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Each link between an organisation unit and a domain entity can be classified using the following roles:
Role | Description |
|---|---|
Owning unit | Accountable for maintaining, governing, and developing the domain entity. |
Utilising unit | Makes active use of the domain entity to perform its own functions. |
Providing unit | Delivers the outputs or services of the domain entity to other units. |
Consuming unit | Receives or depends on the outputs or services of the domain entity. |
Custodian unit | Maintains the authoritative or source record for the domain entity. |
Dependent unit | Relies on the domain entity for operational or strategic execution. |
Supported unit | Gains business value through a domain entity but is not directly consuming it. |
These roles allow for precise modelling of interdependencies, enabling traceability, governance, and impact analysis across organisational functions.
Defining relationships
Inter-unit domain relationships describe how specific business domains (such as Capabilities, Information, Services, or Value Streams) are supported, governed, consumed, or otherwise utilised by different organisational units within the enterprise. These relationships are used to clarify the operational and strategic dependencies across the business.
Valid domain types
The following domain types may be used as the focal point for inter-unit relationships:
Domain | Typical inter-unit relationship usage | Notes |
|---|---|---|
Capability | Owning, utilising, supporting, consuming, dependent, custodian | Most commonly used; a central anchor for inter-unit coordination |
Information | Providing, consuming, custodian, dependent | Typically shared across units with a clear lineage of stewardship |
Service | Owning, providing, consuming | Represents operational service dependencies between units |
Value stream | Shared, contributing, dependent | Highlights collaborative delivery of customer or internal value |
Initiative | Supported by, accountable to | May be indirectly implied rather than structurally modelled as a relationship |
Product | Supported, owned, developed by | Used sparingly in inter-unit context; product-level relationships tend to be value stream mediated |
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Note: Not all domain types are suitable for direct inter-unit relationship modelling. For example, Strategy, Policy, and Performance are usually overarching or analytical and are more often linked to organisational roles or artefacts than mapped through inter-unit relationships. |
Recommendations
The Capability domain should be the primary entry point for defining inter-unit relationships. It acts as a stable anchor and supports links to other domains such as Information and Services.
Consider cascading relationships. For example, an inter-unit relationship to a capability can imply indirect relationships to its supporting information or services.
Avoid over-modelling. Inter-unit relationships should reflect operational dependencies or governance needs, not every possible interaction.
Examples
Capability domain example
Capabilities may be shared, reused, or leveraged across the organisation. Clear designation of relationship roles supports investment planning, service level expectations, and architectural traceability.
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This approach ensures that data stewardship is clearly defined and that consuming units know the appropriate contact points for change requests or data issues.
Relationship strength
To enhance the usefulness of inter-unit domain relationships in organisational analysis, a numeric relationship strength value may be added. This value provides a relative indication of the intensity, criticality, or frequency of interaction between an organisational unit and the domain entity. It is intended to assist in prioritising governance, resource allocation, or change management efforts.
Scale
Value | Description |
|---|---|
1 | Very weak – minor or occasional interaction |
2 | Weak – intermittent or low-impact interaction |
3 | Moderate – regular involvement or mutual dependence |
4 | Strong – frequent and important interaction |
5 | Very strong – mission-critical, embedded, or highly interdependent |
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Note: Relationship strength is subjective and may vary by use case. It is often informed by data (e.g. usage frequency, support tickets, volume of transactions), expert judgement, or stakeholder interviews. |
Inter-unit domain relationships JSON
{ "$schema": "https://json-schema.org/draft/2020-12/schema", "title": "InterUnitDomainRelationship", "description": "Defines a relationship between organisation units in relation to a specific domain entity.", "type": "Capabilityobject", "properties": { "nameid": { "type": "Incident Managementstring", "description": "Coordinate and respond to safety incidents in the workplace", "primaryOwnerOrgUnitId": "OU-WorkplaceSafetyOpsUnique identifier for the inter-unit domain relationship." }, "domainEntityType": { "type": "string", "contributingOrgUnitsenum": [ { "orgUnitId": "OU-ClaimsAssessment", "role": "Data provider",
"contributionType": "Provides incident data and status updates "Capability", "Information", "Service", "ValueStream", "Initiative", "Product" ], "description": "The type of domain entity the relationship applies to." }, "domainEntityId": { "type": "string", "description": "Identifier of the domain entity (e.g., capability ID, information asset ID)." }, "relationshipType": { "orgUnitIdtype": "OU-Communicationsstring", "roleenum": "Stakeholder engagement"[ "Owning", "Utilising", "Providing", "Consuming", "Custodian", "Dependent", "Supported", "Accountable", "Contributing" ], "contributionTypedescription": "Crafts and distributes public and internal messagingThe type of relationship the unit has to the domain entity." } ], "organisationUnitId": { "type": "string", "dependenciesdescription": [ { "domain": "Information"Identifier of the organisation unit participating in the relationship." }, "relationshipStrength": { "type": "integer", "minimum": 1, "maximum": 5, "description": "Numeric representation (1–5) of the strength of the relationship between the organisation unit and the domain entity." }, "notes": { "type": "string", "elementIddescription": "INF-IncidentReports"Optional free-text field for explanatory comments." } }, "sharedByOrgUnitsrequired": ["OU-WorkplaceSafetyOps "id", "domainEntityType", "domainEntityId", "OU-ClaimsAssessmentrelationshipType"], } "organisationUnitId" ]}