Determining capability interdependency/constraints and analyzing risk in business architectures

• US 8,543,447 B2
• Filed: 06/16/2009
• Issued: 09/24/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 06/16/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Corneil, Chad K., Merrifield, Eric S. Jr.
• Primary Examiner(s): Jeanty, Romain
• Assistant Examiner(s): Gills, Kurtis
• Application Number:
  US12/485,775
• Publication Number:
  US 20100318395A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,561 Days
• Field of Search: 705/7.36
• US Class Current: 705/7.36
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0637 Strategic management or analysis, e.g. setting a goal or target of an organisation; Planning actions based on goals; Analysis or evaluation of effectiveness of goals
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0201 Market modelling; Market analysis; Collecting market data

Abstract

The present invention extends to methods, systems, and computer program products for determining capability interdependency and analyzing risks in business architectures. Accordingly, embodiments of the invention can be used to drive an understanding of the relative interdependency (complexity) of a capability and how capabilities impact one another. Connectedness and/or data exchanged between capabilities can be used to formulate relative interdependency (complexity) of a capability and can be analyzed to inform a number of strategies from data architecture and business intelligence and project risk. Other risk/impact analysis data can be combined with interdependency (complexity) to present risk/impact analysis scenarios for organizations.

Claims

1. At a computer system, the computer system including a processor and system memory, a method for identifying interdependency between business capabilities and underlying components that provide functionality to the business capabilities, the method comprising:

an act, performed by the processor of the computer system, of accessing a business capability model for an organization, the business capability model including a plurality of hierarchically arranged business capabilities, each business capability representing a portion of what the business organization does, each business capability in the business capability model connected to one or more other business capabilities in the capability model;

an act, performed by the processor, of creating a capability to capability map for the business capability model by;

arranging the business capabilities in a table format with each business capability being arranged in a corresponding vertical column and a corresponding horizontal row of the table to create a grid of intersecting business capabilities, such that a cell exists representing the intersection of each business capability with every other business capability;

for each business capability, determining whether the business capability drives or is driven by each of the other business capabilities; and

based on the determination, assigning an visual indicator to at least some of the cells, wherein a first visual indicator is assigned to a cell when the corresponding business capability in the vertical column drives the corresponding business capability in the horizontal row, a second visual indicator is assigned to a cell when the corresponding business capability in the horizontal row drives the corresponding business capability in the vertical column, and a third visual indicator is assigned to a cell when the corresponding business capability in the horizontal row and the corresponding business capability in the vertical column drive each other;

for each business capability in the business capability model, an act, performed by the processor of the computer system, of determining the dependence and constraints of the business organization on the business capability, including;

an act of determining, for each business capability and based on the assigned visual indicators in the capability map, a dependence value between the business capability and other business capabilities, the dependence value based on the number of other business capabilities that the business capability drives and the number of other business capabilities that drive the business capability;

an act, performed by the processor of the computer system, of creating an interdependency and constraints view of the business organization, including;

an act of calculating the interdependence of each business capability relative to the other business capabilities based on the corresponding dependence values;

an act of spatially arranging the business capabilities relative to one another according to the hierarchal arrangement; and

an act of applying a heat map to the spatially arranged business capabilities by assigning a color from a range of colors to each business capability based on the dependence value of the business capability, wherein the range of colors is organized such that a color at one end of the range indicates that a business capability has a lower dependence value whereas a color at the opposite end of the range has a higher dependence value.

2. The method as recited in claim 1, further comprising:

an act of accessing a plurality of business capability attributes, the plurality of business capability attributes corresponding to the business capabilities of the organization;

an act of formatting the accessed plurality of business capability attributes in accordance with data formats defined in a structured data model;

an act of modeling the business capability model from the formatted business capability attributes, including

an act of modeling a first business capability from the formatted business capability attributes, the first business capability supported by a first set of people, processes, and technology and data in the business organization that indicate how the first business capability does work;

an act of modeling a second business capability from the formatted business capability attributes, the second business capability supported by a second set of people, processes, and technology and data in the business organization that indicate how the second business capability does work; and

an act of modeling a connection between the first business capability and the second capability from the formatted business capability attributes;

an act of modeling constraints associated with the connection between the first business capability and the second business capability from the formatted connection attributes.

3. The method as recited in claim 1, further comprising:

an act of presenting the interdependency and constraints view to a decision maker to assist the decision maker in making a decisions with respect to allocating resources for the organization.

4. The method as recited in claim 1, wherein the act of creating an interdependency and constraints view of the business organization comprises an act of creating a risk/impact analysis view of the business organization, the risk/impact analysis view combining the dependence values with risk/impact analysis data.

