=Paper=
{{Paper
|id=Vol-479/paper-5
|storemode=property
|title=Inter-Organizational Alignment with e3alignment
|pdfUrl=https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-479/paper5.pdf
|volume=Vol-479
}}
==Inter-Organizational Alignment with e3alignment==
https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-479/paper5.pdf
Inter-Organizational alignment with e3 alignment
Vincent Pijpers
Free University, FEW/Business Informatics, De Boelelaan 1083a, 1081 HV
Amsterdam, The Netherlands. (v.pijpers)@few.vu.nl.
Abstract. In this paper the e3 alignment framework is presented. The
e3 alignment framework is designed for alignment between organizations
operating within a value web, which is also known as inter-organizational
alignment. The e3 alignment framework focuses on the interaction be-
tween these organizations to create alignment. In addition, e3 alignment
considers four different types of interaction. To analyze and trace changes
over these types of interactions, various conceptual modeling techniques
are utilized.
1 Introduction
Business-IT alignment is a broad concept [4], but in general the improvement of
coherence between business processes and information systems is meant. To do
so, the first condition is that there is alignment within the business and IT them
self. So business-IT alignment is not only improving coherence between busi-
ness and IT, but also within both business and IT [5]. In addition, business-IT
alignment is traditionally more concerned with the alignment within a single or-
ganization. However, nowadays organizations increasingly operate in value webs,
in which multiple organizations cooperate to meet complex customer needs [14].
Yet, for these value webs to be successful, the organizations need to be properly
aligned [6, 18]. For organizations participating in a value web, I argue with the
e3 alignment framework that we need to focus on the interaction between these
organizations to create inter-organizational alignment. I reason so, since one of
the success factors of a value web is that each actor involved should be able to
make a sustainable profit, and does so by interacting with the other organizations
in the value web, e.g. by exchanging objects of economic value [6].
The e3 alignment approach takes four different perspectives on “interaction”
into account, since there is no single type of interaction (e.g. information ex-
changes and economic value transfers are different kinds of interactions). By do-
ing so, we also separate concerns. In other words: per perspective, e3 alignment
focuses on one specific type of interaction. Separating concerns is well-known
in the field of requirements engineering (see [10]). In e3 alignment the following
perspectives are taken on interaction: 1) a strategic perspective, to understand
the strategic influence of organizations on other organizations; 2) a value per-
spective, to understand the things of economic value exchanged between the
organizations in the value web; 3) a process perspective, to understand the order
2 Proceedings of CAISE-DC 2009
and activities behind the interactions; 4) an IS perspective, to understand the
IT enabled exchange of information between organizations.
By focusing on interaction, e3 alignment takes an external view on alignment,
or inter-organizational alignment [5]. Inter-organizational alignment is concerned
with the alignment between actors within a value web. In contrast, an internal
view on alignment, or intra-organizational alignment, focuses on the alignment
within a single organization [5], which is the main concern of most traditional
business-IT alignment frameworks (e.g. [7]). The e3 alignment approach includes
both forms of business-IT alignment: (1) alignment within one of the perspec-
tives on interaction, which is concerned with aligning interactions between actors
as seen from a single perspective [5]; (2) alignment between two, or more, of the
perspectives on interaction, which is concerned with alignment between perspec-
tives [5], for instance between the value and IS perspective. Creating alignment,
or consistency, between perspectives is well-known in the field of requirements
engineering and is a direct result of separating concerns (see [10]).
To actually create inter-organizational alignment a number of steps should
be taken, which are based on the requirements engineering cycle (see [15]): 1)
alignment problem analysis, in which the alignment problems are analyzed; 2)
alignment solution design, in which (alternative) solutions are found; 3) im-
pact analysis, in which the impact of the proposed solutions is analyzed. To
actually create alignment these steps should be performed over a number of it-
erations. Furthermore, I reason with e3 alignment that conceptual modeling tech-
niques should be used to actually execute the process of alignment. e3 alignment
utilizes light-weight, yet ontological well founded, modeling techniques. Utilizing
modeling techniques enables us to create shared understanding among stakehold-
ers [3], allows for traceability of changes over the perspectives [10], and closely
resemble the way-of-working in information system design. The following model-
ing techniques are utilized: e3 forces [11], e3 value [6], UML Activity Diagrams [2],
and IS architectures [17].
