Research On Key Techniques Of Business-IT Alignment In Military Information System Architecture

Military information system is a complex man-machine system,including functions such as command,control,communication,computer,surveillance,reconnaissance,and intelligence.Currently,due to the dynamic changes of business environments,subversive innovations of information technologies,and complex interactions of organization elements,the business and IT alignment(BITA)issue in military information system is hard to achieve.The BITA issue attracts increasing attentions in the last three decades.However,because of the complexity issue occurred in governments,firms,and military fields,the sustainable BITA has barely applied in practice.System of systems architecture(So SA)is defined as the structure of components consisting of military information systems,their relationships,and the disciplines and guidelines governing their design and evolution over time.The development of military information system architecture(MISA)is beneficial to plan the business and IT elements,to determine their relationships,and thus to form the mappings of business and IT.Currently,scholars have attempted to analyze BITA achievement,measurement,and maintenance with the help of SoSA.With regards to the dispersivity and inadequacy of extant research,more targeted research need to be conducted.Focusing on the BITA issue in military information system,this thesis considers the SoSA methodology,conducts studies from review analysis,BITA achievement,BITA measurement,and BITA evolution.We enumerate the main contributions as follows:(1)We conduct a review analysis combining SoSA and BITA.Scholars have started to analyze BITA issue from the perspective of SoSA,and has conducted multiple studies.Aiming at the dispersivity of extant research,we attempt to conduct a systematic review first.We gather literature with a keyword method and several screening rules,and then acquire 111 papers.Considering a 5W1 H method,we collect the publication time,authors,research questions,research fields,motivations,challenges,and research methods of each paper,and then can induce the publication trends,research mainstreams,collaboration relationships,and so on.The review can identify the limitations of extant research,and determine the future directions.(2)We propose a SoSA BITA analysis method via the perspective of resource allocation.To address the research limitation of IT governance,this thesis focuses on the resource allocation angle,analyzes BITA with a portfolio decision approach.First,we introduce the portfolio decision approach in the SoSA design phase,and allocate IT resources for business functions,in order to improve the IT governance maturity of BITA.Second,facing with the dynamic business and IT changes,we introduce a dynamic portfolio decision approach in the SoSA evolution phase.This method can achieve the dynamic resource allocation,and then improve the sustainable IT governance maturity of BITA.(3)We propose a BITA measurement method based on DoDAF 2.0.The extant research focusing on BITA measurement with SoSA is hard to collect suitable data and lack an integrated measurement process.To address this issue,this thesis refers to the DoDAF 2.0,and proposes a detailed BITA measurement process,including four steps: identify the relationships of DoDAF 2.0 data meta-model and BITA metrics;identify the corresponding SoSA models;measure the BITA metrics;measure the whole BITA maturity.This process systematically collects the SoSA data,and provides a guidance for BITA measurement.(4)We analyze and validate the BITA coevolutionary principles.With the improving of military information system complexity,we deem that the BITA tends to focus on the coevolution of business and IT,instead of forming a fixed solution of alignment.More reasonable principles need to be gathered to manage and control BITA in the process of SoSA evolution,in order to mitigate the predictable and unpredictable changes.The extant research tends to neglect the agents’ roles in SoSA,and also lacks the collection and validation of agent-relevant principles,which act as the sources of complexity improvement.Facing with this problem,this thesis aims to analyze and validate the agent-relevant principles.First,we review the extant coevolutioanry research of BITA,and identify the limitations on principles collection and validation.Second,we propose a system dynamic model to illustrate the relationships of BITA principles and their implementing process.Third,we propose an agent-based model to validate the principles including mutual-communicating,knowledge sharing,and intelligence,and then explain the supporting effects of these principles.In summary,facing with the key problems of BITA combining with So SA,this thesis considers the fields of review analysis,BITA achievement,BITA measurement,and BITA evolution,and analyzes the SoSA’s support and limitations within these fields.Several targeting approaches are proposed.We deem that this thesis provides theoretical and practical contributions for military information system design and application.