The Status of Enterprise Architecture and Information Technology
Investment Management in the Department of Justice
Audit Report 06-02
November 2005
Office of the Inspector General
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The ITIM framework is a hierarchical model comprised of five maturity stages. Each stage builds upon the lower stages and represents a step toward achieving both stable and effective ITIM processes. A summary of the five stages is presented below.
Stage 1 describes the state of an organization prior to any framework implementation and does not contain critical processes. Maturity stages 2 through 5 are composed of a series of critical processes, each of which must be implemented and institutionalized for an organization to satisfy stage requirements and advance to the next stage. The ITIM framework also breaks down each critical process into a set of key practices. Key practices are specific tasks and conditions that must be in place for an organization to implement effectively the necessary critical processes. A summary of ITIM critical processes for each maturity stage is presented in the following chart.
Four core elements comprise each critical process in the ITIM framework. These elements indicate whether the implementation and institutionalization of a process can be effective and repeated. The four core elements outlined in the ITIM framework are: (1) purpose, (2) organizational commitment, (3) prerequisites, and (4) activities. The following chart illustrates the relationship between the four core elements.
Each core element, except for the "purpose" core element, contains specific key practices. The ITIM framework states that these key practices are the attributes and activities that contribute most to implementing and standardizing a critical process. |