Operational and structural business IT alignment

Abstract

In recent years, Enterprise Architecture has gradually emerged as the preeminent means to change and transform large organizations. By employing Architectural Principles, organizations strive to master the complexity inherent in business processes and IT system and their harmonious alignment. Unfortunately, very rarely has the coevolutionary and emergent nature of alignment been taken into consideration in IS research. Even if different approaches focus on business IT alignment, most of them have a tendency to focus on alignment as a state or an outcome. In this paper we argue that a dynamic approach is necessary in order to achieve business IT alignment in a long-term perspective. Furthermore we demonstrate that the choice of architectural principles has an impact on the ability to achieve and maintain operational as well as structural alignment. A case study is used as a basis for the analysis. The conclusion is that an Enterprise-centric architecture can create freedom of action for dynamic operational alignment, and that Business-oriented IT management can keep the IS Architecture aligned with the Business Architecture in a long term perspective. © 2011 Springer-Verlag.