“Unified” organizations bring it all together.  Their needs for integration of data across business units and standardization of processes are both high.  Dow Chemical is an example used by the Enterprise Architecture as Strategy authors.  Dow cross-sells products within regions, so it needs excellent data integration, and it sells the same products, via standardized processes, in more than 175 countries around the world.  Sixty percent of Dow’s work processes are standardized and five of its eight global processes are housed in a shared-services organization.  Dow has achieved enormous bottom-line efficiencies by focusing on both data integration and process standardization…as well as shared services!

Of course there are hybrid situations as well.  Some companies employ one model for certain functions and another for others.  Once you’ve established where you fit in, or where you should fit in from the standpoint of your operating model, defining process and IT strategies becomes much easier. 

We would like to hear your thoughts and ideas.  It could be interesting to discuss some more examples of where public and private sector organizations fit in, and why.  Where does your organization fit into the MIT framework?  What about companies like Wal-Mart and Dell?  And what about public sector organizations?  How about universities?  Or utility companies?

The “Replication” model on the lower right is for organizations whose success depends on efficient and repeatable processes, but not on shared customer relationships. McDonald’s and other franchise operations are clear examples of this type of organization. Repeat the process meticulously and make sure that the experience is consistent at each company outlet and you’ve got a winning formula for success!

TD Bankworth, also described in the Enterprise Architecture as Strategy book, represents a financial services organization that found a Replication framework to best support its growth strategy. The organization transitioned from a Diversification to a Replication model because the latter enabled it to make efficient and effective acquisitions, and to get new branches up and running quickly.

Stay tuned for the next post, and last in this series, which covers the Unification Model.