An enterprise model is a digital representation of an organisation encompassing its structures, activities, processes, information, resources, people, behaviours, goals, and constraints. Enterprise models can be seen as versatile abstractions of complex enterprises that support communication, but also dissemination and reuse of knowledge. They help to connect linguistic and cognitive gaps between various inter- and intra-organisational stakeholders and also support the transformation of models into corresponding implementation level representations. To truly understand what enterprise modeling is about, we need to first understand the two main concepts – enterprise architecture and the art of modeling.
Capturing the essence of modeling
Modeling, at its core, is about abstraction – hiding complexity to focus on what is relevant for specific stakeholders and purposes. Bernd Mahr’s characterisation of modeling captures nicely its multifaceted nature:
1. Purpose of the model:
- Understanding
- Communication
- Agreement
2. Utility of the model:
- Analyse/Assess
- Plan/Design
- Explain/Explore/Predict
3. Domain of the model:
- Interest, experience, and perspective of a human
- Application or world accepted by a community of practise
- Discourse among some people
4. Context of the model:
- Personal context of the modeler
- Environmental context
- Social context
- Spatio-temporal context
A model is created by abstracting a concept or activity from the real world. By definition, the model represents reality but includes only those parts that are relevant to the stakeholders and serve a specific purpose. However, for a model to be effective, the modeler and its users must share a consistent interpretation of its elements.
“The purpose of abstraction is to hide complexity, but not to reduce complexity.”
The good old enterprise architecture
In the rapidly evolving landscape of the digital world, enterprise architecture is often seen as a relic of the past. But still, it remains a cornerstone for organisations striving to align technology with business objectives. The core principles of EA are more relevant than ever in today’s fast-paced and data-centric world.
At its core, enterprise architecture is about creating a blueprint that aligns IT systems, data, business processes, and strategic goals. Enterprise architecture can be seen as a trinity of processes, data and technologies. It offers a structured approach to understanding the “big picture,” ensuring that all moving parts of an organisation work harmoniously.
Moreover, the challenges EA aims to address—managing complexity, avoiding redundancy, and driving efficiency—remain universal. In fact, these issues are amplified in modern environments characterised by fragmented ecosystems and decentralised operations. EA provides the discipline to tame this complexity.
The good old enterprise architecture isn’t a relic—it’s a foundation. Its value lies in its ability to evolve, guiding organisations through change while preserving the cohesion and strategic focus that businesses need to thrive.
Three disciplines, three disconnected modeling acts
“Business data without business process is hollow, and business process without business data is blind”
Currently, we are often modeling all the dimensions of enterprise architecture: Processes, data and applications/systems. However, the problem is that all three modeling acts are often done in silos, although the real value exists at the crossroads of these modeling acts.
Enterprise Architects have great technology diagrams showing the system architectures and the lifecycle of various IT services. In some occasions, processes and data exist, but they are treated as second-class citizens due to a high bias towards the technology landscape.
Data people are so busy building data models that sometimes we don’t even stop to think about what we are actually modeling and for who. Are we building a conceptual or logical model? And is the logic of logical modeling about the logic of system, business or information?
Business process modeling is often mistakenly equated with process mining, even though they are distinct yet complementary activities. And once again, we should pause to consider whether we are truly modeling business processes, digital processes, system processes, or data processes.
The ambiguity and vagueness we are trying to avoid in the modeling are often one big reason we fail before we even get to the actual modeling work.
Make enterprise modeling great again
“What is not made explicit is implicit, which allows everyone to make assumptions. Incorrect assumptions are sources of miscommunication and misunderstanding.”
John Zachmann
Effective enterprise modeling starts with language. In order for us to understand each other, we need to either speak the same language or have a translator in use. This same applies to creating the business language used for modeling. We can either aim towards a common language, a lingua franca or build business-specific tribal languages and bring them together. In the ontology world, upper and domain ontologies are a good example of such.
A good enterprise model creates an interconnected trinity of process, data and technology. Understanding the relationship between these three builds a great foundation for enterprise modeling. Data is actually “just” a digital representation of a business event or entity. And systems exist to run these processes digitally with data. Understanding how processes produce and consume data, and how that data connects to the system level enables us to build a comprehensive understanding of how the organisation actually operates.
Conclusions
In today’s corporate world, Enterprise Architects tend to be quite heavily leaning towards technology architecture. Data and Information Architects live deep in their data silos. And business process architecture is adrift. Still, in order to truly steer the organisation in the right direction, we should bring together the three musketeers of enterprise architecture to build a comprehensive enterprise model that could build a digital twin of an organisation and enable utilisation of the full potential.