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Technology Strategy Patterns

Technology Strategy Patterns

by Eben Hewitt
Publisher: O'Reilly Media, Inc.
Release Date: October 2018
ISBN: 9781492040866
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Book Description

Technologists who want their ideas heard, understood, and funded are often told to speak the language of business—without really knowing what that is. This book’s toolkit provides architects, product managers, technology managers, and executives with a shared language—in the form of repeatable, practical patterns and templates—to produce great technology strategies.

Author Eben Hewitt developed 39 patterns over the course of a decade in his work as CTO, CIO, and chief architect for several global tech companies. With these proven tools, you can define, create, elaborate, refine, and communicate your architecture goals, plans, and approach in a way that executives can readily understand, approve, and execute.

This book covers:

  • Architecture and strategy: Adopt a strategic architectural mindset to make a meaningful material impact
  • Creating your strategy: Define the components of your technology strategy using proven patterns
  • Communicating the strategy: Convey your technology strategy in a compelling way to a variety of audiences
  • Bringing it all together: Employ patterns individually or in clusters for specific problems; use the complete framework for a comprehensive strategy

Table of Contents

  1. Preface
    1. Welcome
      1. Intended Audience
      2. Purpose of the Book
    2. Conventions Used in This Book
    3. Using Code Examples
    4. O’Reilly Safari
    5. How to Contact Us
    6. Acknowledgments
  2. Introduction
    1. This Is Water
    2. Discovering Strategy
    3. Driving Strategy with Patterns
  3. I. Context: Architecture and Strategy
    1. The Origins of Patterns
    2. Applying the Patterns
  4. 1. Architect and Strategist
    1. Business Strategies
      1. Marketing at Michelin
      2. Acquisition and Integration at Oracle
      3. Differentiation at Xerox and Canon
    2. The Architect’s Role
      1. Vitruvius and the Principles of Architecture
      2. Three Concerns of the Architect
    3. The Strategist’s Role
      1. The Triumvirate: Strategy, Culture, and Execution
    4. Summary
  5. II. Creating the Strategy
    1. A Logical Architecture of the Creation Patterns
  6. 2. Analysis
    1. MECE
      1. Applying MECE Lists
    2. Logic Tree
      1. Diagnostic Logic Tree
      2. Solution Logic Tree
      3. Creating the Tree
      4. Problems Versus Opportunities
    3. Hypothesis
      1. The Five Questions
      2. 1. The Conjunct of Propositions Describing the Problem
      3. 2. The Semantics Characterizing These Propositions
      4. 3. Possible Outcomes
      5. 4. Probability of Each Outcome
      6. 5. Ease and Impact Scoring
      7. Signal and Noise
      8. Context
      9. Objects and Relations
    4. Strategic Analysis as Machine Learning
    5. Summary
  7. 3. World Context
    1. PESTEL
      1. Creating the PESTEL
      2. Researching for PESTEL
      3. Applying the PESTEL
    2. Scenario Planning
      1. Steps for Scenario Planning
    3. Futures Funnel
    4. Backcasting
    5. Summary
  8. 4. Industry Context
    1. SWOT
    2. Porter’s Five Forces
      1. Threat of New Entrants
      2. Ease of Substitution
      3. Bargaining Power of Customers
      4. Bargaining Power of Suppliers
      5. Industry Rivalry
      6. Applying the Five Forces
    3. Ansoff Growth Matrix
    4. Summary
  9. 5. Corporate Context
    1. Stakeholder Alignment
      1. Determining Stakeholders
      2. Determining Drivers
      3. Stakeholder List
      4. Stakeholder Matrix
    2. RACI
      1. Alignment Meetings
    3. Life Cycle Stage
    4. Value Chain
      1. Maximizing Efficiency
      2. Supporting Functions
      3. Applying the Value Chain
    5. Growth-Share Matrix
    6. Core/Innovation Wave
    7. Investment Map
    8. Summary
  10. 6. Department Context
    1. Principles, Practices, Tools
      1. Principles
      2. Example: NASA Strategy
      3. Current and Future Model
      4. The Principles, Practices, Tools Sankey Diagram
      5. Business Process Mapping
      6. The Law of the Product of Probabilities
    2. Application Portfolio Management
      1. Planning with Asset Classes
      2. Capability Mapping
      3. Business and Technology Attributes
      4. Project Heat Map
    3. Summary
  11. III. Communicating the Strategy
  12. 7. Approach Patterns
    1. 30-Second Answer
    2. Rented Brain
    3. Ars Rhetorica
      1. Logical Fallacies
    4. Fait Accompli
      1. Facing a Cold Audience
      2. The Meeting Before
    5. Dramatic Structure
      1. Establish the Status Quo
      2. Create an Inciting Incident
      3. The Plan
      4. Shock and Awe
    6. Deconstruction
      1. Three Levels of Problems
      2. Three Causes of Problems
      3. Semiotics: Signs and Symbols
      4. Scopes Without Center
      5. The World as System: Synthetic Decomposition
    7. Scalable Business Machines
      1. Business as System
      2. The Origin Theory
      3. Aspects of the Scalable Business Machine
      4. Executing
    8. Summary
  13. 8. Templates
    1. One-Slider
    2. Use Case Map
    3. Directional Costing
      1. Rough, Refined, Realistic Estimates
      2. Estimate Template
    4. Priority Map
    5. Technology Radar
    6. Build/Buy/Partner
      1. Build
      2. Buy
      3. Partner
    7. Due Diligence
      1. Internal Use
    8. Architecture Definition
      1. The Template
      2. Executable Architectures
    9. Summary
  14. 9. Decks
    1. Ghost Deck
    2. Ask Deck
    3. Strategy Deck
    4. Roadmap
    5. Tactical Plan
      1. MergeSort Meeting
  15. 10. Bringing It All Together
    1. Patterns Map
    2. Conclusion
  16. A. Recommended Reading
    1. Strategy Books
    2. Consulting Books
    3. Philosophy Books
  17. Index