An exploration of the many ways to approach the discipline of enterprise architecture

Despite growing interest in enterprise architecture (EA) around the world in recent years, a lack of common understanding is frequently described by EA researchers/practitioners. We conducted a systematic mapping study and it revealed that the extent to which the authors/researchers are focused on EA, the sectors in which they are working, the academic disciplines in which they have studied, the countries where their affiliated organizations are located, the subject areas of the journals/publishers of their publications and the way they have approached EA and its practitioners are some major elements that might influence the existing uniformity in EA. In addition, this study demonstrates how important it is to pay attention to the definition of 'enterprise architecture' itself. The contribution of this study is the organization of the EA literature according to three major questions concerning 'who' have been published in the literature, 'where' they have been located and 'what' their publications are about. This helps to better identify sources of variety which could be on the basis of the lack of common understanding in EA and provides practitioners and stakeholders a better understanding of this challenge. This also provides relevant directions for future studies.