The business capability model defines what a business does. It represents a blueprint of business capabilities for a business. The capability model (map) illustrates a set of distinct capabilities, typically organized in a hierarchical tree format, that are independent of organization structures, and resources (e.g. people, business processes, products and IT systems) but can be viewed as a container for all the organization resources (tangible or intangible). The capability Model broadens the strategic perspectives and can be used to help an enterprise in strategic analysis and planning. Executives involved with high level strategic analysis of their organizations can make use of it to identify emerging opportunities and can use it to serve as a communication medium to align business with IT and prioritize initiatives/projects.

Once the capability model is established, Enterprise/Business architects can create many capability maps to help planners do their job of strategic planning, business design and analysis. For example, architects can use Enterprise Evolver to create following four maps to support the strategic planning, and business – IT alignment quickly.

  1. Goals- Capability map – This view provides traceability of capabilities back to the goals of the enterprise. The strategic goals define the end and capabilities provide the means to achieve those ends. Using this view, strategic planners can understand what goals are achieved through what capabilities and what capabilities need to be prioritized for enhancement.
    A map to track capabilities support back to the Goals and Strategy.

    A map to track capabilities support back to the Goals and Strategy.

  2. Capability- Initiative map– This view provides an understanding of degree of change to a business that will be needed to execute a strategic goal captured in the above map. The Capability- Initiative map can be used to detect redundant capabilities being delivered or enhanced by multiple projects simultaneously. This information helps identify opportunity to combine efforts and projects. The map helps enterprise leaders to better understand the impacts of changes on capabilities and the cost for building or enhancing a capability.
    Capability Initiative Impact Map

    Capability Initiative Impact Map

  3. Business-IT alignment map– This view depicts how capabilities are supported by business processes and IT resources (e.g. systems, business information, people, services etc.) . In the picture below, on the right side, you see big picture view illustrating how capabilities are implemented in business process/activities and what resources in terms of application systems, business information and people are used to support the activities. On the right side, instead of viewing the big picture, a view is shown for just one capability. Filters allow you to view a subset of a map. You can apply multiple filters at any map’s abstraction layer.
    Depiction of how capabilities are supported by business processes and IT resources .

    Depiction of how capabilities are supported by business processes and IT resources .

  4. Capability Heatmap – Heatmapping is a separate function in Enterprise Evolver for creating heatmaps for any organization element (e.g. capability, application, skill etc.). You can use this feature to create capability heatmap , for example you can create a capability heatmap to focus on critical opportunities for technology investment and skill upgrades or a heatmap of customers jobs and outcome to identify opportunities. The color schemes used in generating heatmaps can be used to signify weakness or maturity in capabilities. Multiples dimensions can be used to rate capabilities by assigning weights and scores with a built-in calculator. Capability heatmap can also be viewed graphically (see picture below on the right side) .
Capabilities Heatmap to focus on critical opportunities

Capabilities Heatmap to focus on critical opportunities

 

There are other capability maps as well that can be created to support business evolution. In many industry, strategist and executives see the bulk of revenue coming from emerging markets . Enterprise/Business architects have a vital role to play help their stakeholders to accelerate business growth in emerging markets. Capability map can be also used to accelerate capability development effort in emerging market. To win in an emerging market, success is depends upon how quickly organizations can build new capabilities or replicate existing capabilities with few changes in the supporting resources. Enterprise/Business Architects can create a capability map focusing the need of emerging markets; they can use the Map compare feature of the app to depict the gaps between existing capability map with the emerging market capability map .

Watch this brief video to understand how you can do capability modelling in Enterprise Evolver.

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