Enterprise Wheel - Holistic Enterprise Design

The Enterprise Wheel – a tool for using and applying the EDGY language.

Navigating Enterprise Development with a 360-Degree Compass

The Enterprise Wheel is a holistic tool that provides a unified view for enterprise development, allowing us to see our enterprise as one connected system. It acts as a 360-degree compass: we can start from any point – whether it’s a customer need, a new technology, or a strategic goal, and ensure that we remain aware of how our choices and decisions impact the rest of the landscape.

The Enterprise Wheel provides:

Holistic Overview: Our enterprise is viewed as a complete and interconnected system. By integrating Identity, Experience, and Architecture, it is ensured that every decision is made with an understanding of the whole.
Human-Centric Focus: It is ensured that processes and technology always serve real people and their needs: our customers, employees, and partners. The human experience is kept at the heart of all design and development efforts.
Collaborative Way of Working: Experts from different disciplines, from business owners to developers, are brought to the same table to speak a shared language. This ensures a shared understanding and keeps everyone on the same page.

As a diagnosis tool, the Enterprise Wheel ensures that our strategy, operations, and customer experience are constantly aligned. With this approach, we can navigate enterprise development and ensure that every part of our enterprise is moving in the same direction.

The Enterprise Wheel (or Enterprise Design Wheel) tool can be used as a source of inspiration and guidance when starting with an enterprise design & development challenge. Enterprise perspectives and intersections are introduced as sectors of a wheel in two levels: 1) Facets represent the sectors at high-level and 2) enterprise elements represent the sectors at detail-level.

360-Degree Awareness. A dynamic navigation tool that allows us to enter the design & development process from any perspective. By ‘rotating’ the wheel, we gain a full 360-degree view of the impact of our choices. This allows us to uncover perspectives and elements that might otherwise remain hidden, ensuring all interconnected parts of the enterprise are considered.

Holistic View. Rotating the wheel ensures a holistic view: it helps us zoom in on details while revealing elements and impacts that would otherwise stay out of sight. It turns the ‘unknown’ into a shared understanding. Hidden connections and dependencies are brought to light, ensuring that no critical element remains outside the focus of development. This ensures that all relevant or even critical elements are fully considered. A holistic view ensures that cybersecurity and risk management are integrated into every perspective of the enterprise, from strategic identity to architecture.

The Enterprise Wheel supports holistic systems thinking and ensures all elements are considered in collaborative co-design and development – everyone is invited.

The Enterprise Wheel – the Navigator

The Enterprise Design Wheel (based on the EDGY language) is a tool that helps us see our enterprise as a single, connected organism rather than a collection of separate, distinct departments.

Why it is a powerful tool:

Connects the “Why”, the “What” and the “How”: It ensures that our strategic goals (Identity) actually translate into customer experiences (Experience) and are supported by our internal systems (Architecture).
Common Language: It provides a universal vocabulary, so that people from different disciplines or practices or departments finally mean the same thing when we use a word like “Service” or “Capability.”
Spotting Gaps: It reveals e.g. if we are building technology that doesn’t serve a customer need, or if we have a grand vision that our current systems simply cannot deliver.
Resilience and Security: The wheel allows for the identification of critical dependencies, ensuring that security and risk resilience are built into the enterprise by design.

How the Enterprise Wheel works as a Navigator:

The Enterprise Wheel acts as a 360-degree navigator, as a ‘compass’, allowing us to navigate the enterprise from any starting point:

Outside-In (Customer Need First):
- Start from Experience to find out what people need, then rotate the wheel to see what Architecture we need to build to support it, or rotate the wheel to see if the need is aligned with our Identity: our goals and promises?
Inside-Out (Capability First):
- Start from Architecture (e.g., a capability or tech, such as a new AI tool) and then rotate the wheel to see how it could or should change the customer Experience, or rotate the wheel to see if the architectural element is aligned with our Identity, our strategic goals etc.
Top-Down (Purpose First):
- Start from Identity, and then rotate the wheel to ensure every process, service or product or other element in our Architecture aligns with our purpose, mission, vision, and strategic goals, and our brand values and promises support our customers’ Experience.

In short: The Enterprise Wheel ensures that no matter which direction we are heading, we never lose sight of how it affects the rest of the enterprise.

The Wheel acts as a navigator: we can enter from any point, take one direction to start with, and then ensure that we are aware of how things are connected, as we see the overall landscape all the time.

The Enterprise Wheel as an analysis tool – for enterprise development

Analysis can be started on any sector, and then continued to adjacent sectors to any direction. The view can be taken from different viewpoints such as from enterprise, organisation, employee or customer viewpoint.

How to use the Enterprise Wheel?

Any Point of Entry: We can start our analysis from any perspective depending on our current challenge: Identity (Why?), Experience (What? Who?), or Architecture (How?).
Dive into the Elements: Once a perspective is chosen, we “zoom in” to the specific EDGY elements to address details.
Turn the Wheel (Clockwise & Anti-clockwise): Rotating the wheel allows us to see the non-obvious connections, to make the invisible visible.

