SAP’s Marco Michel provides an in-depth analysis of the critical role that Enterprise Architecture (EA) plays in SAP's transformation journey into the cloud. Drawing from SAP's internal experience, Michel outlines the strategies and methodologies that have underpinned this transformative process. He emphasizes the importance of aligning enterprise architecture with SAP's broader business strategy, advocating for a comprehensive understanding of this strategy among architects.
The presentation delves into the necessity of adopting a cloud strategy that supports standardization and automation, enabling SAP to shift from custom-tailored solutions towards a more scalable and efficient cloud service model. Michel highlights the implementation of a capability-driven approach to streamline processes, reduce complexity, and ensure that technology investments are directly tied to strategic business outcomes. This session underscores the significance of governance, data architecture, and a holistic view of the IT portfolio in navigating the challenges and seizing the opportunities presented by the cloud transition.
Main Themes
These themes collectively outline a comprehensive approach to managing SAP's transformation into the cloud, emphasizing strategic alignment, education, simplification, the role of enterprise architecture, governance, and the strategic use of data.
Strategic Alignment and Understanding: The transformation from a solution company to a true cloud company and the emphasis on standardized platform functionality available via subscription align with the strategic alignment theme. SAP's move towards a cloud-first strategy, while not exclusively cloud-only, is highlighted as part of their strategic direction.
Education and Mindset Shift: The talk and slides emphasize the importance of educating the team and broader organization on SAP’s strategic direction towards the cloud, which is crucial for ensuring alignment and fostering a culture of continuous learning and adaptation.
Simplification and Standardization: The slides underscore the move towards simplification and standardization as part of SAP's cloud strategy. This includes leveraging SAP Business Technology Platform (BTP) as the foundation and following a principle of "one solution per capability" to support SAP's business capabilities.
Role of Enterprise Architecture: Enterprise Architecture's role is depicted as designing the end-to-end, enterprise-wide architecture to support business goals and ensuring that the target architecture and roadmap are aligned globally across processes, applications, and data.
Governance and Portfolio Management: The establishment of architecture governance mechanisms, such as the Architecture Review Board (ARB) and Design Review Board (DRB), to make educated architectural decisions, collect feedback, and ensure transparency is emphasized. This governance structure supports the strategic IT governance and portfolio management theme.
Data as a Strategic Asset: The importance of building a strong data foundation with the Intelligent Enterprise Data Platform and treating data as a valuable corporate resource is highlighted, aligning with the theme of treating data as a strategic asset.
Agility Within Governance: While the emphasis on agility within governance is not explicitly outlined in the slides, the introduction of governance boards and the strategic use of the LeanIX tool for architecture modeling suggest a framework that balances agility with the need for structured decision-making and alignment.
Remember:
"“The discipline of EA is more important than ever, a strong and business architecture focused EA Practice is key to drive SAP’s digital transformation” - Marco Michel
Access Presentation: Here
Watch the YouTube Video of Marco's Presentation: Here
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