The paper is structured as follows: First, research problems will be discussed.
Second, the e3 alignment framework will be presented. Hereafter, the relation-
ships between the perspectives on interaction will be discussed. The paper ends
with lessons learned, in which we reflect on the practical usability of e3 alignment,
identify future research directions and present conclusions.
2 Research Approach
Companies are increasingly participating in value webs; these are sets of orga-
nizations which collaborate to jointly satisfy a complex customer need [14]. Re-
cently, Chan and Reich [4] published an article summarizing and analyzing over
150 articles concerned with aligning business and IT in organizations. However,
most of the work identified by Chan and Reich [4] on business-IT alignment
focuses just on alignment concerns within single organizations, neglecting the
environment in which these organizations operate. To this end, I argue that
alignment issues also exist between multiple enterprises. Subsequently making
Proceedings of CAISE-DC 2009 3
the overall research question: how to achieve business-IT alignment between
multiple organizations? Furthermore, among the directions for future research,
discussed by Chan and Reich [4], was “examining the process of alignment”.
Part of such a alignment process is the exploration phase in which alignment
issues are elicited and (alternative) solutions are considered for improving align-
ment [18]. This phase is often referred to as the early requirements engineering
phase, in which the business context is analyzed to elicit business requirements,
which ultimately are satisfied by information systems [6, 18]. Subsequently the
specific research problem is: How to deal with business-IT alignment issues in
such an early phase, characterized by limited availability of information about
the case at hand, time constraints, and high uncertainty [13]?
To deal with this specific research problem first a number of exploratory
case studies have been performed to determine what (eg. which perspectives)
is important to consider in the early phases of inter-organizational business-IT
alignment. Furthermore, these case studies were also used to analyze the relation-
ships between the various perspectives. Such knowledge is required to determine
if there is mis-alignment between the perspectives. Based on these findings the
e3 alignment framework and approach were created. Hereafter e3 alignment was
tested on industrial strength case studies within the Dutch aviation sector and
Spanish electricity sector.
3 The e3 alignment Framework
To cope with the two aforementioned research problems, we introduce e3 alignment.
With e3 alignment , it is possible to explore a wide range of inter-organizational
alignment issues concerning the interaction between organizations, and their in-
formation systems, in a value web, seen from multiple perspectives, and with the
aid of modeling techniques. To understand the philosophy behind e3 alignment we
present the model in figure 1. The model shows the key features of e3 alignment
:
– e3 alignment is concerned with creating alignment, or coherence, between or-
ganizations operating in a value web by focusing on the interaction between
these organizations (see section 3.1). In figure 1, these interactions are rep-
resented by the horizontal lines.
– e3 alignment takes four different perspectives on interaction between orga-
nizations: a strategic, value, process, and IS perspective (see section 3.2).
For each perspective there is a horizontal line in figure 1, representing the
interactions considered by such a perspective.
– To understand and analyze each of the four perspectives on interaction, per
perspective a conceptual modeling technique is utilized, as stated in the
brackets per horizontal line in figure 1.
– Since we take multiple perspectives on interaction, e3 alignment creates align-
ment between organization within a single perspective (the horizontal ar-
rows) and alignment between perspectives (the vertical arrows in figure 1).
4 Proceedings of CAISE-DC 2009
Fig. 1. The e3 alignment Framework
We explain the two types on alignment in more detail and with examples in
section 4.
