Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Working Knowledge
Business Research for Business Leaders
  • Browse All Articles
  • Popular Articles
  • Cold Call Podcasts
  • About Us
  • Leadership
  • Marketing
  • Finance
  • Management
  • Entrepreneurship
  • All Topics...
  • Topics
    • COVID-19
    • Entrepreneurship
    • Finance
    • Gender
    • Globalization
    • Leadership
    • Management
    • Negotiation
    • Social Enterprise
    • Strategy
  • Sections
    • Book
    • Cold Call Podcast
    • HBS Case
    • In Practice
    • Lessons from the Classroom
    • Op-Ed
    • Research & Ideas
    • Research Event
    • Sharpening Your Skills
    • What Do You Think?
    • Working Paper Summaries
  • Browse All
    • COVID-19 Business Impact Center
      COVID-19 Business Impact Center
      Visualizing and Measuring Software Portfolio Architectures: A Flexibility Analysis
      09 Apr 2014Working Paper Summaries

      Visualizing and Measuring Software Portfolio Architectures: A Flexibility Analysis

      by Robert Lagerstrom, Carliss Y. Baldwin, Alan MacCormack and David Dreyfus
      Contemporary business environments are constantly evolving, requiring continual changes to the software applications that support a business. Moreover, during recent decades, the sheer number of applications has grown significantly, and they have become increasingly interdependent. Many companies find that managing applications and implementing changes to their application portfolio architecture is increasingly difficult and expensive. Firms need a way to visualize and analyze the modularity of their software portfolio architectures and the degree of coupling between components. In this paper, the authors test a method for visualizing and measuring software portfolio architectures using data of a biopharmaceutical firm's enterprise architecture. The authors also use the measures to predict the costs of architectural change. Findings show, first, that the biopharmaceutical firm's enterprise architecture can be classified as core-periphery. This means that 1) there is one cyclic group (the "Core") of components that is substantially larger than the second largest cyclic group, and 2) this group comprises a substantial portion of the entire architecture. In addition, the classification of applications in the architecture (as being in the Core or the Periphery) is significantly correlated with architectural flexibility. In this case the architecture has a propagation cost of 23 percent, meaning almost one-quarter of the system may be affected when a change is made to a randomly selected component. Overall, results suggest that the hidden structure method can reveal new facts about an enterprise architecture. This method can aid the analysis of change costs at the software application portfolio level. Key concepts include:
      • This method for architectural visualization could provide valuable input when planning architectural change projects (in terms of, for example, risk analysis and resource planning).
      • The method reveals a "hidden" core-periphery structure, uncovering new facts about the architecture that could not be gained from other visualization procedures or standard metrics.
      • Compared to other measures of complexity, coupling, and modularity, this method considers not only the direct dependencies between components but also the indirect dependencies. These indirect dependencies provide important input for management decisions.
      LinkedIn
      Email

      Author Abstract

      In this paper, we test a method for visualizing and measuring software portfolio architectures and use our measures to predict the costs of architectural change. Our data is drawn from a biopharmaceutical company, comprising 407 architectural components with 1,157 dependencies between them. We show that the architecture of this system can be classified as a "core-periphery" system, meaning it contains a single large dominant cluster of interconnected components (the "Core") representing 32% of the system. We find that the classification of software applications within this architecture, as being either Core or Peripheral, is a significant predictor of the costs of architectural change. Using OLS regression models, we show that this measure has greater predictive power than prior measures of coupling used in the literature.

      Paper Information

      • Full Working Paper Text
      • Working Paper Publication Date: March 2014
      • HBS Working Paper Number: 14-083
      • Faculty Unit(s): Finance
        Trending
          • 24 Feb 2021
          • Lessons from the Classroom

          What History's Biggest Wars Teach Us About Leading in Peace

          • 25 Feb 2019
          • Research & Ideas

          How Gender Stereotypes Kill a Woman’s Self-Confidence

          • 17 May 2017
          • Research & Ideas

          Minorities Who 'Whiten' Job Resumes Get More Interviews

          • 13 Jul 2020
          • Research & Ideas

          Merck CEO Ken Frazier Discusses a COVID Cure, Racism, and Why Leaders Need to Walk the Talk

          • 17 Aug 2020
          • Research & Ideas

          What the Stockdale Paradox Tells Us About Crisis Leadership

      Carliss Y. Baldwin
      Carliss Y. Baldwin
      William L. White Professor of Business Administration, Emerita
      Contact
      Send an email
      → More Articles
      Alan D. MacCormack
      Alan D. MacCormack
      MBA Class of 1949 Adjunct Professor of Business Administration
      Contact
      Send an email
      → More Articles
      Find Related Articles
      • Analysis
      • Software
      • Technology
      • Video Game
      • Web Services

      Sign up for our weekly newsletter

      Interested in improving your business? Learn about fresh research and ideas from Harvard Business School faculty.
      ǁ
      Campus Map
      Harvard Business School Working Knowledge
      Baker Library | Bloomberg Center
      Soldiers Field
      Boston, MA 02163
      Email: Editor-in-Chief
      →Map & Directions
      →More Contact Information
      • Make a Gift
      • Site Map
      • Jobs
      • Harvard University
      • Trademarks
      • Policies
      • Digital Accessibility
      Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College