CAS, instrumental rationality and enterprise architecture

Patterns emerge from natural chaos. When we look at how systems evolve, there is an inevitability of such emergence. When I am designing the enterprise architecture for my company, the value statements (such as Agile, SLA, SOA or any new buzzword in the architecture value system) are all secondary to the ultimate goal – business survival. The value statements, in some case, the vision statement you find in every architecture document, simply become justification, or for a better word, the instruments for advancing the organization survival goal. When the vendors come in with multi-million dollar project proposals, all the evaluation around such value system is just a game of negotiation and internal political process. The rituals and the artifacts of this game are no more significant than any other more obvious instruments such as haggling the price or looking around for capable software engineers who can deliver. The advances in cloud computing and service outsourcing will definitely change the “values” and future vision statement dramatically. To me, such emergence of new paradigm is inevitable in the dynamic technological field.

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