Who Convinced the Middle East That IT Architecture = Enterprise Architecture?

The answer lies in a 3-part influence chain — an imported belief system, institutionalized by vendors, consulting firms, and certification bodies, and unchecked by internal strategic leadership.

1. Global Consulting Firms (BIg 10 + EA Boutiques)

They were first to arrive, positioning EA as part of digital transformation, often as a technology-first activity.

These firms made EA synonymous with:

• Application landscape rationalization

• Cloud migration planning

• IT cost reduction

• Data warehouse modernization

They filled strategy decks with boxes labeled “Enterprise Architecture” — but in practice, it was IT solution architecture at best, with just a few strategic overlays.

They convinced boards and CIOs by saying:

“We’ll give you a future-state enterprise architecture in 12 weeks.” But what the client got was: A slide deck showing servers, systems, and some disconnected org charts.

They did not model 15 departments, nor deconstruct business rules, nor map process-event-data-rule logic across the enterprise. They simply rebranded IT blueprints as EA.

This confusion continues today, especially in large banking, oil & gas, and aviation clients across Riyadh, Abu Dhabi, and Dubai.

2. TOGAF and Certification Factories

TOGAF played a silent but powerful role in this misdefinition.

The TOGAF syllabus:

• Spends more time on terminology than execution

• Allows one to “define EA” without touching business operations, revenue logic, or departmental models

• Encourages a tech-first interpretation: application, data, tech layers

In the Middle East, TOGAF became a recruitment keyword — HR departments looked for “TOGAF-certified architects” assuming they were business architecture experts.

Instead, most knew how to:

• Create a viewpoint

• Draw a heatmap

• Reference an ADM phase

Meanwhile, strategy teams and department heads never saw EA as their concern — it was filed under “IT’s responsibility.”

So the result?

TOGAF = EA

EA = IT Landscape

IT Landscape = Enterprise Understanding

A tragic logical fallacy — yet it got normalized in banks, ministries, and telecom firms across the region.

3. Enterprise Tool Vendors and “Magic Quadrant” Influence

The final link was sealed by EA tool vendors and analysts.

Tool vendors — many of them scoring high in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant — sold software that could:

• Catalog applications

• Create architecture diagrams

• Manage solution portfolios

They claimed:

“Use our tool to build and govern your Enterprise Architecture.”

But in reality, the tools were being used to:

• List systems

• Tag owners

• Map integrations

What they never offered:

• 6-perspective mapping across departments

• Full variable-based decomposition (process, rule, timing, event, data, network)

• Strategy-to-operations traceability

Enterprise X-Rays? Missing.

15 Department Anatomy Models? Missing.

Problem Diagnosis from Stage 2–7? Missing.

And yet… these tools were branded as EA platforms.

So CIOs — influenced by Gartner and the “Quadrant logic” — believed:

“If we buy the tool and get certified, we’re doing EA.”

So Who’s to Blame?

It’s not one party. It’s a perfect storm of misinformed alignment:

Actor	What They Sold as EA	What Was Missed
Big 4 & consulting firms	Tech roadmap + cloud migration	Business rules, process logic, inter-departmental flows
TOGAF/CERT bodies	Generic frameworks	Enterprise-specific anatomy, real execution
Tool vendors	System catalogs + dashboards	Enterprise diagnostics, department interlinking
Internal CIOs & leaders	Trusted these sources	Never challenged or questioned the definition

The Middle East is Now Waking Up to the Gap

In Abu Dhabi, Riyadh, Dubai — leadership teams are starting to sense:

• IT architecture is not helping them solve customer delays

• TOGAF diagrams are not reducing project overruns

• Application catalogs are not aligning with national KPIs

This is the moment to intervene with the ICMG Anatomy model.

Because once leaders realize they’ve been shown the “thumb nails” but not the “Nervous System,” they will demand the full anatomy.