VBZ Intel Agency
IT Virtualization (ITV) Enterprise Architecture Framework

VBZ IT Virtualization (ITV) Enterprise Architecture Framework (Roadmap to the Cloud)

In a world of dynamic requirements and mandates for more IT computing power, less power consumption, reduced budgets, and resources businesses are continuously faced with the challenge to quickly respond to ever changing customer demands, growth opportunities and market changes. VBZ’s Virtualization Framework provides the blueprint for business owners and stakeholders to assess and transform their IT environment to improve their bottom line, to meet fluctuating demands and to comply with mandates through the implementation of an agile and adaptive IT infrastructure powered by “Virtualization”.
Overview
VBZ’s ITV Framework is a hybrid Enterprise Architecture framework that can be mapped back to Zachman, Spewak, and FEA. The ITV Framework for the purpose of my project provides VBZ the blueprint to virutalize all or parts of its IT environment. This framework provides a holistic view of the IT activities as the virtualization occur and the impacts of those efforts on the current environment. . The ITV framework is the mechanism to facilitate structured communication amongst stakeholders to enable clearly defined measurable success. It allows the stakeholders to assess and implement the virtualization plan that will best meet their immediate business needs, with the end goal of a fully virtualized environment.
VBZ’s ITV framework consists of five components: (Note: All components are tied back to the fifth component - Governance ) Figure 1.
1) Business Architecture -- aligns VBZ’s operations, strategic goal and objectives with IT requirements; provides the pertinent data for the creation of a business case the virtualization transformation and provides the business view of the enterprise. I utilized the first two rows of Zachman’s framework to provide the planner and the owner with a high level overview and scope of the IT virtualization transformation effort, which will highlight any business boundaries and constraints.
2) Transformation Planning - conducts detailed analysis of the “as is” environment to determine which components of the IT infrastructure to virtualize first based on the business requirements. The completion of the detailed analysis triggers the designing of the ‘to be” and a detailed transformation plan. . This is a continuous of the planning initiative from business architecture.. This component. is composed of four sub-components:
a. Conduct detailed Analysis- This process is one of the most critical to determining the fastest and safest path to the optimal end state. CIRBA provides a software solution that does the holistic analysis of the architecture which conducts transformational analytics based on the types of virtualization. The software analyzes specific constraints in the IT environment to determine best hosting strategy.
i. Analysis will be conducted on Data, Application, and Networks
b. Identify Candidate—helps the stakeholders determine what assets to transition based on the analysis.
c. Develop Solution Design & Plan-
d. Conduct Risk Analysis & Verification & Validation Testing (Feedback mechanism –creates an iterative loop until corrective action are accomplished and approved by the Governance component)
e. Procurement Plan
3) Transformation (Implementation) – consist of the steps to implement the approved design solution and migration from the “as is’ to the ”to be”
a. Implement Integration Technology
i. Migrate Data ii. Migrate Application iii. Migrate Network
b. Align workflow processes
c. Conduct Acceptance Testing (Feedback mechanism –creates an iterative loop until corrective action are accomplished and approved by the Governance component)
4) Virtualization Performance (VP) Management (Maintain operations) – This component is is a representation of maintaining an operation system. VP management is required to better manage the complexities associated with virtualization. It provides the mechanism to maintain your virtualized environment at the required service level agreements and Quality of Service thresholds. It consist of three subcomponents:
a. Conduct Monitoring & Audit
b. Collect & Access Metrics
c. Process Improvement Review & Impact Analysis (Feedback mechanism –creates an iterative loop until corrective action are accomplished and approved by the Governance component – Process starts over with review of change from a business perspective)
5) Governance The governance component is essential to facilitating the delivery of high quality IT services. The ITIL framework is the glue of this component. The ITIL elements utilized include Incident Management, Problem Management, Change Management, Release Management, Configuration Management, Service Level Management, Capacity Management, Availability Management, Security Management, Knowledge Management, Application Managements and Asset Management. These elements not only provide triggers for governance board review/approval but it also provides traceability and a golden thread to manage and review framework activities holistically. The governance component also enables collaboration amongst stakeholder which is critical to ensuring a democratic decision making process. This component also includes control processes to trigger financial analyst, compliance reviews, and appropriate levels of approval as assigned in the decision matrix decision thresholds template. It also provides the requisite oversight of all activities that occur in the ITV EA framework.

As a government entity VBZ is required to comply with the guidance of the Federal Enterprise Architecture (FEA) Program. A goal of the program is to improve the overall management of the government’s IT portfolio and to improve collaboration across government entities to better leverage existing IT investments. I have incorporated the Business Reference Model (BRM) associated with IT and Technology Management into the ITV EA Framework. According to the FEA Consolidated Reference Model Versions 2.3, this involves the coordination of information & technology resources & systems required to support or provide a service. It further states the elements of this model are called Lines of Business (LOBs). The FEA CRM description for each LOB is as follows:
• Lifecycle/Change Management involves the processes that facilitate a smooth evolution, composition, and workforce transition of the design and implementation of changes to agency resources such as assets, methodologies, systems, or procedures.
• System Development supports all activities associated with the in-house design and development of software applications.
• System Maintenance supports all activities associated with the maintenance of in-house designed software applications.
• IT Infrastructure Maintenance involves the planning, design, and maintenance of an IT
Infrastructure to effectively support automated needs (i.e. platforms, networks, servers, printers, etc.).
• Information Security involves all functions pertaining to the protection of federal and information systems from unauthorized access, use, disclosure, disruptions, modification, or destruction, as well as the creation and implementation of security policies, procedures and controls. •
• Information Management involves the coordination of information collection, storage, and dissemination, and destruction as well as managing the policies, guidelines, and standards regarding information management.
• Information Sharing relates to any method or function, for a given business area, facilitating: data being received in a usable medium by one or more departments or agencies as provided by a separate department or agency or other entity; and data being provided, disseminated or otherwise made available or accessible by one department or agency for use by one or more separate departments or agencies, or other entities, as appropriate. • System and Network Monitoring supports all activities related to the real-time monitoring of systems and networks for optimal performance.
Supply Chain Management

The Enterprise Architecture Repository is the ITV EA framework library. It contains all documentation (files, models, drawings, etc) and artifacts pertaining to the framework. It is the one stop shop for all data holdings. (Note: This note a component of the ITV Framework)

Stakeholders
The key stake holders for the virtualization project are listed below. The developer, end user, and maintainer have been identified as subject matter experts in their functional areas and will participate in the governance board reviews and corporate decision making processes for decision events related to this project.
• Owner, Mr. Dilbert
• Developer, Ms Alice
• End User, Mr. Wally
• Maintainer, Homer Simpson
Stakeholder analysis which was conducted via a survey identified the Business Architecture component as an area of high concern. The figure 2 below was created to depict a viewpoint representing the concerns. It also contains views and models that could be used to address stakeholder concerns. An overview of the views and models can be found in DODAF 1.5 and DODAF 2.0.

ITV Enterprise Architecture Framework Strengths and Weaknesses

Strengths
• Incorporates iterative processes as a check as balance between “as is” and “to be”
• Stringent governance component that is tied to every aspect of the framework
• Aligns with business strategy to reduce cost
• Tied to mature reference models for additional guidance (FEA BRM)
• Encourages stakeholder collaboration via governance
• Contains a EA repository
• Steps through the entire development/ deployment cycle (planning, designing, implementing, maintain with process improvement mechanisms)
• Maps to best practices
Weakness
• Lack of maturity
• No forcing function to ensure framework is executed in prescribed order

In an effort to validate the ITV EA framework the matrix below depicts a Rosetta Stone mapping to existing frameworks.