Once upon a time, A scholar visited a Zen master to learn about Zen. As the master poured tea, the cup filled up, but he kept pouring until it overflowed onto the floor.

“It is full!” the scholar shouted. “No more will go in!”

“Like this cup,” the master said, “you are full of your own opinions. How can I show you Zen unless you first empty your cup?”

Background

The journey to becoming an Enterprise Architect (ERP-focused) is unique to each individual. We all started from a single architecture domain (business, application, technology) and grew in our careers to become enterprise architects. We have become proficient learners and expanded our knowledge through traditional EA models such as TOGAF, Zachman, and Gartner.  We also complement academic knowledge with our real-life experience across various projects and are successful and confident in our ability to perform tasks our own way. We all recognize that we must continuously learn to ensure that we stay relevant in future.

However, too often EAs lean back on “what has always been” for projects.  For example, EAs from a technical domain may be quick to recommend brownfield migrations from ECC to S/4 as part of their architecture roadmap, even though they lack the skills to navigate the intricacies of a transformation project.  Defaulting to a risk-averse approach (aka Status quo) when advising leadership slows transformation. It limits the adoption of new capabilities and, in turn, significantly reduces or eliminates business value realization via innovations as part of the project.

EAs need to up their game because “Future ain’t what it used to be”

Gone are the days when EA debated methodologies and standards and preached from the ivory tower. The traditional EA role focused more on long-term roadmaps and governance, while the modern EA needs to be a business-savvy storyteller. This modern EA needs to be proficient in technologies that impact critical business functions, realistic about what can be practically done within a given timeframe, and able to influence stakeholders across the organization.

As such, EAs need to up their game to help companies navigate the current waves of transformation and grow new skills to:

• Comprehend the capabilities of modern ERP [What’s possible] and how to implement these on a technical debt-ridden legacy ERP that supports business-critical processes.
• Comprehend how Gen AI and Agentic AI capabilities will impact the transformation. Many EAs have no experience implementing these capabilities across the business, application, data, and technology layers. EAs need to look beyond the hype and focus on business outcomes
• Live up to management's high expectations to find efficiencies while, at the same time, inspiring teams and their leadership, who are still set in their ways from circa 2010.
• Influence without authority on these multi-dimensional transformation teams that include internal stakeholders such as business leaders, IT leaders and external stakeholders, such as large IT solution providers and system integrators

Staying ahead is a shared obligation

Businesses and IT teams often look to EAs for guidance to chart a path forward. EAs have a shared obligation to stay ahead of the curve by gaining new capabilities. If you are open to emptying your cup of preconceived biases and behaviours, here are a few pointers.

Capabilities of Modern Enterprise Architect

To be an effective Enterprise Architect, an EA needs to have capabilities across the following four clusters.

EA Capabilities across four clusters

1.      Business & Value

As outlined already, today’s EA must go beyond technology and operate as a business transformation leader.  This often requires a deep understanding of industry dynamics, the ability to connect technology to financial outcomes and a skill to communicate this value in a way that resonates with executives.

An enterprise architect needs to have strong industry fluency. This often comes from experience, but can also be learned through curiosity, understanding how companies make money, how they differentiate, and what pressures they face.  EAs must continuously translate this knowledge into architectural decisions that drive measurable impact and outcomes.

• Industry fluency – understand industry trends, competitive pressures and business models
• Technology savviness – know how new technologies enable new business capabilities—not just how they work
• Financial acumen – connect architecture decisions to financial outcomes
• Outcome Storytelling – translate complex architectures into clear, compelling narratives that resonate with business stakeholders
• Value Realization Mindset – focus on adoption, consumption, and measurable outcomes—not just design and delivery
• Executive Engagement – communicate effectively with C-level and business leaders to align architecture to strategic priorities

How to acquire this capability:

2.      Architecture & Technology

While today’s EA must be business-focused, they still need strong technical credibility.  This doesn’t mean being the deepest in every domain, but rather having the ability to connect architecture across domains, apply the right patterns and guide organizations toward a scalable, future landscape.

• Architecture Domains – Understand business, application, data and technology architecture and how they interact.  EA must ensure alignment across these layers.
• BTP – Know when and how to leverage SAP BTP for side-by-side extensions, integrations, data and innovations.  The EA needs to guide on what belongs in the core versus what should be built outside and be a champion of a Clean Core approach along these guardrails.
• Integration Architecture – design and govern integration patterns across SAP and non-SAP systems using API first thinking.
• AI & Innovation Enablement – understand how AI, automation and data platforms fit into the architecture
• End-to-End Systems thinking – connect the dots across the entire landscape from front-end experience to backend processing analytics to ensure a seamless, integrated business process and experience

Selected learning course:

3.      Transformation and Delivery

In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is.

Understand the impact of technology change on people and processes. Ineffective change management is the most critical factor in determining the success of your transformation project. The project team often makes thousands of decisions while balancing constant trade-offs among scope, timeline, and budget. An enterprise architect needs to provide architectural clarity and enable transformation, so the project team has the information and boundaries to make decisions.

How to acquire this capability:

4.      Leadership Influence

EA uses leadership to navigate intense political resistance and align conflicting internal departmental and vendor goals. These are learned skills, developed through self-awareness and the deliberate cultivation of behaviours and habits. Find a coach and mentor that you trust to help you grow.

• Develop Executive Presence: Projecting the confidence needed to secure buy-in and trust from senior leaders. LinkedIn Learning: Developing Executive Presence
• Understand Program Governance: Maintaining organized oversight and clear rules across complex project tasks. LinkedIn Learning: Program Management Foundations Book: How Big Things Get Done
• Influence Without Authority: Leading and aligning departments that don't directly report to you. LinkedIn Learning: Leading without authority , Influencing Others
• Partner Alignment: Ensuring external vendors stay perfectly synced with the company's internal goals
• Community Standing: Building a reputation as a trusted advisor to ensure the new system is widely accepted.

Learning is no longer episodic but rather embedded in delivery, tooling and customer engagement.

Most of us are experts in many of these capabilities. If we are aware of our blind spots and we make deliberate efforts to address them through continuous learning, anyone can develop the skills. Also, EA never works alone [Except in the bathroom :)]. If we know we are not good at a specific task, we should always bring a collaborator who is proficient at it. Our loyalties lie in delivering outcomes, not in being the smartest person in the room.

Let’s start by emptying our cup!