2009-05-05 EA IP Advisory Group Call Minutes

TSC EA IP Advisory Group

Tuesday, April 21, 2009 at 3 PM EDT (US Eastern Daylight Time, GMT -5)
To participate, dial 770-657-9270 and enter pass code 124466#

Dimdim meeting link: http://webmeeting.dimdim.com/portal/JoinForm.action?confKey=lynn_hl7

back to EA IP Meeting Agenda and Minutes

Agenda

1. Roll call:
   • Chair: Marc Koehn (Marc.Koehn@GPInformatics.com)
   • John S. Carter (jcarter@apelon.com)
   • Nancy Orvis (nancy.orvis@tma.osd.mil)
   • Ken Rubin (ken.rubin@eds.com)
   • Ed Tripp (Edward.tripp@estripp.com)
   • Lynn Laakso, HQ - scribe (lynn@hl7.org)
2. Agenda Review
3. Standing Agenda Items
   • No comments on previous meeting notes
   • Update on recent activities in Discussion of Breakout document
     • Sent out a few minutes ago to pass and cts2 alpha project, charter framework for alpha project consideration. Time challenged as some of them have resource through may 31st. Ioana may be able to get PASS work done in that timeframe. Will circulate as they come forward.
4. Current discussion topics
   • Enterprise Architecture Breakout group document discussion
     • Going to the breakout document: Nancy and Ken had previously challenged us to look at the top-down architecture view. We subsequently took a subgroup discussion on a couple of Friday afternoons. The resulting document includes some front matter / background for those not on EA IP advisory group calls who would otherwise not know the context.
     • Ken walked us through the document:

       What do we mean by enterprise architecture and how rigorous a treatment do we wish to have? One end of spectrum in fully-funded, fully-staffed robust agency context one might take a top down and side to side approach, on the the other end a more cursory lightweight treatment may be considered. We are closer to lightweight than rigorous. Nonetheless, we deed documented and repeatable processes; HL7 POV has two benefits – most of the org doesn’t care about enterprise architecture ‘per se’ and are not architects. Also may focus on more appropriate impact rather than architecture for architecture sake.

       Concern as breakout group: recognize that we’re just trying to carry the ball down the field but not representative of larger group – a pre-alpha thing, brainstorming and some text.

       What are the objectives of the architecture revision, with this process – did the brainstorming. Covered a lot of ground in our first meeting. Then a notional process for how to accomplish it and what might be the milestones. Then, tried to develop short term game plan; immediate action plan for review today and going into Kyoto for those that are there can continue work in the spirit of the larger group’s intent.
       Also discussed: If we were to actually do the work, what might that look like? Education process, process facilitation, get our heads around what the problem was.

     • Ken reviewed Brainstorm Outcomes: look for input on have we met the 80/20 rule standards process, and objectives. Haven’t tried to sort it.

       These are reasons to improve core products and processes… if there’s anything that doesn’t make sense, more troublesome than if we missed something.

     • Nancy highlighted an issue with the objective pertaining to other SDOs – as worded it didn't make sense if we’re talking about the EA since it didn't surface the deeper issue that the EA work should “make visible” our strengths and weaknesses, in order to clarify our offerings with respect to other SDOs; based on that we can then coordinate in areas where they can do a better job.

       Marc noted that this was a key point but that it will be hard to action since it will require us having a strong consensus on these strengths etc.; it was agreed that this is a key item to address going forward. What part of the health industry are we in? Health EDI? Clinical Research, we are *what, exactly, is this* in Healthcare?

     • Next section- Notional “Standards Process”: Marc asks: how do we model our business, even if we don’t know exactly what it is?
       Phantom framework allows us to begin an as-is and to-be description against that process.

       In regard to the "measurement" step, Ed suggests we should also measure the quality of the output, in addition to success of implementation. This should go beyond the qualify of the spec per se and also cover “Fitness for use”.

     • Ken reviewed the milestones: not tied to dates at this time. Marc intends to build on this for review on Saturday with TSC and further elaborate with Advisory Group in upcoming calls and meetings. Ed suggests we include the audience of the white paper: Intended is HL7 internal stakeholders.
     • John asks what is the approval of as-is architecture? Intent is to make sure key governance groups agree on ‘view of the world today’. If we use the abstract "Standards Process" then this step would implicitly validate that documentation/analysis approach as well.
     • John suggests that the step 2 for walk through a project example it be an existing project, not an alpha project. Helpful to compare a piece of finished work done the ‘old way’. Review an old project for number of artifacts, how many months to develop, number of people, steps required, Use as education process, motivation for change process. We noted that this will only be challenging insofar as we can find a suitable project.
     • Ken suggests adding dimension of quality of product (# of known implementations within 12 months of publish, # of comments, # of votes non persuasive).
     • Marc continued on to Immediate Next Steps:

       Use the powerpoint mentioned on Q3 Wednesday at MayWGM.

     • Marc will be sending updates and revisions to the list
     • Key points to bring to a subsequent agenda

       How best to clarify / confirm the business scope?

       Further discussion on the "Quality" questionn

Adjourn 3:50 PM