Stage 3. Business Architecture: phase summary

6 min read 5 sections 7 key points

Stage 3 makes the business layer explicit before any system or technology decision is taken. Working from Phase B of the TOGAF ADM, you describe a target Business Architecture for London Grid Distribution: how the enterprise needs to operate to meet its goals and strategic drivers, with the baseline present only to make the gap visible. Across the phase the same discipline recurs: every artefact must change a real decision, or it is decoration.

Phase B sets a target, not a record of today

The objective of Phase B is to develop a target Business Architecture that describes how the enterprise needs to operate to achieve its goals and respond to the strategic drivers in the Architecture Vision, addressing the Statement of Architecture Work and stakeholder concerns. Org charts and process maps are inputs, not the complete output. Phase B covers business models, capabilities, services, organisation relationships, value streams, measures, and gaps. If it ends as a process catalogue, the rest of the ADM optimises around current workflows rather than the capabilities and outcomes the enterprise actually needs.

Business model and organisation mapping frame the design space

A business model describes how an organisation creates, delivers, and captures value, and the definition is deliberately broad enough to cover regulated service obligations. A regulated utility still has a business model: service obligations, accountability structures, information responsibilities, and a funding model shaped by the price control. Organisation mapping then exposes the actors, roles, and interactions behind an outcome, focusing on responsibility structure and interface risk rather than management hierarchy. G206 separates reporting lines from responsibility relationships because transformation friction appears at the handoffs, not on the org chart.

Capabilities, planning, and value streams carry the analysis

A business capability is an ability or capacity tied to a specific purpose or outcome, named in technology-neutral terms rather than after systems. Capability-based planning (G233) only earns its value when capabilities are assessed multi-dimensionally, prioritised, and connected to intervention choices; a heatmap that cannot tell urgent from deferrable is a refusal to prioritise. Value streams (G178) trace the end-to-end, value-adding journey for a triggering stakeholder, and the mapping needs all six elements, including enabling capabilities and pain points, to act as an analysis tool rather than a picture.

Footprints and gaps make the target testable and actionable

The content metamodel sets the relationships that hold business architecture together: goals drive services, services require capabilities, and measures evaluate both. A business footprint renders those relationships on one page with explicit connecting lines; proximity on a slide is not connection, and a target without measures is an assertion, not an architecture. Gap analysis then compares baseline and target to identify what is missing, what changes, and what can be reused, forming the bridge into later ADM phases. Business gaps come from capability weakness, accountability problems, handoff friction, measure misalignment, and ungoverned dependencies, so they cannot all be closed by replacing a system.

The London case and the theatre test

The London Grid Distribution connections modernisation walkthrough applies every Stage 3 method to one transformation problem, beginning before vendor demos are scheduled, to prove the concepts connect. In the business-layer gap log for that case, three of four major gaps require a non-technology intervention as the primary response. The closing discipline is the usefulness test: an artefact that looks polished but changes no decision, exposes no hidden dependency, and informs no governance outcome is theatre, and the most dangerous theatre is the kind that feels productive.

Watch out for

  • Reducing Phase B to org charts and process maps, so later ADM phases optimise around current workflows
  • Naming capabilities after systems or applications, which defeats the purpose of technology-neutral capability mapping
  • Treating an all-amber-or-red heatmap or four boxes on one slide as a finished assessment or footprint
  • Logging every business gap as 'implement a new system' instead of examining capability, accountability, handoff, measure, and governance root causes

Key takeaways

  • Phase B produces a target Business Architecture; the baseline exists only to make the gap visible
  • A business model applies to a regulated utility through service obligations, accountability, information duties, and price-control funding, not competition
  • Capabilities are abilities tied to a purpose and named independently of systems; traceability comes from mapping capabilities to systems, not merging their names
  • A value stream (G178) needs all six elements, including enabling capabilities and pain points, to function as analysis rather than a simplified process map
  • A footprint requires explicit relationships between goals, services, capabilities, and measures, not four boxes near each other
  • In the London connections gap log, three of four major gaps need non-technology intervention first
  • The usefulness test for every Stage 3 artefact is whether it changed a real decision, exposed a dependency, or informed a governance outcome

With the business layer made explicit and testable, the scenario practice puts these methods under pressure on realistic London Grid Distribution problems so you can spot and correct the common mistakes before the timed stage assessment.

Start the scenario practice