Recently, I was brought in, at a Fortune 500 organization, as an Enterprise Architect by their newly established Enterprise Architecture practice. I was to work on a couple of major initiatives. In the kick-off meeting, a Program Manager for one of those initiatives raised this question - "We already have a couple of architects working on this program. Why do I need a third one?". To be fair, he wasn't resisting my presence. He simply wanted to know the value I was going to add. It was a fair question, especially considering the fact that he was indirectly paying for my role.

I am sure different flavors of this question (why does an organization need Enterprise Architecture (EA) or what exactly is the role of an Enterprise Architect etc.) have been asked in several other organizations and answered. Here is my take on it: