This is a Systems Architecture visual and a a format that we use repeatedly. A simple set of 10 building blocks, sometimes more depending on the environment, but it does not deviate from this structure.

It is quick to draw on a whiteboard or sheet of A3 and its an abstraction that allows everyone in a meeting to participate and begin to understand a complex IT infrastructure. The empty boxes hide the fact there are three distinct layers that move from physical things such as the Network to Applications used by IT’s customers.

Filling in the boxes helps make it a little more recognisable, each of these building blocks exists in almost any IT architecture. With it complete you can see it covers everything you will find in a corporate IT environment regardless if there are dedicated servers for each of these building blocks or you have a Small Business Server containing all of them.

Network and Compute provide our foundation and as IT has matured there is less need for details in this layer. Next, we have our Infrastructure applications such as:

Identity and Access Management.
Database services.
File and Print.

Finally, we have the applications that run our businesses and supported by the building blocks underneath them.

The first thing we need to do when working with almost any client, is understand the architecture, what are the main systems and who supports them. We are normally provided a very detailed network diagram and then told its out of date and not reflective of the current state. These diagrams are of value and should be maintained but, they are very complicated and do not support any planning or strategic exercise. The detail requires lots of explanation and tends to raise several roadblocks or objections to any change, thinking about changing anything becomes hard. We agree the devil is in the detail which is precisely why you need to elevate yourself above it if you are to successfully innovate, increase efficiency or change your service model.

With the basic structure in place you can begin to add details such as the specific software and version used or the IT provider that installed and supports it. You can also visualise how other key parts of IT management relate to your technical architecture.

Service Delivery sits between all of the technical stuff and IT’s customer, Operations Management is all of the activities that maintain and support the IT, and Governance is the policies and legislation that IT needs to adhere to or ensure the business complies with.

You might look at each of these areas of IT management individually but each of them will impact or be impacted by some or all your architecture building blocks.

Service Delivery - which of building blocks supports that service? Does it fulfil all the requirements for that service? How can we improve it? For example, how do we add self-service password resets to our Identity and Access Management solution?
Operations Management - how are we maintaining the technology? Are there any scheduled upgrades? What are the dependencies between the building blocks?
Governance - what policies are in place? Does the building block enforce or adhere to that policy? What legislation is relevant for the business? Are we compliant with the legislation?

From that simple diagram, we can begin to understand all aspects of an IT environment and all its complexity.

A simple view of Systems Architecture