Architecture as Process
Architecture as Capability: From Artifact to Action
Architecture is often reduced to a set of diagrams, models, standards, and practices—things an architect defines, curates, and defends. Architecture is conceived as a “structure,” and the architect is its author. However, this framing is a poor fit within organizations operating in complex, adaptive environments. Nearly everyone questions the value of an architect in a high tower.
Here, I would like to propose a reframing: Architecture is not a set of methods or models—it is an organizational capability. It is not (only) a noun but (simultaneously) a verb. It is not a static structure but a dynamic organizational process. (To be more specific, nouns only appear to be stable in relation to other processes within a temporal frame, they are themselves processes).
As a side note, I do not mean architecture is a process in the sense of a sequence of steps or a method. We’ll return to this in a following post.
Architecture is a function of the firm’s capacity to make sense of complexity and act coherently across internal systems and external markets.
When we say architecture is a capability, we mean that it is something a firm does, not just something it has. If you’ve been around the Resilience Engineering community you’ve heard John Allspaw say this about resilience as well. Amplifying Sources of Resilience: What Research Says
Architecture-as-ongoing-process: In contrast to thinking of the world as made up of static things—nouns—process theory sees reality as ongoing activity—verbs. It emphasizes becoming over being. From this view, something like “architecture” isn’t fixed structures or artifacts but a pattern of actions and decisions that enfold over time. It’s not just something a company has, but something it does continually. This framing shifts our attention from outcomes to the processes that generate and sustain them.
Architecture-as-ongoing-process is a social practice entailing coordinated sense-making and action—an ongoing process by which an organization, more or less successfully, achieves and maintains coherence across its teams, products, platforms, operations and market positioning (to name a few). This process of coherence making is also referred to as “joint optimization” within SocioTechnical Systems Theory.
Architecture-as-ongoing-process as a capability manifests as:
- Making sense of and anticipating* how technical, organizational, regulatory, and market constraints interact;
- Responding with appropriate structural adjustments—reorganizing teams, evolving interfaces, decomposing systems;
- Enabling change through scaffolding that makes coherent evolution possible.
We’ll explore this further in the following post; however, in order to address a concern that people might have, let me address the first point. Anticipation, prediction, and modeling are all well-known to present problems in that our predictions and expectations frequently turn out to be incorrect. Models are, by definition, reductive and, therefore, always present an opportunity for a critique from correspondence (the map is not the territory). In this framing, however, these critiques are not especially relevant. To the extent that predictions, anticipations, and models are used to make sense of a system in order to take action, and to the extent that action is taken and, therefore, the decisions materialized (reified), those predictions, anticipation, and models are active agents within the system. They act in the sense of constraining the system by modifying the probability that the sociotechnical system will modify itself in this or that way.
The Role of the Architect: Sense-Maker in Constraint Regimes
Architects, then, are not blueprint writers. They are not analogous to city planners establishing and enforcing building codes. They are sense-makers of constraint regimes. Their job is not primarily to produce models but to:
- Map and interpret the current landscape of constraints (technical, social, temporal, economic);
- Explore and imagine speculative futures—how constraints might evolve, collapse, or recompose;
- Help the organization make sense in order to take action to shape these regimes toward coherent and sustainable outcomes.
⠀This work is deeply contextual and recursive. Architects must read signals from both inside and outside the organization—shifting team dynamics, evolving platform capabilities, market pressures, and emergent regulatory environments—and translate them into constraint-aware interventions.
The “deliverables” of architecture, then, are not static artifacts but sense making interventions in constraint regimes—adjustments that guide the organization toward structures that are more adaptable, legible, and aligned with its strategic intentions.
In other words, the success of any IT initiative depends less on what you build and more on whether it fits—with your systems, teams, customers, and constraints.
Coherence as the Aim, Not Consistency
Traditional architecture emphasizes consistency: uniform interfaces, standardized patterns, and clean diagrams. However, as any number of teams can tell you, architecture that consists only of models and diagrams is easy to ignore. But if architecture is how your organization makes sense of complexity and acts coherently, then it’s everyone’s problem.
Coherence is powerful. Coherence is contextual, temporal, and strategic—it’s about different parts of the system making sense together under current and anticipated conditions.
Achieving coherence doesn’t mean enforcing sameness but cultivating coherence within a constraint regime. Architectural coherence may sometimes mean allowing heterogeneity or even intentional redundancy if that supports agility, resilience, or customer value.
The architect’s job is not to police deviation from a master plan but work with the sociotechnical system to tune the conditions under which coherence can emerge—across products, platforms, and business units in a way that aligns with evolving organizational goals and market signals.
Architecture as Situated Action
Architecture-as-capability operates within context. It is responsive to:
- Internal constraint regimes—codebases, deployment pipelines, organizational structures, team cognition;
- External regimes—customer expectations, industry norms, market shifts, regulation, geopolitical dynamics.
⠀This means architecture is always situated. There is no “pure” architecture—only interventions made within constraint regimes (from within complex and evolving sociotechnical systems).
Architecture is never finished. It is always ongoing, always partial, and always at risk of entrenchment or decay.
Recognizing this shifts architecture from a question of correctness to one of fitness: How well do our systems and structures fit the conditions in which they must operate and evolve?
The Ongoing Process of Architecture
When architecture is seen as a capability, the work of architecture becomes a continuous process of sense-making and action. This ongoing process involves:
- Surfacing constraints—making visible the invisible structures shaping behavior (decisions and actions);
- Anticipating transitions—recognizing emerging misalignments before they crystallize into dysfunction;
- Creating affordances—intervening in ways that open up new possibilities for coherent action;
- Enabling agency—building systems and platforms that allow others to act coherently without central control.
⠀In short, architecture is the organizational function of coherence-making within a constraint regime. It is the capability that allows a firm to remain legible to itself, and adaptable to its environment, even as both are constantly shifting.
Architecture as Organizational Attunement
This reframing invites us to rethink architectural maturity. It’s not measured by how many models you’ve created, how many reference architectures you’ve published, or how tightly you’ve enforced standards. Instead, maturity is measured by how fluently the organization can navigate constraint regimes, make sense of complexity, and act with coherence. Architecture is thus not (only) the result of good diagrams but of good dialogue—about what’s changing, what’s possible, and what kind of futures we want to make real. Architecture is the capability to sense and shift constraint regimes in ways that allow the organization to act coherently.
The architect’s job is not to own the architecture, but to enable the process of architecture to occur meaningfully and sustainably within the firm.
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