Vanguard Magazine

26 FEBRUARY/MARCH 2020 www.vanguardcanada.com defence systeMs needs to study them periodically As-Is, to evaluate their performance and identify ca- pability gaps. At times, one also needs to redesign/revise their configuration To-Be able to close capability gaps and to ensure that the DES is sufficiently robust to ac- complish its mission under any foresee- able future. In order to implement, audit or improve a DES, its design (the way in which it is, or needs to be, constructed) must be described in a more-or-less de- tailed EA. The emerging design of a DES cerns. To capture the essence of a DES, four fundamental viewpoints must be tak- en. They boil down to the following ques- tions about the DES: 1. What is it? – the DES as perceived (human, material, informational and financial resources, as well as external entities and forces) 2. What is it supposed to do? (mission, strategic directions, value creation measures and targets) 3. How is it functioning? – functional views (capabilities, services, activ- ity networks, user journeys, processes, methods, controls) 4. How are resources configured? –struc- tural views (ontology, authority struc- ture, role matrix, IT network, data model, application structure tree, facil- ity layout, bill of material) These fundamental viewpoints are sum- marized in the generic high-level EA-cube in Figure 1. A DES can be examined from different viewpoints, but it is indivisible. The functional and structural views are two sides of the same coin. The evolu- tionary perspective arrow indicates that DESs are living and adaptive organisms in a changing environment. In an EA, one does not necessarily pro- vide detailed views of all DES elements. The purpose of an EA is to effectively and rigorously convey information about a DES design to facilitate its synergic devel- opment and adaptiveness, and to nurture organizational learning. The DES is typi- cally represented at different abstraction levels using selected modeling formalisms. Figure 1: Defence Enterprise System (DES) Architecture Cube can never be observed/described exactly and exhaustively. An EA is a rigorous de- scription, at a point in time, of some essen- tial elements of a DES design sufficient for action, i.e. focusing on what is useful and nothing else. EAs are shared understand- ing (synthesis) of an As-Is DES or shared vision of a To-Be DES. DESs are complex systems of systems and they cannot be described as a whole. EAs are therefore an integrated and co- herent set of complementary views (facets of a design) reflecting stakeholders' con- A member of Task Force-Mali stands guard while other members set up a Forward Area Refueling Point during Operation PRESENCE-Mali on February 16, 2019. Photo: DND

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