The literature on enterprise architecture (EA) posits that EA is of considerable value for organizations. However, while the EA literature documents a number of proposals for EA measurement solutions, there is little evidence-based research supporting their achievements and limitations.
This thesis aims at helping the EA community to understand the existing trends in EA measurement research and to recognize the existing gaps, limitations, and weaknesses in EA measurement solutions. Furthermore, this thesis aims to assist the EA community to design EA measurement solutions based on measurement and metrology best practices. The research goal of this thesis is to contribute to the EA body of knowledge by shaping new perspectives for future research avenues in EA measurement research.
To achieve the research goal, the following research objectives are defined:
1. To classify the EA measurement solutions into specific categories in order to identify research themes and explain the structure of the research area.
2. To evaluate the EA measurement solutions from a measurement and metrology perspective.
3. To identify the measurement and metrology issues in EA measurement solutions.
4. To propose a novel EA measurement approach based on measurement and metrology guidelines and best practices.
To achieve the first objective, this thesis conducts a systematic mapping study (SMS to help understand the state-of-the-art of EA measurement research and classify the research area in order to acquire a general understanding about the existing research trends.
To achieve the second and third objectives, this thesis conducts a systematic literature review (SLR) to evaluate the EA measurement solutions from a measurement and metrology perspective, and hence, to reveal the weaknesses of EA measurement solutions and propose relevant solutions to these weaknesses. To perform this evaluation, we develop an evaluation process based on combining both the components of the evolution theory and the concepts of measurement and metrology best practices, such as ISO 15939.
To achieve the fourth objective, we propose a mapping between two international standards:
• COSMIC - ISO/IEC 19761: a method for measuring the functional size of software.
• ArchiMate: a modelling language for EA.
This mapping results in proposing a novel EA measurement approach that overcomes the weaknesses and limitations found in the existing EA measurement solutions.
The research results demonstrate that:
1. The current publications on EA measurement are trending toward an increased focus on the “enterprise IT architecting” school of thought, lacks the rigorous terminology found in science and engineering and shows limited adoption of knowledge from other disciplines in the proposals of EA measurement solutions.
2. There is a lack of attention to attaining appropriate metrology properties in EA measurement proposals: all EA measurement proposals are characterized with insufficient metrology coverage scoring, theoretical and empirical definitions.
3. The proposed novel EA measurement approach demonstrates that it is handy for EA practitioners, and easy to adopt by organizations.
| Date | 31 Oct 2019 |
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| Original language | American English |
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| Awarding Institution | - École de technologie supérieure
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| Supervisor | Alain Abran (Supervisor) |
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Qasaimeh Abdallah, A. (Author),
Abran (Supervisor),
31 Oct 2019Student thesis: Doctoral thesis › Doctorate in Engineering: Engineering