The Enterprise Wheel supports flexible entry points: you can approach the enterprise top-down via the Experience, Identity, or Architecture lenses, or bottom-up, starting from a specific, granular element like a Product or Application.

Top-down: This is for strategy. We start e.g. with Identity (Why we exist) to define our purpose, and then move toward the specific elements we need to build (Architecture/Operations) to deliver what our customers need (Experience).
Bottom-up: This is for auditing or troubleshooting. We start with a concrete element, such as a Product or Service, and trace it back to see which Capabilities realise it and which Customer Journeys, Tasks, or needs it supports.

Whether starting from a high-level perspective or a specific element, the Enterprise Wheel ensures a holistic view where all other perspectives and interdependencies are taken into account. It supports systems thinking by making the relationships between Identity, Experience, and Architecture visible. The Enterprise Wheel prevents the “blind men and the elephant” problem where different departments see the enterprise in isolation.

Turn the Wheel

By rotating the wheel (clockwise and anti-clockwise), we can discover non-obvious connections and make the invisible visible

Why It Makes Things Easier?

It breaks down silos.
Invites stakeholders to “step out” of their specialised, comfort zones – to see the forest from the trees.
It clarifies the interdependencies between elements, showing how everything affects everything else.

Get the Enterprise Wheel PowerPoint template from here: link

See the Enterprise Wheel templates as pdf

The Enterprise Wheel supports systems thinking by mapping the relationships between all elements, allowing us to see the enterprise as a dynamic whole and understand how every change impacts the entire system.

The Enterprise Wheel – Holistic, Human-Centric, Collaborative -Diagnosis Tool

Holistic:
- It doesn’t just look at departments, disciplines or perspectives in isolation; it looks at the entire enterprise (Identity, Experience, Architecture).
Human-Centric:
- It puts People (Customers, Employees, Partners, Stakeholders) and their Experience at the heart of the design & development, rather than just focusing on cold processes or technologies.
Collaborative:
- It brings people from different disciplines (Architects, Designers, Business Owners) together to make sure everyone is on the same page and to create a shared understanding.

Why the Enterprise Wheel Matters for Business Development?

The Enterprise Wheel helps to see the complete picture when developing the business.

The Problem It Solves: Most enterprises work in silos – changes in one area can create unexpected problems elsewhere.

What It Does: The wheel shows how everything in the business connects. It’s a simple visual tool that lets us:

Start from any business challenge we’re facing right now
See what else will be affected by our decisions
Discover connections we didn’t know existed
Make sure we’re not solving one problem while creating three others.

Why It Works:

Everyone can use it – no special training needed
No blind spots – forces us to look at all perspectives and aspects before deciding
Shared language – gets different disciplines talking the same way
Flexible – adapts to whatever challenge we are working on

Use EDGY elements when using the Enterprise Wheel as an analysis tool. Use the free Enterprise Wheel PowerPoint template, available for download: link. An example template is shown below.

Rotate the wheel in any direction:

By utilisng the Enterprise Wheel, more specialised elements can be derived from the EDGY Facet Elements as shown below.

With the help of the Enterprise Wheel we can get into many ‘Enterprise Concepts‘….

The Enterprise Wheel serves as a navigator for business development and decision-making, helping us navigate complexity and avoid costly surprises.

The Enterprise Wheel summary

WHAT?

A Shared Tool for All Roles
- Provides a single tool for collaborative enterprise design and development for everyone involved, that eliminates “lost in translation” moments by replacing jargon with a universal vocabulary.
Perspective Switching & Reframing
- Enables perspective switching by rotating through Identity, Experience, and Architecture – allowing stakeholders to see the big picture from different viewpoints and step into each other’s shoes.
360-Degree Impact Analysis
- Enables stakeholders to take a holistic view of the enterprise by looking beyond their own area to see how every detail impacts the enterprise as a whole, preventing ‘tunnel vision’.

HOW?

Any Point of Entry:
- You can start our analysis from any perspective depending on your current challenge: Identity (Why?), Experience (What? Who?), or Architecture (How?).
Dive into the Elements:
- Once a perspective is chosen, you “zoom in” to the specific EDGY elements to address details.
Turn the Wheel (Clockwise & Anti-clockwise):
- Rotating the wheel allows you to see the non-obvious connections, to make the invisible visible.

Top-down:

You start e.g. with Identity (Why we exist) to define the purpose, and then move toward the specific elements needed to build (Architecture/Operations) to deliver what your customers need (Experience).

Bottom-up:

You start with a concrete element, such as a Product or Service, and trace it back to see which Capabilities realise it and which Customer Journeys, Tasks, or needs it supports.

Get the Enterprise Wheel PowerPoint template from here: link