Glossary

Capability map

Also called: capability model

A hierarchical model of an organization's capabilities, classified by type (core, strategic, enabling) and criticality.

A hierarchical model of an organization's capabilities, classified by type (core, strategic, enabling) and criticality. It is the structural basis for decisions on investment, redesign, automation and governance, not a diagram produced to complete a deliverable.

Its usefulness is measured by the decisions it supports, not by how complete it is. A map that classifies capabilities by criticality can answer where to invest and what to automate first. One that merely lists everything the organization does is an inventory, and inventories do not prioritise.

Related terms

Business architecture

A structured, coherent representation of how an organization creates, delivers and captures value.

Business capability

What an organization must know how to do, expressed independently of who does it or which system supports it.

Strategic portfolio management

The discipline — and tool category — that connects strategy to the portfolio of investments, initiatives and capabilities that is meant to deliver it.

The eight business architecture models

A framework inherited from Villalobos describing the organization through eight interrelated models: business, financial, strategic, capability, organizational, process, resource and indicator.