Business-IT alignment and service oriented architecture: a proposal of a service-oriented strategic alignment model

Since its inception, SOA has been postulated as the solution to the problems of alignment between business and IT. However, these problems still remain, especially at external level where the business strategy should be aligned with the IT strategy. Based on the Henderson and Venkatraman’s strategic alignment model and the literature review of strategic aspects in SOA this paper proposes a Service-Oriented Strategic Alignment Model (SOSAM) in order to achieve business services and information technology external strategic alignment. The business strategy includes the definition of business service scope, the distinctive business service competencies and the business service governance; and the IT strategy includes the definition of technology service scope, the service systemic competencies and the service governance