Capability Mapping
Overlaying systems onto capabilities to expose duplication and gaps.
5 to work through
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intermediate
A services marketplace maps its architecture by listing its microservices. Why is that not a capability map, and what does the difference change?
2 min answer -
intermediate
An enterprise builds a capability map and it is never used again. What makes capability mapping produce decisions rather than documentation?
2 min answer -
intermediate
You have mapped capabilities and overlaid cost and differentiation. What decision does that enable?
2 min answer -
advanced Multiple choice
A capability map published nine months ago is quoted in every strategy deck. Each level-3 capability lists between four and eleven supporting systems and no system supports only one capability. The last two quarters of funding decisions contradict the map's own priorities. The two capabilities the strategy calls differentiating are both rated mature. What is the diagnosis?
3 min answer -
advanced
Salesforce's 2009 SIGMOD paper describes serving many tenants from shared tables with a metadata layer, rather than giving each customer their own schema. Which business-model decision forced that, and what did it cost them?
3 min answer
3 terms in this topic
Capability Heat Map
A capability map coloured by a chosen dimension — maturity, cost, risk, or strategic importance — to make patterns visible to non-technical stakeholders.
practiceCapability Mapping
Laying out capabilities hierarchically and overlaying information — systems, cost, health, differentiation — to make investment decisions visible.
conceptInverted Capability Map
A capability map whose boundaries and names were derived from the existing system inventory, so it confirms the current implementation and cannot sho…
1 artifact you would hand over
Neighbouring topics
Business Architecture
General material on the business side of architecture.
Business Capabilities
What a business does, stated stably and independent of implementation.
Business Processes
How work actually flows, including the handoffs nobody documented.
Value Streams
End-to-end delivery of an outcome, and where the waiting happens.
Domain Boundaries
Where the language of the business changes, and services should too.
Stakeholder Analysis
Who is affected, what they need, and who can block you late.
Product Thinking
Treating platforms and services as products with users and a lifecycle.
Business KPIs
The numbers a design is ultimately judged against.
Regulatory Constraints
Non-negotiable requirements that remove design options entirely.
Organisational Constraints
Team structure, skills and budget cycles as architectural inputs.
Time to Market
The constraint that dominates most products, and how to trade against it.
Build vs Buy
Differentiation versus table stakes, priced over five years.
Business Cases
Expressing an architecture proposal in the currency that gets funded.
Operating Models
How delivery, platform and governance functions fit together.
Team Topologies
Stream-aligned, platform, enabling and complicated-subsystem teams.
Platform as a Product
Adoption earned rather than mandated, with an owner and a roadmap.
Outcome Measurement
Knowing whether the thing you built achieved what it promised.
Portfolio Prioritisation
Choosing between investments with incomparable benefits.
Business Continuity
What the business does while the system is unavailable.