Understanding Enterprise Architecture: Perceptions by the Finnish Public Sector

Enterprise architectures (EA) support organizations in managing the complexity of their business environment and facilitate the integration of strategy, personnel, business and IT. In Finland, the use of EA has recently been mandated by the newly passed Act on the Direction of Public IT Governance. This has forced public sector authorities to familiarize themselves with the Finnish EA method. As part of the familiarization process, public sector organizations were given a chance to make statements on the proposed EA. We acquired the statements and conducted a content analysis to find out how the public sector authorities have understood the proposal and its basis, i.e. the EA itself. It turned out that while the statements were diverse and dependent on the level of previous knowledge on EA, several themes frequently appeared. Even though these problems of misunderstanding the EA concept are not new, the themes provide insights into how EA is understood. This helps researchers and practitioners to conduct their EA related works with multiple stakeholders.