Copyright © 2005 by Beth Gold-Bernstein and William Ruh

Template B

Enterprise Integration Strategy

Specification

<ENTERPRISE NAME>

<PLACE LOGO HERE>

<author>
<version>
<revision date>

Business Integration Strategy Specification 1

Copyright © 2005 by Beth Gold-Bernstein and William Ruh

Template Instructions
This is a template for the Enterprise Integration Strategy Specification. This page should be removed
prior to publication of the specification. The template is a guide for the enterprise and should not be
blindly followed. The organization should
• Review the chapter in the book that refers to the template to understand its use.
• Examine the template outline and determine what additions might be necessary based on
unique organizational needs.
• If absolutely necessary, remove any sections that will not apply. (The authors strongly
discourage this practice.)
• Save the template for future use.
• Begin to develop the document.
Guidance is given for preparation of the document throughout the template.
• Text shown as normal text should be used in the document. It may be modified as
necessary.
• Text shown in pointed brackets is either instructional guidance in the application of the
document or a description of the type of information to be added and should be removed
prior to publication.
• Text shown in double-pointed brackets is a placeholder for the insertion of text by
the authors.
Headers and footers should be customized as necessary as a final step in the completion of the
document.

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Copyright © 2005 by Beth Gold-Bernstein and William Ruh

ENTERPRISE INTEGRATION STRATEGY

SPECIFICATION
Template Instructions......................................................................................................................2
1.Introduction..................................................................................................................................4
2.Scope...........................................................................................................................................4
3.Key Participants...........................................................................................................................4
4.Integration Strategies...................................................................................................................4
5.Mapping to Business Strategies and Initiatives............................................................................4
6.Strategic Sourcing........................................................................................................................5
7.Standards.....................................................................................................................................5
8.Metrics.........................................................................................................................................6
9.Risks............................................................................................................................................6
10.Conclusions and Recommended Next Steps.............................................................................6
Appendix A: References.................................................................................................................7

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Copyright © 2005 by Beth Gold-Bernstein and William Ruh

1. Introduction
<The introduction should be a short executive overview of the specification. It should answer the
following questions:
• How will the integration strategy support business needs?
• Are there any major constraints, such as limitations imposed by legacy systems, or
requirements, such as the need for high security, that are a major factor in the integration
strategy?
• What are the anticipated benefits of the strategy?>

2. Scope
<The scope defines whether this strategy covers integration across the entire enterprise, a
division, a line of business, or some other scope. The types of applications involved determine the
scope of the integration strategy, and the methods of integration required. The scope should not
be defined in terms of technological boundaries. For example, a strategy for the communication
network is inappropriate.>

3. Key Participants
<There are three types of participants that should be identified:
• The team responsible for the creation of the strategy in its initial form, as well as for any
on going improvements. Anyone that provided information or review should be included in
this list.
• The group who will be implement and apply the strategy.
• Approvers of the strategy.>

4. Integration Strategies
<Companies must identify the strategies by which the enterprise can use technology to maximize
competitive advantage. Key integration strategies include service-oriented and process-driven
architectures. The matrix below also includes best practices in integration strategies. Use the
template as a guide for defining your particular set of integration strategies.>

<Redundancy management <strategy> <rationale>

strategies>
<Skill set management strategies> <strategy> <rationale>
<Reusability strategies> <strategy> <rationale>
<Process driven integration <strategy> <rationale>
Strategies>
<SOA strategies> <strategy> <rationale>
<Implementation strategies> <strategy> <rationale>
<Business integration strategy <strategy> <rationale>
lifecycle>

5. Mapping to Business Strategies and Initiatives

<This section provides a mapping between business initiatives defined in the Business Strategies
and Initiatives Specification and integration strategies in the form of a matrix. Discuss
nonobvious points of support. If any row or column is blank (i.e., a business strategy has no
integration strategy to support it or an integration strategy supports no business strategy), discuss

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Copyright © 2005 by Beth Gold-Bernstein and William Ruh

the implications. Any budgeting for projects that has been done to date or expected allocations
should be included at this point. This reflects the IT organization’s portion of the budget allocated
to this initiative. Rank projects in importance to company, to prioritize infrastructure
investments.>

