Part of the reason for undertaking the MCA process was to be able to deeply understand that what I thought makes an architect is what and architect really is - or at least the rest of the world considers one to be.  A previous post, IT Architecture - The Usual Suspects, was written when I was applying for inclusion in the MCA programme and was the result of trying to understand what the selectors, other certified architects, and the IT industry in general thought of people who call themselves 'architects'.

In December last year I had my first mentorship session and all was well, but it took a long time for me to really formulate my thoughts and approach to obtaining MCA certification.  It would seem a complete waste to fly halfway around the world and then have the case study that was considered such an achievement be sneered upon because it comes out of Africa.  It was only later that I read on BoingBoing about an essay that gives tips on 'How to write about Africa', which states "Never have a picture of a well-adjusted African on the cover of your book, or in it, unless that African has won the Nobel Prize. An AK-47, prominent ribs, naked breasts: use these." It also includes the advice to close with a quote by Nelson Mandela, which you will see below, I subconciously did months before I even read the advice.

As preparation I had my notes, references, documents, presentations, models and a whole host of material to start with but I couldn't get going.  After a few false starts I decided to write text only - no diagrams or references, just to see where it would lead me.  But something was still missing and I realized that to explain why I do things in a certain way that the audience would have to have some idea of the environment that I work in, otherwise nothing would be really clear.

Miha covered MCA and Intercultural issues last year but it goes beyond culture and into the environment that one grows and operates in.  Being a colonial descendant I am culturally similar to my English ancestors and, slightly strange accent aside, would not be considered culturally out of place in Great Britain, the English speaking former colonies and to some extent the States.  However my approach to architecture differs to that of my international peers and I would even need change my own approach in another country.

The result was an MCA submission which I believe contains all the necessary world-class details, with all the checkboxes checked and a preamble which paints an environmental picture (although devoid of AK-47's and naked breasts).

I decided to post the entire preamble on this blog as an insight into my local environment and as a trigger for readers to think about their own.  Perhaps you can think of how you may approach architecture differently because of your own environment.  Maybe the country, state or town that you live in has a profound impact on your architecture and, when viewed by outsiders, is either banal or innovative.

Disclaimer: Although this document was submitted months ago, I have had no feedback, so please don't consider this a recipe for MCA success. 

Simon

MCA Submission Preamble

It would seem unnecessary to provide a social, political and economic outlook for South Africa in order to asses the an individual’s IT skills yet while an individual computer or system is ignorant of its cultural position, the application and uses of such a system is responsive to its environmental influences – so some understanding is crucial.

The low level technical implementation within a system is essentially the same across the world – a developer in Silicon Valley will code up a “Hello world” example the same as one in Cape Town, Bangalore or Sydney. It is the reason that the system is being built and the approach to building it that is localized. So, similar to global organizations attempting to understand the local markets in which they operate, one needs to understand the cultural nuances of the particular IT environment in order to understand the abilities and skills of an individual, team and even the system itself.

Since architectural disciplines are not only focussed on specific technical issues it is particularly necessary to have a smidgen of understanding of the South African environment in order to asses a South African architect. When considering an architect’s ability to implement an organizations’ vision or strategy using the resources available, the context of that vision and strategy is required. Although, like the developer coding a “Hello world” example, the architects style, approach and use of techniques should be of the highest international standards and at the same time fit for the environment.

As much as South Africa has had a transition to democracy that has been reasonably peaceful there are lingering issues. Although they may not be newsworthy enough to retain continued international interest they are relevant to local people and businesses. South Africans only resolved their political issues recently and are still trying to build an economy and empower and uplift their fellow South Africans. There are many issues that could be discussed and some of them quite large, such as poverty and unemployment, but for brevity I will focus on those that affect my professional role and the projects that I am involved in.

The South African population is largely undereducated and under skilled and, coupled with the desire to redress the wrongdoings of the past, creates an environment where the skills base is very thin. This lack of skills is not limited to engineering types, but also extends up the management chain and into support services. Also, South Africa's growth is in infrastructure, manufacturing and agriculture – leaving IT, financial services and other industries to make do with the less ambitious of the newly educated.

Traditionally IT workers have been made up of white males, and this is still largely the case, yet legislation and regulation of Black Economic Empowerment has had knock-on effects within IT. While the workers are still white males, the organizations making use them are motivated not to do so and are increasingly turning away capable people. These ostracised workers have little loyalty and tend to move around a lot, diluting their skills and eventually taking on international opportunities. Staff churn is extremely high and I would estimate that at any time more than half of an organizations IT complement has been there for less than two years. Regardless of the merit and reasoning behind the political and social intentions a vacuum is created – particularly in IT. Very few up-and-coming educated blacks choose IT as a career, preferring more booming and lucrative sectors and those that do are needed in more senior positions, to satisfy affirmative action quotas, and do not spend enough time in implementation roles where they can make a desperately needed contribution.

An interesting side effect of affirmative action and the lack of skills, is that skilled resources are moving to consulting companies and ISV’s and being sold back to corporates at a premium under the banner of an international brand. The problem is that the skills in these organizations do not necessarily live up to the celebrity of their international counterparts and the buyers of these skills lose the ability to control the operations and future of their own systems – a potential strategic error that never allows them to really leverage IT to differentiate themselves in the market. With the bulk of available skills being tied up in product or consulting focussed organizations the approach to IT becomes bland and uninteresting.

