Business and Information Systems MisAlignment Model (BISMAM): an Holistic Model Leveraged on Misalignment and Medical Sciences Approaches

Organizations aim to achieve business and information systems alignment, but actually “feel” and “suffer”, on a daily basis, the difficulties that inhibits the alignment achievement, in other words, the misalignments. This paper proposes a model, the Business and Information Systems MisAlignment Model (BISMAM), to understand, to classify and to manage misalignments. This proposal addresses the alignment problem combining misalignment approach with medical sciences approach based on a metaphor between misalignment and disease. The authors believe that the misalignment approach is closer to organizations real life and that medical sciences approach provides the relevant concepts and techniques for misalignment classification and management. Based on both academic research and years of professional consultancy, the authors propose an initial and possible instantiation to the BISMAM model, establishing a misalignment classification scheme that links enterprise architecture views, misalignment symptoms and causes, and defining techniques to detect, correct and prevent misalignments.