3.1 Interaction Between Actors in Networks
Since organizations increasingly operate in value webs [14], e3 alignment takes a
network perspective on alignment. In essence, a network is a number of nodes
which are connected. In both the business and IT literature, nodes are often
referred to as actors. An actor can be a variety of things, an actor can be an
organization, but also an actual person or even a piece of hardware [2].
A second key element of networks is the interaction between actors, which is
the key focus of e3 alignment . Interaction between actors is represented in figure
1 by the horizontal lines. There is interaction between two actors if one actor
somehow influences the other.
3.2 Multiple Perspectives
Interaction is a fairly generic construct. Furthermore, it has been dealt with in
both business and IT literature. Interaction is expressed in business literature
ranging from supply chain literature where objects of value are exchanged be-
tween actors (e.g. [9]) to strategic literature where actors influence each other
on a strategic level (e.g. [12]). In IT literature, interaction is often considered
from an information viewpoint where information is exchanged between actors
(e.g. [2]) or a process viewpoint where the sequence of interactions is considered
(e.g. [16]).
Since various conceptualizations of interaction exist to address various stake-
holder concerns, e3 alignment separates these concerns by taking different per-
spectives on interaction. Each perspective analyzes a different type of interaction
between organizations. The benefit of separating concerns is that (large) com-
plex issues are reduced in more comprehensible issues, making it easier to focus
on the key elements. To cover the wide range of interactions between actors in
a network, four different types of interaction are considered in e3 alignment (see
the horizontal arrows in figure 1):
– The Business Strategy perspective, which considers how other organizations
influence the strategic position of an organization. This type of interaction
Proceedings of CAISE-DC 2009 5
is taken into consideration in e3 alignment , since it shows how organizations
influence each other on the long term.
– The Value Creation perspective, which considers how value is created by
the value web in which the organization operates. This type of interaction
is taken into consideration since it shows the things of economic value ex-
changed between actors in a network to ultimately be able to meet a customer
need.
– The Process perspective, which considers the cross-organizational coordina-
tion processes to support the value creation. This type of interaction is taken
into consideration in e3 alignment since this view on interactions shows the
actual physical transfer of objects and takes “time” into consideration, such
that the activities behind the interactions and sequence of interactions can
be considered.
– The IT/IS perspective, which considers information systems and technolo-
gies used to interact with the environment to exchange information. This
type of interaction is taken into consideration since it will enable us to shows
which part of the exchange of objects (e.g. information) is facilitated by in-
formation technology.
4 Inter-organizational Alignment
4.1 Modeling Techniques
For each type of interaction considered for inter-organizational alignment, a mod-
eling technique is given (between brackets in figure 1). To be able to execute the
process of business-IT alignment, e3 alignment departs from traditional align-
ment frameworks by actually introducing techniques and methods for creating
alignment. The e3 alignment approach considers for each type of interaction a
specific modeling technique. The benefit of utilizing known modeling techniques
is that we can easily create more shared understanding over various aspects of
the value web at hand [3]. In addition, we can trace changes over the four per-
spectives to better understand the consequences of design choices within one of
the perspectives [10]. Finally, by choosing this model-based approach, we closely
resemble the way-of-working in information system design, so the models devel-
oped provide a suitable starting point for further design and implement ion of
the information systems needed to enable the value web. The following modeling
techniques are utilized:
– e3 forces for the strategic perspective, which shows from a strategic per-
spective how organizations influence the value offerings of other organiza-
tions [11].
– e3 value for the value perspective, which shows what of value is exchanged
between actors in a value web to meet customer needs [6].
– UML activity diagrams for the process perspective, which shows the coordi-
nation process and activities executed to enable the value creation [2].
– IS architectures for the IS perspective, which shows the exchanges of infor-
mation and data between various information systems [17].
