Governing without impeding
As architects, once we have defined the architectural boundaries of the system, we need to let go and get out of the way, unless we want to become the impediment to innovation. But letting go is difficult. It goes against our nature; we like to be hands-on. And it flies in the face of traditional governance techniques. But we must let go for the sake of the business, whether it realizes this or not.Governance has an understandable reputation for getting in the way of progress and innovation. Although it has good intentions, the traditional manual approach to governance actually increases risk, instead of reducing it, because it increases lead time, which diminishes an organization's ability to react to challenges in a modern dynamic environment. But it doesn't have to be this way.We have already taken major strides to mitigate the risks of continuous innovation. We define architectural boundaries that limit the scope of any given change, and we fortify...