Enterprise Architecture (EA) management has been gaining importance in organizations, and while EA management frameworks provide a holistic and generic view on the subject, organizations introducing EA management are often left alone regarding the details of the approach. The EAM Pattern Catalog, presented in this article, is a collection of best practices for addressing specific concerns in EA management related to e. g. architectural standardization, application landscape planning, or interface, business object, and service management. It provides methodologies for addressing these concerns, together with information models defining the relevant concepts, and viewpoints for visualizing them.
This article describes the structure and extent of the EAM Pattern Catalog, and exemplifies its approach by outlining EAM patterns for addressing architectural standardization. Architectural standardization tries to tackle the complexity of the EA created by historically grown structures. These structures lead to disadvantages as low maintainability, low bargaining power at IT suppliers, or the need of largely diverse skills in the IT workforce.