From Rewrites to Reusability: How Software Platform Anatomy Guides Sustainable Platform Evolution

Category: Organizational & People-Driven Change — Team churn, leadership shifts, missing documentation, reactive delivery

Series: Rethinking Requirements: How the ICMG Enterprise Anatomy Model Makes Systems Change-Ready

Perspectives Covered: Strategy, Business Process, System, Component Specification, Implementation, Operations

Key Variables Impacted: Rule, Data, Function, Event, UI, Network

It starts with a single sentence.

“We’re thinking of rewriting the eligibility engine.”

Nobody’s surprised. It’s been said before. Too many branches. Too much conditional logic. “We can build it better this time.”

The architects start scoping. Developers look relieved. Business teams are cautiously hopeful.

But a week later, someone else chimes in:

“Didn’t we rewrite this two years ago?”

And suddenly, silence.

Because yes—they did. Sort of.

But nobody knows where that rewrite ended. Or what got reused. Or what still lives

inside that monolith with 18 different feature flags and three overlapping calculation rules.

And so begins another cycle of hopeful reinvention—this time, with even less clarity than before.

When Rewrites Become a Habit, Not a Solution

In retail lending, product evolution is constant—new risk criteria, dynamic pricing, customer-specific workflows.

But too often, platforms evolve through rebuilds, not reuse. Every wave of change triggers large-scale rewrites:

• A new credit rule = spin up a new engine

• Another bank onboarding = duplicate half the workflow

• Compliance updates = build a patch that bypasses existing logic

The architecture begins to sprawl. Not by design. By default.

Nobody can confidently say what should be reused, what needs isolation, or where one rule set ends and another begins.

And when a new feature needs to ship?

Teams freeze.

Because nobody wants to touch a system they don’t fully understand.

Why This Happens: The Symptoms of Missing Platform Anatomy

Without a shared model of the platform’s architecture, decisions become people-driven, not system-driven.

Business teams keep asking for modularity—but get black-box rewrites instead🚨 Developers replicate logic because they don’t know where else it lives🚨 Operations can’t trace failure points across versions🚨 Testers struggle to know what “known behavior” actually means

You’re not reusing components because your platform doesn’t define them in any reusable form.

There’s no map of:

• Which component performs what function

• Which rule applies to which process

• Which event triggers what update

• Which data is shared vs client-specific

Rewrites become the only option—because the original architecture left no blueprint behind.

Rewriting the Rewrite Cycle: ICMG Software Platform Anatomy to the Rescue

The ICMG Software Platform Anatomy brings structure where there was none.

It defines architecture as a living, traceable model—connecting platform elements across six key variables (Rule, Data, Function, Event/Timing, Network, UI/Channel) and six perspectives (Strategy to Operations).

Instead of chasing short-term fixes or rebuilding from scratch, teams model the platform’s current state—and then evolve it systematically.

What does that look like in practice?

A Platform Model That Knows What Came Before—and What Comes Next

Every component is designed with:

• Purpose (why it exists)

• Perspective (where it fits)

• Dependencies (what it relies on and impacts)

• Governance (who owns it, how it’s reused)

You don’t just know what’s being reused—you know why, where, and how.

So instead of rebuilding the eligibility engine for the third time, you:

• Identify the rule-function pair that governs eligibility

• Trace its link to client-specific configurations

• Update only the logic needed, without duplicating the data fetch layer

• Retain version history, rollback points, and test alignment

  
  

You’re not rewriting anymore.

You’re evolving.

With context.

Traditional SDLC vs. ICMG Software Platform Anatomy

Area	SDLC Problem	ICMG Anatomy Model Advantage
Component Clarity	Modules are hardcoded and undocumented	Each component is modeled, versioned, and traceable
Rule Ownership	Rules live in people’s heads or scripts	Rules are modeled across perspectives and variables
Reuse vs Rebuild Decisions	Teams rebuild by default due to lack of confidence	ICMG enables reuse with architectural precision
Test Confidence	No linkage between component logic and test cases	Tests are aligned to modeled components and traced logic
Onboarding New Teams	Every team re-discovers what exists, often choosing to rewrite again	New teams rely on the model, not just tribal knowledge
Platform Longevity	Architecture gets fragmented by rewrites	Model preserves intent and structure across evolution cycles

What a Rebuild Takes with It

Every rebuild wipes away the rationale of the previous one.

• The undocumented assumptions.

• The informal design discussions.

• The subtle rule variations for different customer types.

Without an Anatomy Model, the platform slowly forgets how it came to be—until all that remains is an over-engineered codebase nobody wants to touch.

Reuse Becomes Possible When Architecture Becomes Visual

Reusability doesn’t begin in code. It begins in architecture.

With ICMG, you get:

1. A visual blueprint of components, rules, data flows, and events

2. Version control and traceability for components, not just code

3. A shared platform memory that survives team churn, handovers, and strategy shifts

4. A foundation to scale without rebuilding what already works

Build for Longevity, Not Just Delivery

Most teams optimize for short-term release. ICMG helps you optimize for platform sustainability.

If your platform needs to support dozens of clients, changing regulations, and evolving risk logic, then your architecture can’t live in Git commits and Slack threads.

It must be modeled. Structured. Governed.

Tired of writing the same logic again and again?

Ready to move from reactive rewrites to intentional platform evolution?

Explore the ICMG Fast Track Rating and Enterprise Select Programto map, model, and future-proof your lending platform—component by component.

Because sustainable architecture isn’t about building fast.

It’s about building once, and building right.