"[1] The United States Federal Government is an example of an organization that practices EA, in this case with its Capital Planning and Investment Control processes.
[4] As a discipline, EA "proactively and holistically lead[s] enterprise responses to disruptive forces by identifying and analyzing the execution of change" towards organizational goals.
The individual models in an EA are arranged in a logical manner that provides an ever-increasing level of detail about the enterprise.
The practice of EA "analyzes areas of common activity within or between organizations, where information and other resources are exchanged to guide future states from an integrated viewpoint of strategy, business, and technology.
The term architecture refers to fundamental concepts or properties of a system in its environment; and embodied in its elements, relationships, and in the principles of its design and evolution.
Their mission, vision, strategy, and the governance framework define all roles, responsibilities, and relationships involved in the anticipated transformation.
In addition to this structure, business unit architecture establishes standards, policies, and procedures that either enhance or stymie the organization's mission.
[14] Notable benefits include support in the areas related to design and re-design of the organizational structures during mergers, acquisitions, or general organizational change;[15][16][17][18] enforcement of discipline and business process standardization, and enablement of process consolidation, reuse, and integration;[19][20] support for investment decision-making and work prioritization;[16][21][17] enhancement of collaboration and communication between project stakeholders and contribution to efficient project scoping and to defining more complete and consistent project deliverabless;[18][19] and an increase in the timeliness of requirements elicitation and the accuracy of requirement definitions through publishing of the EA documentation.
[27] Additionally, there have been a number of reports, including those written by Ivar Jacobson,[28] Gartner,[29] Erasmus University Rotterdam and IDS Scheer,[30] Dion Hinchcliffe,[31] and Stanley Gaver,[32] that argue that the frequent failure of EA initiatives makes the concept not worth the effort and that the methodology will fade out quickly.
[1][33][34][35] The EA of an organization is too complex and extensive to document in its entirety, so knowledge management techniques provide a way to explore and analyze these hidden, tacit, or implicit areas.
In return, EA provides a way of documenting the components of an organization and their interaction in a systemic and holistic way that complements knowledge management.
[38][39] The broad reach of EA has resulted in this business role being included in the information technology governance processes of many organizations.
Analyst firm Real Story Group suggested that EA and the emerging concept of the digital workplace are "two sides to the same coin.