When driving through Sandton in Johannesburg, the business centre of South Africa, it is difficult, looking at modern office buildings and fancy cars, to picture the financial disposition of the bulk of the population. The per capita income of South Africa is misleading and there are huge contrasts in the financial contributions of the population groups. While business does have a responsible role to play in alleviating poverty it is largely a social problem. What South African businesses are trying to do is capture the markets offered by the rising middle class. For example, it is only recently that South Africans have had the income and access to credit to buy passenger vehicles and the motor industry has, over the last few years, seen a growth of about 16% - high above the GDP growth of 6%. Although there is increased income, disposable income and available credit, the South African economy is not driven by consumer spending as much as in larger economies. South Africa’s economy is still rooted in commodities which has neither a very high nor interesting IT spend.

Organizations attempting to capture the local emerging market operate on fairly small margins and have to be careful of the cost of servicing their customers – for example, an IT cost of US$2 per month for a life insurance policy may be fine in a first-world country, but when the average consumer buys one through a clothing retail outlet for US$10 per month then such a high IT cost makes the product useless.

The retail chain Shoprite caters to low and middle income groups where access to internet, telephones and even electricity or water are tenuous and Shoprite operates on a margin of under 4%. Obviously in that environment grandiose IT strategies using the latest technologies are not going to work because they are too expensive and inaccessible to the bulk of the customers. At a Shoprite IT strategy workshop the idea of a call centre was proposed, on the back of all the hype surrounding the technology, and was quickly vilified by the Chairman who pointed out that most of the customers are illiterate, don't have telephones and speak one of eleven official languages. "How would a call centre help?", he asked "That is what the store manager is for – to deal with problems immediately and in front of the customer". Such issues are often forgotten by evangelistic technologists who fail to consider the cost and application. At an international mobile technology event a few years ago, Allan Knott-Craig (the local mobile hero and internationally recognised mobile technology leader) was on a panel at a conference and his colleagues were shocked when, at a time when Europeans were paying fortunes for 3G licences and WAP was the next big thing, he commented "Most of the people on our network will just want to make a phone call".

The low income state of consumers does not need to stifle innovation however, although it does make it more challenging. For example, Vodacom (a South African mobile network) was the first operator in the world to offer prepaid services on the GSM network. The idea took off like wildfire in South Africa (where 90% of mobiles are based on prepaid) and quickly spread as an offering around the world. The lack of an existing, established market does create opportunities for IT innovation in delivering products and services. If the market is unfamiliar with an established delivery channel then it opens up opportunities to create new and innovative distribution and channels. For example, most of the population did not have bank accounts and although traditional bank branches existed, the newly economically active are quite comfortable with banking using ATM’s, till points at supermarkets and mobile banking. When considering such channels IT is a key strategic component for the entire business model.

As an ‘Emerging Market Economy’ South Africa is subject to the vulnerability and jitters of speculative traders. When a blip happens in some other part of the world, the effects can be felt on our own currency, the Rand, which has over recent years experienced a lot of volatility. Such volatility obviously has effects on larger economic issues, such as investor confidence, but is also felt in IT – where most of the input costs are based on imports. Hardware and software vendors do not create alternative pricing for countries such as South Africa and imported products land up costing even more because of shipping and middle-men. This has created an environment where IT costs are excessive and the purchase of an additional server with its licences is no trivial matter. Even trying to understand the operating and upgrade costs over the next few years is virtually impossible to estimate when the value of the currency could drop by 20% over a few days.

How does one measure the importance of a South African organization in an international context? Is it’s comparison to turnover or profitability with its first world counterparts – a capitalist would argue that those are the only measures. What about trying to measure the contributions that they make to the communities that they operate in or the lives of their employees? Shoprite is opening up retail stores in remote parts of Africa, bringing products, such as shampoo, to people for the first time in their lives – and that we take for granted. South African mobile operators Vodacom and MTN are doing the same by providing voice and data communication across Africa.

Likewise, how does one measure the skills of an individual using an international yardstick? Granted, the base set of skills should be of an international standard, but the approach and usage of those skills will be localized. This is not a question of double standards and the more successful African countries such as South Africa have a culture of being able to compete in international markets on an equal footing with any other country in the world – but South African businesses trading internationally have to highlight their differences to western partners. I think that with skills, particularly those of an architect (which is already loosely defined), the same approach needs to be taken.

A core South African philosophy is that of Ubuntu – a word of Zulu origin meaning ‘humanity to others” that is difficult to define clearly and an attempt by Nelson Mandela is as follows:

“A traveller through our country would stop at a village, and he didn't have to ask for food or for water. Once he stops, the people give him food, entertain him. That is one aspect of Ubuntu but it'll have various aspects. Ubuntu does not mean that people should not enrich themselves. The question therefore is: Are you going to do so in order to enable the community around you to improve?”

The interesting IT twist on Ubuntu is that it has rapidly become the most popular desktop Linux distribution – created in South Africa by a team set up by Mark Shuttleworth. While the international open source community can understand the connotations between traditional ubuntu and the philosophies of the open source community, it is only a South African who can truly understand the relevance in a local context. One only has to experience rural South African schools, desperate for resources, where children are taught under trees to understand the significance of a technology movement that will benefit those children.