Ein Architekt in der Schweiz

OK, I'm off to Switzerland to do an extremely interesting project - which is of course, as we know the Swiss, ultimately confidential and therefore you will not read much about it.

If someone knows an address where I can buy a copy of "Asterix chez les Helvètes", I hold myself recommended. Still need to buy my half-fare card as well.

Just a few general opinions on the cultural differences I have noticed till now. Most of the clichés on the country appear to have some truth to them. In quite a few business letters I received till now (mostly to arrange a few private affairs), I am treatened with all kinds of consequences in the second last sentence if I do not comply with procedures within a defined period. As in "if you drop your piece of bread in the fondue for the third time, you will be thrown into the lake". Not that any of these consequences would be less grave in Belgium, but we usually do not feel the need to mention them explicitly on the first business letter.

I am very impressed by the efficiency of business processes (which seem to be well thought through in advance of operating them) and the high quality of service I generally receive, for example the service I get from my Swiss bank. Swiss banks truly operate in another league in that field. I don't see a lot of difference in the front-office, in both countries front-office staff will do whatever is in their power to help their customers, but at my Swiss bank, the back-office seems to be much better aligned. And even construction workers have delivered on the promised date (twice already). Flexibility in responding to unanticipated customer requests is a bit less, though.

The way politics are close to life has impressed me as well. Although I obviously have no right to vote, I receive about 10 times as much leaflets from political parties and initiative committees as I do in Belgium, where only the extreme right party goes through the trouble of writing and posting leaflets instead of limiting themselves to group-chats in their local café. These leaflets explain the stakes really well if you combine the for and against arguments from different parties. The direct democracy seems able to make though decisions, reinforces the sense of community and if you gather enough signatures within a defined time period, any group of people can launch their own political initiative. The opposition parties have a more active role than just decrying shame on the coalition in force. Subsidiarity between gemeinde, cantons and bund is a frequent topic of debate, though. Seems like a nice idea for my country as well, as it forces politicians to explain their voting recommendation clearly to the public instead of cooking up ugly compromises among themselves in some secluded chateau. For which they know they won't be punished until the next election, when everyone has forgotten the stakes and the stands. I learned that the local Jean Marie DD is called Christoph Blocher.

More impressions will follow as I go. I hope I will keep noticing the differences.

Evolutionary and Structured

One enduring problem of architects, and enterprise architects in particular, is we tend to perceive our enterprise (cfr. TOGAF for a definition) as something we can/must structure to optimize it. Using an enterprise architecture framework, for example.

Time to look around: most of the things you will see around you have been improved by evolution, i.e. successive generations of selection, recombination and mutation. Seriously, look around. This blogging application. Your workstation. The chair you are sitting on. Your keyboard evolved from the typewriter. Also, there were many lesser designs on the way.

Which designs survive, is sometimes determined by great ideas, sometimes by pure coincidence. A bit of marketing may help, also.

Lately, I tend to take the view that filling up an enterprise framework can be done really, really shallow, then select a few (max. 3) focus areas for being inspired by evolution. It is enough to find a few champions, coordinate their work just enough, realize a few designs that you can breed with. Changing surroundings may do the rest, and weed out some competing organisms. If you pick the right genes to start with, of course.

What is really shallow ? 2 levels of business process, 2 levels of roles, without sequencing and only the most important business documents = a business architecture. An application list with a few features and interfaces for each application = an application architecture. A technical components list and a preferred technology list = a technical architecture. A list of infrastructure platforms and databases = an infrastructure architecture. You can't do a thorough impact analysis on that, or present an architectural business case with several solution scenarios, but it may be enough to build a common understanding and get evolution going. Then, structure only the parts where this brings a real advantage to the development process itself.

How come ? It's important to be understood by most colleagues. It's not important to have everything documented. It's important to be fast. It's important to have essential things documented. It's not important to be rigidly structured (forget large-scale reuse first). It's important to adapt to what happens around you. As an enterprise and as an architect within it. Especially if it's chaotic. It's important to tell a story. Of just a few essential projects that worked. It's important to have essential team discipline. It's important to open freedom of imagination. It's important to feed ownership. It's important to have just enough common reference to communicate.

Keeping the right balance depends on the wind strength, but also on its variability.