Capability-based planning (CBP) entails the process of planning, delivering, and engineering of strategic business capabilities in an enterprise. This process is business oriented and mobilizes the requisite resources and efforts in every line of business to offer the desired capabilities.
CBP incorporate various business models and is applicable in organizations where latent capabilities are essential by use of multiple resources (Galpin 14). To enhance these capabilities, there is the need for analysis and refinement of business scenarios. Similarly, the adoption of information technology (IT) in CBP is essential in the consolidation of corporate data and provision of related services by the establishment of a data center.
Despite the technical aspects attributed to that IT projects, CBP has geared it towards the delivery of business outcomes. It implements this approach through the linkage of IT vision architecture with corporate strategies and line of business plans. In this regard, it necessitates planners to regulate horizontally and vertically the service-oriented architecture if there is the need to achieve the desired capabilities.
The CBP mainly addresses the needs of management construction, education and training of personnel, IT architectural tasks and other essential change management tasks (Salaman 32). The management construction entails the development of a good management layout, which facilitates the realization of organization goals and objectives.
Since the personnel are another crucial component of an organization, CBP enhance the delivery of knowledge and skills that will promote the desired capabilities.
Similarly, CBP handles IT infrastructural tasks by the adoption of the best technology necessary for the achievement of anticipated services within the organization mainly concerning data handling and management. In addition, CPB undertakes other multiple roles, which enhance change management through the reengineering process.
The DODAF portrays information perspectives instead of knowledge perspectives in the search for desired capabilities. In this regard, there exists a need to revise this approach and adopt knowledge perspectives in handling capability acquisition. The knowledge perspectives entail three major concerns to the manner of capability realization within the available resources (Birkler 46).
Primarily, it concerns the evaluation of projects concerning an enterprise’s strategies and policies. In this regard, it aligns the projects to the strategic direction of the enterprise in the realization of the desired capabilities. Secondly, it involves the evaluation of the manner in which an enterprise analyzes the needed additional resources to realize the strategic direction.
Thirdly, it determines whether the additional resources will create an impact on the organizational outcome. This implies that the additional resources should make the biggest bang for the buck. On the contrary, the information perspectives entail the determination of the required products by creating an integrated architecture.
This approach relies on the required and expected results. For DODAF to counter the risk of producing products with no customers, it is essential that they build an architecture description that indentifies the stakeholders’ needs and concerns by mapping them to the selected products. Additionally, the programs, which have no designated interests, require handling concerning capability acquisition.
The DODAF modification through the incorporation of knowledge perspectives would enhance the need for capability-based planning. This is realizable since the identification of the consumers needs and concerns would occur in advance. As a result, the planners of DODAF would be able to align the strategic decisions to realize outcome optimization.
Similarly, they will work within the particular resource dimensions available. This will boost their relevance in the market, deriving the benefits of capability-based planning. In addition, the technical team will master the art of working within a particular predefined time limit and resources.
In this regard, the quality of the services offered in the market will meet the consumers’ needs. The aftermath is that both markets participants with respect to the producers and consumers will benefit from the resources they incur (Wisnosky 71).
CBP accomplishment is most effective when dealing with the acquisition of system of systems through the adoption of the available technology and consulting relevant expertise. This process implies that taking into consideration the available technology will assist the planners to evaluate the strategic decisions regarding the system that will enhance the achievement of an organization’s goals and objectives.
Through this plan, the resources required by the system and its utility ratio are determined to facilitate proper decision-making concerning the needed system.
Similarly, during the decision-making process, the consultation of the relevant expertise would provide guidance on the selection of the system that meets the organization’s needs. In this regard, the planners would select the most appropriate system for the organization (Birkler 84).
The recently released DODAF 2 partially addresses these issues. With respect to the manner of addressing the consumers’ needs, the DODAF base their strategic decisions on factors prevalent within the enterprise.
Due to consumers’ variations, the DODAF 2 does not clearly demonstrate the most appropriate way of adequately addressing all the concerns. Nevertheless, it takes into consideration that the consumers’ needs and concerns are of significant value during decision making concerning strategic directions.
Works Cited
Birkler, J. L., C. R. Neu, and Glenn A. Kent. Gaining new military capability: an experiment in concept development. Santa Monica, Calif.: Rand, 1998. Print.
Galpin, Timothy J.. Making strategy work: building sustainable growth capability. San Francisco, Calif.: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1997. Print.
Salaman, Graeme, and David Asch. Strategy and capability: sustaining organizational change. Malden, MA: Blackwell Pub., 2003. Print.
Wisnosky, Dennis E., Joseph Vogel, and Dan Appleton. DoDAF Wizdom: planning, managing and executing projects to build enterprise architectures using the Department of Defense Architecture Framework. Naperville, Ill.: Wizdom Systems, Inc., 2005. Print.