Most Target Operating Models Never Leave PowerPoint.
Your TOM Was Designed to Be Presented. Not Implemented.
Your organisation spends months — sometimes years — and hundreds of thousands of pounds with a consultancy to design a Target Operating Model. What you get back is beautiful. 200 slides. Executive summaries. Heat maps. Org charts.
Then implementation starts. And the TOM dies.
The traceability breaks. No one can connect the strategy box on slide 47 to the process change on slide 112 to the system requirement in the backlog. The layers don't align. Strategy, process, systems, and implementation are managed in separate tools, by separate teams, with separate vocabularies.
The model becomes a museum piece. Updated quarterly — if you're lucky. By the time it's refreshed, the business has moved on. The consultants leave. And they take the logic with them. What's left is a deck. Not a system. Not a capability.
This is Process Debt at the architectural level.
Turn Your TOM From a Presentation Into an Operational System
Target operating model (TOM) software is a platform for designing how an organisation will work in future — its capabilities, processes, people and systems — and for managing the change from today's model to it. HOBA Pro is prescriptive TOM software: it guides teams through the six HOBA steps (Focus, Control, Analyse, Evaluate, Design, Implement) and keeps the model live as delivery happens.
HOBA Pro is the AI-enabled platform that turns your Target Operating Model from a presentation into an operational system.
Unlike tools that model processes in isolation, HOBA Pro anchors your TOM in Business Architecture, with the 3 Ls (Layers, Language, Levels) ensuring structural alignment across every layer of your organisation.
The six steps run the whole transformation. The 4+1 Ladder is how step 5, Design, shapes the target operating model: eliminate the waste found in step 3, Analyse, then standardise, optimise and automate, and only then apply AI as the +1. Most vendors start at the top with AI; HOBA starts at the bottom.
What you get is not a document. It's a living, traceable, multi-layered operating model where every strategic objective has a clear line of sight to the processes, systems, and implementation tasks that deliver it.
When the board asks, "How does this initiative deliver our strategy?" — you point to the model and show them. In real time. Not in next quarter's update.
Built to Operate, Not Just Model
Living Multi-Layer Architecture
- Six steps, one connected model: Focus, Control, Analyse, Evaluate, Design and Implement are linked, so strategy traces through to implementation
- Traceability by design: Every strategic objective, business model element, process, system, and implementation task is linked
- 3 Ls alignment: Layers, Language, and Levels are enforced structurally
- AI-enabled insight: The platform surfaces gaps, conflicts, and optimisation opportunities across layers automatically
From Model to Mandate
- Capability-driven roadmapping: Turn operating model elements directly into prioritised implementation backlogs
- Impact analysis before commitment: Model a change at the strategy layer and see the ripple effects before you spend a penny
- Governance and accountability: Assign ownership to every element. Track status. Audit changes.
- Cross-functional visibility: Executives see strategic alignment. Architects see structural integrity. Delivery teams see clear requirements.
Built for Enterprise Reality
- Audit-ready traceability: Every decision, every change, every link is logged and reviewable
- Data sovereignty: Self-hosting available for organisations where data must stay in-country
- Framework-native: Grounded in the published HOBA Framework — tested in public sector transformation
- Certified practitioner ecosystem: Your teams can be trained and certified in the same framework the software implements
How HOBA Pro Works: From Strategic Intent to Operating Reality
Anchor in Strategy
For Leaders Who Need a TOM That Actually Works
Transformation Directors
COOs
Operating Model Leads
Consultancies
What Changes When You Operationalise Your TOM
Strategy-to-implementation traceability
Elimination of architectural drift
Faster, more confident decision-making
Reduced reliance on external consultants
Audit and regulatory confidence
Less Process Debt
How HOBA Pro Differs
“We don't replace your tools — we give them something real to execute.”
HOBA Pro: The Transformation Layer
What is this business becoming, and what has to be true to get there?
Enterprise Architecture
LeanIX, Bizzdesign, Ardoq
Project Management
Jira
Process & IT Operations
Signavio, ServiceNow
Enterprise Architecture Tools (LeanIX, Bizzdesign, Ardoq)
These are neutral repositories: they map your current enterprise and hold whatever you model. HOBA Pro is prescriptive: it guides you through designing and delivering the target operating model.
HOBA Pro sits on top of your EA tool rather than replacing it. Your EA suite maps the enterprise; HOBA Pro transforms it.
BusinessOptix
BusinessOptix offers process modelling, simulation, and TOM design — and they serve their market well. Where they focus on process-centric optimisation, HOBA Pro takes an architecture-first approach.
BusinessOptix is strong at process modelling and mining. Its Target Operating Model capability is process-led. HOBA Pro anchors the TOM in Business Architecture — the six-step HOBA method, with traceability from strategy through to implementation. Process is one layer, not the whole story.
HOBA Pro combines AI-enabled software with the published HOBA Framework, training, and certification — so your team's capability grows with the platform.
Big Four Consultancies
The major consultancies produce impressive TOMs. Their senior partners pitch with authority. Their junior consultants deliver with enthusiasm. And when the engagement ends, the knowledge leaves with them.
Big Four TOMs are typically delivered as documents — often 100-200 slides — with limited tooling for ongoing management. HOBA Pro is a platform, not a project deliverable. The TOM lives in software, updated by your team, owned by your organisation.
Big Four engagements are expensive and dependency-forming. HOBA Pro gives you the framework, the training, and the software to build and maintain TOM capability in-house — at a fraction of the cost, without the 'bait and switch.'
Big Four models rarely have native traceability from strategy through to implementation. HOBA Pro is built for exactly that — because without it, the TOM is just a very expensive diagram.
The difference: EA tools map your enterprise. BusinessOptix gives you process models. The Big Four give you presentations. HOBA Pro gives you an operational system.
Target Operating Model Software FAQs
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