Browsing by Author "Bommel, Patrick van"

Now showing 1 - 7 of 7
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    Applying Soft Systems Methodology in Enterprise Architecture Creation Workshops
    (Enterprise modelling and information systems architectures, 2011) Nakakawa, Agnes; Bommel, Patrick van; Proper, H.A. Erik
    Lack of effective involvement of stakeholders is one of the main drawbacks of enterprise architecture initiatives. Ongoing attempts to overcome this involve using Collaboration Engineering to develop a collaboration process that enterprise architects can execute to facilitate collaborative sessions with stakeholders during architecture creation. However, a field study evaluation of this process revealed that it offered inadequate support for stirring vigorous and rigorous discussions during activities that required organizing and assessing problem or solution aspects that resulted from brainstorming activities. Since Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) helps to structure rational thinking about messy situations, its techniques can be adapted to supplement the design of the collaboration process with support for triggering discussions and creating a shared understanding and vision among stakeholders. This paper therefore presents a script that shows how this can be done, and discusses its evaluation in a real case.
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    Challenges of Involving Stakeholders When Creating Enterprise Architecture
    (SIKS/BENAIS Conference, 2010) Nakakawa, Agnes; Bommel, Patrick van; Proper, H.A. Erik
    Although researchers report challenges that occur during enterprise architecture development (in general), there is lack of an elaborate description of those that occur during enterprise architecture creation – particularly if organizational stakeholders are to be deeply involved. Yet understanding challenges of involving organizational stakeholders when creating enterprise architecture is a prerequisite for devising a relevant solution to enterprise architects. An exploratory survey was therefore conducted with the aim of investigating challenges that enterprise architects face when they involve organizational stakeholders during enterprise architecture creation. This paper presents and discusses findings from the survey. The survey results generally indicate why 90% of enterprise architects face challenges when delivering products of enterprise architecture creation, although 96% of architects closely collaborate with organizational stakeholders during enterprise architecture creation.
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    On Supporting Collaborative Problem Solving in Enterprise Architecture Creation
    (Springer Berlin Heidelberg, 2010) Nakakawa, Agnes; Bommel, Patrick van; Proper, H.A. Erik
    Creating enterprise architecture can be perceived as a creative problem solving task, since it involves managing organizational complexity and inflexibility by devising a synergic solution from all organizational units. Creative (or collaborative) problem solving in several fields has been supported by supplementing domain specific techniques with functionalities of a Group Support System (GSS). This paper aims to demonstrate how GSSs can also be used to support collaborative problem solving in enterprise architecture creation. Using the Design Science research methodology, a method was designed to support collaborative problem solving during architecture creation. This method draws from enterprise architecture approaches that are used in practice, and collaborative problem solving theories in academia. It has been evaluated using an experiment and two real life cases. This paper presents findings from this evaluation. The findings were used to refine the method, and they indicate that the effectiveness of academia-based artifacts in addressing problems encountered in practice, can only be achieved through continuous and diverse evaluation of these artifacts in practice.
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    Relating Visual Disability and the Web
    (ITA, 2007) Baguma, Rehema; Bommel, Patrick van; Wanyama, Tom; Patrick, Ogao
    Despite the fact that the proportion of people with disabilities in society has been increasing, many critical online public activities are not readily available to them. Much as a large body of literature has examined the overall impact of visual disability on functional status and quality of life including Web usage, few published studies have explicitly investigated the relationship between visual disability and Web-based tasks. Moreover, the available Web Accessibility guidelines to-date lack coherence and simplicity for easy comprehension and application in Web application design for different disability groups. For example the primary reference guidelines – that is the Web Content accessibility guidelines (WCAG) is organized arbitrarily with no distinct sections according to types of disabilities covered. This makes such guidelines hard to understand and apply by Web content developers. This paper examines how properties of Web applications affect users with various visual disabilities. The goal of this study was to understand the problems faced by Web users with visual disabilities and how the problems can be addressed in Web development tasks. Understanding the relationship between visual disability and Web applications is an important foundation for further research considerations on how to make the Web more accessible to people with visual disabilities. Such considerations may include but not limited to: development of concise visual accessibility indicators and associated design techniques. The paper is organized into six sections namely: introduction; methodology; related work, properties of Visual disability and Web applications, the relationship between visual disability and properties of Web applications; Conclusion and future Work.
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    Repeatable Collaboration Processes for Mature Organizational Policy Making
    (Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg., 2008) Nabukenya, Josephine; Bommel, Patrick van; Proper, H.A. Erik
    Organizational policy making processes are complex processes in which many people are involved. Very often the results of these processes are not what the different stakeholders intended. Since policies play a major role in key decision making concerning the future of organizations, our research aims at improving the policies on the basis of collaboration.In order to achieve this goal, we apply the practice of collaboration engineering to the field of organizational policy making. We use the thinklet as a basic building block for facilitating intervention to create a repeatable pattern of collaboration among people working together towards achieving a goal. Our case studies show that policy making processes do need collaboration support indeed and that the resulting policies can be expected to improve.
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    A Theory-Driven Design Approach to Collaborative Policy Making Processes
    (IEEE., 2009) Nabukenya, Josephine; Bommel, Patrick van; Proper, H. A. (Erik)
    In this paper, we consider improving collaborative policy making processes. We suggest Collaboration Engineering (CE) as an approach that can be useful in enhancing these processes. However, CE needs a theoretical basis to guide the design. This basis is provided by the quality dimensions and the causal theory. We therefore present a theory that provides an understanding of what makes good policies in policy making. This understanding should lead to design choices that should be taken into account to design quality collaborative policy making processes.To determine the quality dimensions of good policies, we use field exploratory studies and literature in the policy making domain research. Furthermore, we consider cause and effect relationships for these quality dimensions to derive the theory.
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    Towards a Theory on Collaborative Decision Making in Enterprise Architecture
    (Springer Berlin Heidelberg, 2010) Nakakawa, Agnes; Bommel, Patrick van; Proper, Erik
    Several challenges in enterprise architecture development indicate the need for collaborative decision making to be deployed during architecture creation. However, how this should be achieved remains ad hoc. This paper, therefore, presents an evolving theory that is currently being used to guide the development of a method for supporting collaborative decision making during enterprise architecture creation. The first iteration to evaluate the relevance of the concepts in this theory was done using an exploratory survey, and the findings are briefly presented.