Priority Business Scope Integration Budget

Strategy/Initiative Strategy
1 Regulatory Compliance Certification of Process $xxx
Sarbanes-Oxley revenue management
reporting
process
2 Increase business Tactical Application $yyy
efficiency and initiative to integration
competitiveness reduce time to
process an order
<priority> <business strategy> <scope> <integration <budget>
strategy>

6. Strategic Sourcing
<This section describes the approach that the organization feels will be most effective to
acquiring any technology. It should set the philosophy, constraints, and approach to sourcing.
Issues to be dealt with are the existing relationships and current use of technology, vendor
preferences, best-of-breed versus single vendor, responsibilities for identifying and selecting as
well as negotiating contracts. It should define the following:
• Preference for best of breed approach versus single vendor or platform approach versus.
two or three preferred vendors
• Preferred vendors for each type of technology
• Procurement process (this part of the specification may point to another internal
document)>

7. Standards
<The intention of this section is to define an enterprise strategy for how different types of
standards will be used in the architecture. This strategy forms the basis for the integration
architecture.
The standards that can be defined in an integration strategy are shown on the chart. One of
the purposes of this section of the strategy is to decide which standards to define at an enterprise
level.>

Proposed Usage References

Communication <example: B2B communications> <Web site for JCA or Web service interface
protocols specification>

Application interfaces <example: packaged application. interfaces> <Web site for JCA or Web service interface
specification>
Message formats <example: internal messages, external <links to appropriate Web sites or internal
messages, EDI messages> specification. documents>
Process models <example: enterprise processes—standard on <links to internal documents or appropriate
tool or standard such as BPEL> Web site>
Metadata <example: metadata about interfaces, Web <links to internal documents or appropriate
services, data transformation, etc.> Web site>

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Copyright © 2005 by Beth Gold-Bernstein and William Ruh

8. Metrics
<Metrics that measure the success and relative value of an integration strategy should be defined.
Metrics should be tracked over time and used as input when refining the strategy and determining
future infrastructure investments. To be of use, each metric must be measurable and manageable.
The effort to collect and track a metric cannot exceed the value of the information it provides.
Owners are responsible for tracking and reporting on metrics.
Specific metrics that can be employed are tracking reuse, tracking the time to implement new
solutions or implement changes to existing systems, tracking savings from reducing redundancy,
and monitoring TCO of a system.>

Integration Metric Name Metric How to Collect Frequency Owner

Strategy Value
<goal> <metric> <value> <collection> <frequency> <owner>
Example: <Component Number of Number of Monthly Repository
<Increase reuse> reuse> times business processes owner, central
component is or composite apps architecture
reused component is used group, or
in, alternatively # competency
of times it’s center (note
checked out from different types of
reuse repository components may
have different
owners

9. Risks
<The risk section defines everything that can or might go wrong. It may also include a list of
assumptions that might be wrong or need further information to be validated. This includes the
organizational, cultural, technical, or management challenges and ability to achieve the desired
business results. Each risk should be associated with a plan to mitigate the risk.>

Significant Unknown
<issue> <description> <mitigation>
Organizational Issues
<issue> <description> <mitigation>
Cultural Issues
<issue> <description> <mitigation>
Technical Issues
<issue> <description> <mitigation>
Management Issues
<issue> <description> <mitigation>
Ability to Achieve Results
<issue> <description> <mitigation>

10. Conclusions and Recommended Next Steps

<This section should complete the document with any major conclusions as well as any
recommended next steps or approved management actions. This document will be used
throughout the project(s) to guide and evaluate the results.>

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Copyright © 2005 by Beth Gold-Bernstein and William Ruh

Appendix A: References
<The appendix should list any reference documents used in the creation of the document so that
its contents can be traced back to their sources if necessary. This should be broken down into
internal documents and external documents. Internal documents are those that belong to the
organization. External documents are items such as articles, whitepapers, Web sites or product
documentation.>

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