Enterprise Architecture as an Enabler for a Government Business Ecosystem: Experiences from Finland

TL;DR

This paper explores how enterprise architecture (EA) can enable a more integrated and interoperable government business ecosystem in Finland, addressing siloed ICT systems and data redundancy.

Contribution

It provides empirical insights into the use and potential of EA in Finnish public sector procurement units, highlighting challenges and opportunities for adoption.

Findings

Low adoption rates of EA in Finnish public sector

EA can improve interoperability and data sharing

Focus on processes and practices is needed for successful implementation

Abstract

Public sector procurement units in the field of ICT suffer from siloed, application-specific architectures, where each system operates in isolation from others. As a consequence, similar or even identical data is maintained in several different databases hosted by different organizations. Such problems are caused by the lack of standard guidelines and practices that would result in interoperable systems instead of overlapping ones. In the Finnish public sector, enterprise architecture (EA) is a mandatory requirement so that an ecosystem can be formed to overcome the above problems. However, the adoption rates are low, and the focus is often on technology rather than processes and practices. This study investigates the use of EA and its potential in Finnish procurement units through semi-structured interviews. Five procurement units and four vendors participated in the study, and altogether 12 interviews took place.