An Exploration of Enterprise Architecture Research

TLDR

Enterprise architecture management is increasingly recognized as crucial for business and IT, yet a common understanding and methodological consistency remains underdeveloped. The study aims to provide a comprehensive overview of enterprise architecture literature by answering research questions on co‑authorship collaboration, intellectual structure, influential works, and principal themes, and to propose a future research agenda. The authors use bibliometric analyses combined with qualitative interpretation to examine co‑authorship patterns, intellectual structure, influential works, and research themes in enterprise architecture. The study finds significant co‑authorship clustering and that greater co‑authorship promotes diffusion of enterprise architecture work; identifies three major research streams, noting that some highly relevant practical topics receive limited attention; and offers manifold contributions supporting researchers and practitioners.

Abstract

Management of the enterprise architecture has become increasingly recognized as a crucial part of both business and IT management. Still, a common understanding and methodological consistency seems far from being developed. Acknowledging the significant role of research in moving the development process along, this article employs different bibliometric methods, complemented by an extensive qualitative interpretation of the research field, to provide a unique overview of the enterprise architecture literature. After answering our research questions about the collaboration via co-authorships, the intellectual structure of the research field and its most influential works, and the principal themes of research, we propose an agenda for future research based on the findings from the above analyses and their comparison to empirical insights from the literature. In particular, our study finds a considerable degree of co-authorship clustering and a positive impact of the extent of co-authorship on the diffusion of works on enterprise architecture. In addition, this article identifies three major research streams and shows that research to date has revolved around specific themes, while some of high practical relevance receive minor attention. Hence, the contribution of our study is manifold and offers support for researchers and practitioners alike.