Haramaya University

College of Computing and Informatics

School of Information Systems
Group Name Id No
1. Deresa Bayisa 1796/06
2. Sheycho Awal 1855/06
3. Negeye Regassa 1849/06
4. Tsgereda Yeshidagna 1864/06
5. Hana Asrat 1812/06
How strategic alignment done?
Organizations develop and implement strategies to achieve
(strategic) goals. The development of a strategy is about
formulating what should be changed to evolve from the
current situation to the desired future state. Strategy
implementation is about translating the strategic plans into
clear actions to execute the strategy
Strategic alignment is the ability to create a fit or
synergy between the position of the organization within
the environment (business) and the design of the
appropriate business processes, resources and
capabilities (IT) to support the execution.
Strategic alignment cannot be reached when strategy
development is considered to be a separate process from
strategy implementation
contd
Types of Strategic alignment
Three Types of Strategy
1,Business strategy
2.Operational strategy
3,Transformational strategy
1. Business Strategy
The first of the three types of strategy is Business. It is primarily concerned
with how a company will approach the marketplace - where to play and
how to win.
Where to play answers questions like, which customer segments will we
target, which geographies will we cover, and what products and services
will we bring to market.
Senior managers typically create business strategy. After it is created,
business architects play an important role in clarifying the strategy,
creating tighter alignment among different strategies, and
communicating the business strategy across and down the organization
in a clear and consistent fashion.
 Contd ....
2. Operational Strategy
The second of the three types of strategy is Operational.
It is primarily concerned with accurately translating the
business strategy into a cohesive and actionable
implementation plan. Operational Strategy answers the
questions:
Which capabilities need to be created or enhanced?
What technologies do we need?
Which processes need improvement?

The vast majority of business architects are currently

working in the operational strategy domain reaching
up into the business strategy domain for direction.
 Contd.

3. Transformational Strategy
The third of the three types of strategy is
Transformational. It is seen less often as it represents the
wholesale transformation of an entire business or
organization.
This type of strategy goes beyond typical business
strategy in that it requires radical and highly disruptive
changes in people, process, and technology.
Transformational strategy is generally the domain of
Human Resources, organizational development, and
consultants.
 phases of strategic alignment
The four phases of the cycle are: plan, model, manage, and measure.
Now let's examine the four phases individually, describing the
activities, best practices, and benefits associated with each phase.
Plan: Translating business objectives into measurable IT services.
The plan phase helps close the gap between what business managers
need and expect and what IT delivers.
According to Giga Research, IT leaders in poorly aligned
organizations are still attempting to explain technology
management issues to their business colleagues and have
not made the leap to understanding business issues and
communicating with business managers on their terms.
Finally, IT needs a way to measure and track both business
level services and the underlying capabilities that support
the services.
 Contd
Model: Design infrastructure to optimize business value
The model phase identifies resources needed to deliver
IT services at committed service levels. This phase
involves mapping IT assets, processes, and resources
back to IT services, then prioritizing and planning
resources that support those business critical services.
The bottom line in measuring the success of alignment
is the degree to which IT is working on the things about
which business managers care. That means IT must have
processes in place for prioritizing projects, tasks, and
support.
To successfully prioritize resources, IT needs a service
impact model and a centralized configuration and asset
management repository to tie the infrastructure
components back to specific IT services.
Contd
Manage: Drive results through consolidated service support
The manage phase enables the IT staff to deliver promised
levels of service. CIOs can ensure that their organization
meets expectations by providing a single location for
business users to submit all service requests, and by
prioritizing those requests based on pre-defined business
priorities.
Without a single point-of-service request, it is difficult to
manage resources to meet agreed-upon service levels.
Moreover, without a method for effectively managing the
IT infrastructure and all changes, the IT staff faces the risk
of causing failures.
Contd..
Measure: Verify commitments and improve operations
The measure phase improves cross-organization
visibility into operations and service level commitments.
They typically relate more to technology than to
business objectives.
Component-level metrics and measures are certainly
important for ongoing service availability. However, to
support real-time resource allocation decisions, these
measures must be interpreted in a broader business
context, including their relationship to business-critical
services.
Stage of strategic alignment
Diagrammatic representations of strategic
alignment
Contd
Cont
Examples of strategic alignment
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