risk behind the tangle of flows between applications, the disparity of data dictionaries and infrastructure choices is to make the whole thing unreadable and to create a very strong inertia in the changes!
The correctly implemented information system is the guarantor of the technical consistency framework, which it must ensure is respected by the business lines and which it must also build. Its mission is to produce the IT system’s reference system in many and varied formats: tools, procedures, standards, vocabulary, security. The IS must systematically enable visibility to be given to the members of the company through promotion, communication and animation.
How does the concept of IS architecture work in practice?
Tools and software for IS architecture
There are two main categories of tools that assist the IS architecture process.
The first is the mapping tools for each of the layers:
Process mapping for the business architecture
Functional mapping for the functional architecture
Application mapping for the application architecture
Technical mapping for the technical architecture
IS modelling software or enterprise architecture software provides answers to the challenge of process mapping: inventory, application portfolio inventory, application islands, views and links between software, etc.
In addition to the initial modelling, maintaining the mapping over time is essential. Without a manager and without a real policy of continuous updating, it is common to find the old maps becoming obsolete just when it is necessary to make in-depth changes!
Conclusion
In conclusion, the role of a technical architect is very transverse. They must have a strong capacity for adaptation, autonomy and communication. In addition to supporting the business lines in the success of their projects, they must learn to work with a large number of players, IT project managers, project managers, IT planners, technical experts, etc. One of the keys to this job is to be able to demonstrate pedagogy and find compromises to obtain the validation of files and recommendations. Also, and this will be his or her core business, it is essential to have technical skills enabling him or her to understand and apprehend all the technical layers of an IS, with a mastery of IS security rules and practices, with a broad knowledge of the recommendations and a strong appetite for solutions enabling an optimal level of availability, integrity, confidentiality and traceability of an information system to be guaranteed.
The requirements of the design ...
... for process optimisation ...
... and better governance.
