Enterprise Architecture at American Express

Instructions:-

1. What are the key components of the architecture American Express has created?

2. Why was it important to standardize so much of the architecture? What are the advantages and disadvantages of a standard Enterprise Architecture (EA) for American Express?

3. Describe how the new architecture supports the goals and strategy of American Express.

4. What types of future payment products and services should be anticipated and prepared for by the Enterprise Architecture (EA) group? What is your vision of how payments might work? If you were advising the Chief Information Officer (CIO) of American Express, what would you suggest his group prepare for?

Solution

Enterprise Architecture at American Express

1. What are the key components of the architecture American Express has created?

The ability to become more effective in doing business and use the new payment mechanisms and also mobile services were the crucial components of the architecture of the American Express. This was accomplished through the technology roadmap and the reference architecture roadmap. The enterprise architecture group created roadmaps to help them understand the organizational structure and also processes to ensure that the American Express’s IT goes in hand with the changes in demand concerning the new payment methods and also mobile services (Ross, 2006).

The technology architecture will ensure that the templates and processes available are in compliance with the requirements of the organization.

2. Why was it important to standardize so much of the architecture? What are the advantages and disadvantages of a standard EA for American Express?

It was important to standardize the architecture because the American Express business strategy focused on deliverance of global, consistent and integrated customer experience based only on the services operating on a common application platform. The advantage of a standard enterprise for American Express involves the ability to provide a more consistent client experience (Bernard, 2012). It can also reduce the operating costs and also reduce risk and exposure. It will also allow for products and services to be marketed quickly and easily.

The disadvantages of the standard enterprise architecture include the idea that the architecture only guides and does not dictate. The architecture has to be seen as ‘fit’ for the employees and the customers of American Express. It should be accepted for its own merits and should also be seen as the value for its projects.

3. Describe how the new architecture supports the goals and strategy of American Express.

The cooperate objectives and goals are to align Information Technology and the organization’s strategy (Henderson, 1993). This involves a maintained customer experience and also the ability to evolve while the industry changes. The architectural enterprise will control the presentation of new commodities and services that will get introduced to the market. This structure will allow the company to grow and change necessarily.

The EA group created roadmaps and also the architectures for the standardized applications all over the business firm. They afterward worked with various organizational solutions delivery groups to develop and manage the common application architecture and come up with strategies that facilitate the businesses objectives.

4. What types of future payment products and services should be anticipated and prepared for by the EA group? What is your vision of how payments might work? If you were advising the CIO of American Express, what would you suggest his group prepare for?

Customers will expect to make mobile transactions, check their accounts via smartphones and also use the American Express Services at any time with the evolution of applications. The customers will also expect to solve their own problems without necessarily communicating with the human transaction service (Bernard, 2012). The American Express has to continue with innovations. Maintaining a healthy continuous communication with their customer and allows listening to their suggestions and feedback will allow the company to respond to new demands quickly.

The American Express needs to continue creating more opportunities for the brand new payment commodities, for example, the phone payment like apple pay, Samsung pay that will help improve the payment securities (Keller, 2011).

References

Bernard, S. A. (2012). An introduction to enterprise architecture. AuthorHouse.

Henderson, J. C. (1993). Strategic alignment: Leveraging information technology for transforming organizations. IBM systems journal, 32(1), 472-484.

Keller, K. L. (2011). Strategic brand management: Building, measuring, and managing brand equity. India: Pearson Education.

Ross, J. W. (2006). Enterprise architecture as strategy: Creating a foundation for business execution. Harvard Business Press.

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