Step 5: Implementation Planning Implementation planning is performed in two parts. The first part takes the project opportunities, documents them fully and organizes them into three tiers or implementation plateaus. The second part produces first-cut project plans for each of the initiatives on the implementation agenda.

The first-cut plans include details about the initiative such as project name, description, critical success factors, task lists, key deliverables, essential skills required and project interdependencies - all the information that an organization needs to drive execution. These plans are a handy way for the architecture development team to pass its insights on to the project managers who will follow them.

Step 6: Architecture Administration Once an architecture has been developed, it's important to create a governance mechanism to ensure that it remains synchronized with the strategic direction of the organization - an important continuous process improvement step that is often overlooked.

It's not unusual for an enterprise to establish a project management office (PMO) to oversee the execution of the architecture plan. Myriad communication vehicles - newsletters, intranet sites, sponsor-review meetings and post-project assessment documents - emerge from the PMO as a means of improving cross-project and cross-company knowledge sharing and transfer.

Clearly, robust and easily modifiable automation is fundamental to achieving an enterprise's vision for the future. However, such benefits don't come without their price. Hard work and management commitment, both from IT and from the highest levels of the business - including the CEO - are needed to build the kind of integrated IT architecture plans that will make the difference between success and failure in today's highly competitive business climate. Your customers and trading partners are waiting.

James Kerr is the former CIO of Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Group and is adjunct professor at the Lally School of Management at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. His latest book, The Best Practices Enterprise, contains a chapter on the Resilient IT Architecture (RITA), on which this article is based. He can be reached at jkerr@kerr-consulting-group.com