The Open Group ‘Digital-First’ Virtual July Event – Highlights Blog

As an organization that is known for its world-class events and prides itself on bringing people together globally, this week The Open Group hosted its second virtual event following the success of the first ever #ogVIRTUAL in April.

It was fantastic to have over 2,100 attendees from 107 countries come together virtually to explore the topic of ‘Digital First’. Sessions and workshops were hosted by a plethora of industry experts and centered on the security, trust, and architectural issues which need to be considered when becoming a “Digital-First” organization.

TOGAF® CERTIFICATION MILESTONE – SOON TO REACH 100K GLOBALLY

The number of individuals certified in the TOGAF® Certification Program as of May 2020 is growing rapidly and about to surpass 100,000 – currently standing at 98,900. This includes certified individuals from 149 countries, with the most certifications awarded in the UK, USA, India, Netherlands, and Australia.

The TOGAF Standard, a standard of The Open Group, is a proven Enterprise Architecture (EA) methodology and framework, used by the world’s leading organizations to improve business efficiency. Representing a Body of Knowledge from world-leading practitioners, the latest TOGAF Standard, Version 9.2 is universally known as industry best practice.

EA and Agile – Not Mutually Exclusive After All!

Every organization needs to be Agile in order to handle all kind of forces and developments inside and outside the organization. Equally, organizations also need the structure and overarching view of an organization that is provided by Enterprise Architecture. and in particular, The TOGAF® standard, a standard of The Open Group. Both Lean and EA can make organizations more Agile, but work from a different, complementary perspective. By synergizing both EA and Lean knowledge, techniques, and people, many organizations are exploiting the strengths of both approaches.

A Case Study on the Origin of the IT4IT™ Standard

Like many of technology’s better creations, the IT4IT™ Reference Architecture standard was born out of necessity.

The IT landscape is continually shaped by innovation. Despite that being a cause for celebration for consumers and end-users, the introduction of these new technologies – such as the mainframe, the PC, client servers, the Internet, cloud computing, IoT, etc. – meant that the IT function had, effectively, lost track of what it needed to manage and control.

An open standard architecture-based approach to managing the business of IT was needed. This would have to be a holistic, end-to-end, service-based description of everything the IT function needs, and to be a good steward of all the IT components, solutions, and services within its remit. It was this issue that set in motion the train of events that brought us to where we are today. But there are no grounds for complacency. The work continues.

Even today the complexity and pervasiveness of, and the dependency on, IT systems continues to grow. In many cases, in many organizations today, the management solution is a loose collection of siloed processes. We are still not paying enough attention on how to remain in control. That is why the IT4IT standard is such an important instrument to manage IT, and why we have chosen to document how it came to be.

The Open Group San Antonio 2020 – Event Highlights

The Open Group hosted its latest event at the Marriott Riverwalk in the lively city of San Antonio, Texas. On January 27 – 30, we welcomed attendees from across the globe – including decision-makers, Enterprise Architects, Data Scientists, engineers, technologists, and end-users representing many businesses and governments – to explore how organizations can utilize their growing volume of data effectively and securely as part of a digital transformation program.

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