6 Proceedings of CAISE-DC 2009
Fig. 2. Relationships between perspectives
4.2 Alignment within a perspective
This type of alignment is concerned with the alignment between organizations [5]
(the horizontal arrows in figure 1) as seen from a single perspective. For instance,
to determine if the value web is profitable for all actors (i.e. aligned), we need
to analyze the value perspective only. Thus, for this type of alignment only one
conceptual modeling technique is taken into consideration.
4.3 Alignment between perspectives
Inter-organizational alignment between perspectives is concerned with the align-
ment between two perspectives on a value web. Three relationships are consid-
ered (see Fig. 2). The relationships between strategy and process/IS perspective
are not considered since these are traceable via the value perspective. Further-
more, the relationship between process and IS perspective is not considered since
a vast amount on this relationship is already present and no clear contribution
would be made.
Strategy and Value Perspective. The relationship between the strategy and value
perspective can be best described as direct financial effect versus long term
effects (eg. switchings costs, partner dependency, etc.). In the value perspective
the exchange of value objects for money is considered, where in the business
strategy perspective the long term (i.e. strategic) effects of these value exchanges
are considered (eg. price and product configuration).
Value and IS Perspective. Two main relationships between the value and IS
perspective can be distinguished: “structure of interactions” and “technologies”.
With the structure of interactions we mean the lay-out, or composition of actors
and their interactions. Field experience and case studies have shown that when
the structure of the value web changes the IS structure follows a similar pattern
and vica versa. Technologies used in the IS perspective partially determine the
actors and value exchanges in the value web, since new technologies often result
in new objects (which might be valuable) and new processes. For instance in the
case study at hand, if new wireless technologies are used to communicate with
ground personnel it might increase their efficiency or lead to new or improved
services, thereby creating more value.
Proceedings of CAISE-DC 2009 7
Value and Process Perspective. The relationship between the value perspective
and process perspective is best described as conceptual vs. physical. In a value
model conceptual exchanges of value are modeled. In a process the physical
delivery and execution of these exchanges are modeled. To this end the same
actors are present in both models [16], since a new actor would imply additional
value exchanges and thus also additional processes. Furthermore, the conceptual
exchanges in the value model are somehow represented in the process model [16].
5 Lessons Learned
Case studies at starting Internet companies, the Dutch aviation industry and
Spanish electricity industry have shows that by incorporating modeling tech-
niques into the e3 alignment framework we were able to actually find mis-alignment,
easily trace the effects of possible solutions over the perspectives and create align-
ment between the organizations and their interaction. Our second claim was that
we needed to consider four types of interactions. First of all, by considering four
perspectives we believe that the areas where alignment issues can occur and
where solutions need to be found are covered. As was found in the various case
studies performed. Although it must be noted that not always all perspectives
were relevant for the stakeholders, commonly one or two perspective were not
(yet) taken into consideration.
6 Related Work
A focus on inter-organizational alignment via multiple perspectives is also found
in [8]. However, in comparison to e3 alignment , only the value (“management”),
process (“administration”) and IS (“IT”) perspective are considered, strategic
implications are not considered. Furthermore, a top-down approach, starting
with the value perspective, is taken into account, while in e3 alignment each per-
spective can be the starting point for inter-organizational alignment. Another
related early phase requirements approach is TROPOS [1]. However, TROPOS
focuses on software development and less on the business-IT alignment. Further-
more, TROPOS mainly takes “actor goals” into account and for instance does
not consider value creation.
7 CONCLUSIONS
With e3 alignment we intend to explore a wide range of inter-organizational align-
ment issues concerning the interaction between organizations in a value web, as
seen from multiple perspectives, and with the aid of modeling techniques. Various
case studies have demonstrated that we are able to rapidly, yet correct, explore
the alignment issues at hand, both within single perspectives as between multiple
perspectives. Furthermore, we able to explore various solutions and understand
there impact on the interactions between the organizations in the value web.
8 Proceedings of CAISE-DC 2009
Acknowledgments This work has been partly sponsored by NWO project COOP
600.065.120.24N16.
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