Although BOAT (Business, Organization, Architecture, and Technology) aims at separating business concerns, the integration, or the mapping, of organizational aspects is important. The attributes ought to be integrated or mapped together since they depend on each other. An organizational aspect can be equated to its goals which, in this case, is an e-business. The mapping of such an aspect should be in line with the goals or objectives set by an organization. It is important to note that the map can either be linear or even non-linear. The stack model for BOAT starts from the Business (B) towards Technology (T) aspect. Notably, this is a traditional system design (Bardopoulos, 2015). The following discourse applies BOAT for an e-business model.
It is, however, important to note that the relationship between these aspects is not linear. The reason behind this is because ‘B’ pulls ‘T’, which is technological development, while the latter also pushes the former by providing new opportunities. As a result, mapping thee aspects takes a cyclic nature due to the dependency of these aspects on one another. In the wheel model, an e-business developmental process does not end after one cycle (Miller & Cross, 2013). Instead, it is a continuous process that is constantly adjusting. The advantage of the wheel model is the fact that a developmental process can start at each and every aspect.
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The separation of these concerns occurs because the business, organization, architecture and technology carry out different functions in e-commerce. Despite their varying functions, they are interlinked and depend on each other. In order to see why the mapping of these aspects is so important, it advisable to discern what concerns and functions each attribute carries out.
The concepts in an e-business are reach and richness; these are the basics of the model. By integrating business with organizational practices, the operationalization of reach and richness is achieved. Reach allows for communication between organizations. It also leads to channels that allow for collaboration between parties (Miller & Cross, 2013). For an organization to acquire high levels of richness, there has to be functionality at the front office organization building so as to interact appropriately with all the concerned partners.
Great level architectures in the A aspect share structural functionalities with great level organization structures in the O aspect. For the success of a business, there ought to be a close alignment of business needs and information systems in e-business. Every architectural structure should strive to achieve the functionality for which it was designed. The key elements of the organization must be seen in the architecture.
There is the mapping of A element to T element. The technologies are mapped from the architecture through basic internet technologies. This is usually considered to be present by default. Infrastructural and feature-oriented technologies are also common in this mapping as they provide a basis for the module (Bardopoulos, 2015). On the other hand, function-oriented technologies normally support extremely unique functions. They can be associated to singular modules recognized in the architecture.
Finally, there is the mapping between the T elements to the B elements. Due to the nature of the model, there is a link between business and technology in e-business. It simply means that technology can push business developments. Communication-oriented technology is constantly used in business. The technology can improve the geographical reach of an organization since they can communicate with parties far away from the main business (Miller & Cross, 2013). Multi-media technology also related to business since it impacts on the richness of the business. By advertising on television, an organization can attract new customers.
- Bardopoulos, A. M. (2015). ECommerce and the effects of technology on taxation: Could VAT be the eTax solution? Geneva: Springer
- Miller, R. L. R., & Cross, F. B. (2013). The legal environment today: Business in its ethical, regulatory, e-commerce, and global setting. Mason, Ohio: South-Western Cengage Learning.
