The Diesel vs Petrol Mistake — Dissecting the Misguided Solution Part 2

When I wrote The Diesel vs Petrol Mistake of Enterprise Architecture, a reader responded with what looked like agreement — but inside it sat the very confusion that created the problem.

Let’s dissect it line by line.

What the Reader Said

Various companies are currently facing issues with the misuse of the term "Enterprise Architecture" where there is a need to educate C-level executives and senior leadership that Enterprise Architecture first belongs to the Enterprise in terms of how it functions as per recent goals and objectives and how structure of processes and structures of business data is intact and available to relevant stakeholders.

So the first and foremost requirement for an enterprise is to document, rationalize and optimize enterprise architecture first and then take a decision on utilizing IT for supporting various business transactions.

So definitely a Cloud Expert or a DevSecOps Expert designated as Enterprise Architect for an Insurance Company for example will be required to be educated on Insurance Business rather than he educating C-level executives and senior leadership about Enterprise Architecture of an Insurance Company as per recent goals and objectives. This is practically happening leading to disasters and waste of money on technology adoption and product purchases.

He’s speaking as if he’s agreeing — but he’s still trapped inside the very misunderstanding the original post exposed.

It’s the same “educate C-level, document business, then apply IT” story — the IT governance lens pretending to be Enterprise Architecture.

Let’s unpack the comment exactly as it appears in most conversations today.

Comment 1:

“There is a need to educate C-level executives that Enterprise Architecture first belongs to the Enterprise in terms of goals and objectives…”

Problem: That sounds right, but it still frames architecture as something executives must learn from IT people. True Enterprise Architecture doesn’t belong to executives or technologists — it belongs to the enterprise anatomy itself. You don’t educate people into anatomy; you make the anatomy visible so decisions become coherent.

Comment 2:

“The first requirement is to document, rationalize, and optimize enterprise architecture first and then take a decision on utilizing IT…”

Problem: This is textbook TOGAF-style governance language.“Document, rationalize, optimize” — that’s the same mechanical vocabulary that produced the Diesel vs Petrol confusion. You can’t document what you haven’t understood anatomically. Documentation without anatomy is another shadow system — it looks structured, but it hides incoherence.

Comment 3:

“A Cloud or DevSecOps expert should be educated on the Insurance Business rather than educating executives on Enterprise Architecture…”

Problem: Still the wrong premise. This assumes Enterprise Architecture = business domain awareness + IT literacy. But ICMG Enterprise Anatomy™ isn’t about domain knowledge — it’s about the anatomy grammar (D1-D15) X (P1–P6) that runs through every domain. Whether it’s insurance or telecom, the building blocks are identical; only the coherence pattern changes.

Every enterprise, like every living organism, has a hidden architecture that defines how its parts coordinate. In ICMG Enterprise Anatomy™, that architecture is expressed through:

• 15 Organ Systems (D1–D15) — the major departments of the enterprise body, and

• 6 Building Blocks (P1–P6) — the universal grammar inside each department that turns intent into execution.

The anatomy doesn’t need to be invented; it already exists. The role of architecture is to make it visible.

Core Issue

1. He believes the solution is to fix who teaches whom.

2. The real correction is to fix the structure itself. Rather discover what already exists i.e Enterprise Anatomy

3. When the anatomy is explicit, nobody needs to teach anyone — structure becomes the teacher.

That’s where Enterprise Architecture stops being a governance function and returns to its true form —the physiology of the enterprise body, not a training agenda.