5. The method as recited in claim 4, wherein the act of creating a risk/impact analysis view of the business organization comprises an act of creating a risk/impact analysis view from one or more of business capability cost, business capability maturity/predictibility, and business capability value.

6. The method as recited in claim 4, wherein the act of creating a risk/impact analysis view from one or more of business capability cost, business capability maturity/predictibility, and business capability value comprises an act of assigning visual indicators to distinguish between interdependence and risk/impact analysis data.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the capability map further includes an additional column for each of the first, second, and third visual indicator, wherein each cell in each additional column includes the number of occurrences of the corresponding visual indicator in the corresponding row.

8. A computer program product comprising one or more computer memory storage devices storing computer executable instructions which when executed by a processor of a computer system perform a method for identifying interdependency between business capabilities and underlying components that provide functionality to the business capabilities, the method comprising:

an act, performed by the processor of the computer system, of accessing a business capability model for an organization, the business capability model including a plurality of hierarchically arranged business capabilities, each business capability representing a portion of what the business organization does, each business capability in the business capability model connected to one or more other business capabilities in the capability model;

an act, performed by the processor, of creating a capability to capability map for the business capability model by;

arranging the business capabilities in a table format with each business capability being arranged in a corresponding vertical column and a corresponding horizontal row of the table to create a grid of intersecting business capabilities, such that a cell exists representing the intersection of each business capability with every other business capability; and

for each business capability, determining whether the business capability drives or is driven by each of the other business capabilities; and

based on the determination, assigning an visual indicator to at least some of the cells, wherein a first visual indicator is assigned to a cell when the corresponding business capability in the vertical column drives the corresponding business capability in the horizontal row, a second visual indicator is assigned to a cell when the corresponding business capability in the horizontal row drives the corresponding business capability in the vertical column, and a third visual indicator is assigned to a cell when the corresponding business capability in the horizontal row and the corresponding business capability in the vertical column drive each other;

for each business capability in the business capability model, an act, performed by the processor of the computer system, of determining the dependence and constraints of the business organization on the business capability, including;

an act of determining, for each business capability and based on the assigned visual indicators in the capability map, a dependence value between the business capability and other business capabilities, the dependence value based on the number of other business capabilities that the business capability drives and the number of other business capabilities that drive the business capability;

an act, performed by the processor of the computer system, of creating an interdependency and constraints view of the business organization, including;

an act of calculating the interdependence of each business capability relative to the other business capabilities based on the corresponding dependence values;

an act of spatially arranging the business capabilities relative to one another according to the hierarchal arrangement; and

an act of applying a heat map to the spatially arranged business capabilities by assigning a color from a range of colors to each business capability based on the dependence value of the business capability, wherein the range of colors is organized such that a color at one end of the range indicates that a business capability has a lower dependence value whereas a color at the opposite end of the range has a higher dependence value.

9. The computer program product as recited in claim 8, further comprising:

an act of accessing a plurality of business capability attributes, the plurality of business capability attributes corresponding to the business capabilities of the organization;

an act of formatting the accessed plurality of business capability attributes in accordance with data formats defined in a structured data model;

an act of modeling the business capability model from the formatted business capability attributes, including;

an act of modeling a first business capability from the formatted business capability attributes, the first business capability supported by a first set of people, processes, and technology and data in the business organization that indicate how the first business capability does work;

an act of modeling a second business capability from the formatted business capability attributes, the second business capability supported by a second set of people, processes, and technology and data in the business organization that indicate how the second business capability does work; and

an act of modeling a connection between the first business capability and the second capability from the formatted business capability attributes;

an act of modeling constraints associated with the connection between the first business capability and the second business capability from the formatted connection attributes.

10. The computer program product as recited in claim 8, further comprising:

an act of presenting the interdependency and constraints view to a decision maker to assist the decision maker in making a decisions with respect to allocating resources for the organization.

11. The computer program product as recited in claim 8, wherein the act of creating an interdependency and constraints view of the business organization comprises an act of creating a risk/impact analysis view of the business organization, the risk/impact analysis view combining the dependence values with risk/impact analysis data.

12. The computer program product as recited in claim 11, wherein the act of creating a risk/impact analysis view of the business organization comprises an act of creating a risk/impact analysis view from one or more of business capability cost, business capability maturity/predictability, and business capability value.

13. The computer program product as recited in claim 11, wherein the act of creating a risk/impact analysis view from one or more of business capability cost, business capability maturity/predictability, and business capability value comprises an act of assigning visual indicators to distinguish between interdependence and risk/impact analysis data.

14. The computer program product of claim 8, wherein the capability map further includes an additional column for each of the first, second, and third visual indicator, wherein each cell in each additional column includes the number of occurrences of the corresponding visual indicator in the corresponding row.