Role and Perception of Enterprise Architects Needs to Align Better with Business Goals, Panel Discovers

The Open Group, a vendor- and technology-neutral consortium, held its 22nd annual Enterprise Architecture Practitioner's Conference in London, England in April 22. This panel discussion podcast, "Resisting Short-term Thinking: Rationalizing Investments in Enterprise Architecture During a Recession," uncovered insights into how enterprise architects can help businesses and IT departments during periods of turmoil. The challenge for EA is to be able to balance the long-term goals against the pressing short-term needs of the business. There are intense commercial pressures right now to reduce costs at a time when capital expenditure is severely constrained. Operational efficiency has become an imperative, but agility and speed to market are equally as important. Join Kevin White, contributing editor to Computer Business Review in the UK, as he moderates the panel. Guests include Henry Peyret, principal analyst at Forrester Research; Phil Pavitt, the group CIO for Transport for London; Thomas Obitz, a principal architect at Infosys; Mike Turner, enterprise architect at Capgemini, and Terry Blevins, a senior principal information systems engineer at MITRE and Open Group Customer Council Board member. Listen here or read a full transcript of the discussion at: http://briefingsdirect.blogspot.com/2009/05/enterprise-architecture-strategy-aligns.html. Sponsor: The Open Group.