Articles

Modeling Standards are Key to Scaling BPM Adoption

Modeling Standards are Key to Scaling BPM Adoption

Author(s):

President, BPMPros LLC

OK, you have completed a successful pilot BPM project and your organization is now committed to a major enterprise BPM initiative.  There are many steps you need to undertake now, too many for a single article such as this, but in this article we will explore one which is often overlooked.   The BPM industry, both tool vendors and consultants, like to talk about how much simpler it is to develop solutions with BPM than with traditional programming tools.  While this is certainly true, too many organizations interpret this as license to short-cut the disciplines which they have found to be necessary in all other forms of solution development.  This article will discuss the importance of modeling standards, provide guidelines on how to develop appropriate standards and perhaps most important how to make them an integral part of your process.

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Four of the Top Reasons for Operational Excellence Failure

Four of the Top Reasons for Operational Excellence Failure

Author(s):

Faculty Member, DBizInstitute.org and Managing Director, Spanyi International

Given that operational excellence (Op Ex) was built on a solid foundation of total quality management principles, it’s a bit surprising that as many as two thirds of Op Ex programs fail to meet expectations. While there are many reasons accounting for the failure of enterprise wide Op Ex programs, the following are arguably the top four in my experience.

Lack of Purpose

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Walking the Business Architecture Talk

Walking the Business Architecture Talk

Author(s):

Faculty Member, BAInstitute.org and Architect and Owner, Leadership Advantage

One of the questions I’m asked frequently is “how do I launch business architecture in my company?” I know it can be challenging–I have a lot of great responses to this question, and I offer classes specifically on this topic and consulting with organizations to do it. At the same time, I believe that benefits from business architecture techniques and models are already attainable for you regardless of your defined role, position or formality in the business. I always say, once you start thinking and acting like a business architect, regardless of where you sit, things will make sense to you in a new way and you will provide value for the business. I was a few minutes early for a lunch meeting a few weeks ago, so I stopped by a furniture store across the street from the restaurant that had a big sale sign out front. When I stepped into the store, it became clear by the room vignettes (and the prices) that this was an interior design retail showroom.

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Decisions and Digital Transformation

Decisions and Digital Transformation

Author(s):

Managing Director, Business Decision Management, Allegiance Advisory Group

As I pondered topics for this quarter’s missive, I decided to browse presentations from some recent conferences that focused on both technology generally, and financial services specifically. The former was full of optimism and excitement over a new day dawning and the power that advances in big data, analytics, and decision management might bring. The latter was replete with complaints over burdensome regulations, an inability to meet customer’s needs, and the desire to modernize extremely outdated legacy platforms. It truly seems that the approaches we discuss regularly here at BPMInstitute.org are not being fully recognized as potential solutions to alleviate the significant pain being felt. But why?

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Robotic Process Automation (RPA), BPM and BPMS

Robotic Process Automation (RPA), BPM and BPMS

Author(s):

Faculty Member, DBizInstitute.org and Managing Director, Spanyi International

There’s a fair amount of excitement around Robotic Process Automation or RPA. Some of it is just hype and some of it has substance. In February of this year, *Forrester forecasted that the size of the RPA market will reach $2.9 billion by 2021 – only to quickly point out that this number pales in comparison to the size of the total Artificial Intelligence (AI) spend estimated at $48.5 billion. Forrester also estimated that there will be over 4 million robots doing office and administrative and sales and related tasks by 2021 and the cost of an RPA robot is currently in the $5,000 to $10,000 range per annum. As a single robot may replace as many as three to five workers – the savings are easy to calculate.**  Further, the return on investment (ROI) from RPA has been predicted at a potential of 30–200% —in the first year. ***

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Agility in Requirements Gathering

Agility in Requirements Gathering

Author(s):

Assistant Vice President, U.S. Bank

Requirements gathering should be done mindfully. Then there is this world we are living in, which requires agility, right? Well, can mindfulness and agile be imagined together? Once you can imagine this your requirements will be solid and done right, and you will obtain agility. Your sign-offs will be also achieved smoothly. It won’t stop there. Development, unit testing, functional testing and UAT will be smooth as well, including your org readiness efforts, along with your usage uptake and learning experience. Does this sound like it is out of this world, or in Utopia as most of us know this is not a very easy thing to achieve?

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The Vigilant Business Architect: Lessons from the Field

The Vigilant Business Architect: Lessons from the Field

Author(s):

Senior Director, Ameriprise Financial

2017 may go down as the year of ransomware, rogue software that infects a computer, scrambles the data, demands you pay money to get access back, and eventually destroys your files. In May the WannaCry ransomware cyberattack affected more than 200,000 users in over 150 countries and disrupted operations for numerous corporations. This was followed in June by a new variant of the Petya ransomware, with this cyberattack impacting over 12,000 devices in around 65 countries, along with some high profile corporations. While most ransomware still targets consumers, what is notable for business architects is that according to Kaspersky Lab, ransomware attacks on businesses increased 11x in 2016. So what is the role of a business architect regarding cybersecurity, disaster recovery, and business continuity planning? I honestly have no idea. In the spirit of never letting a serious crisis go to waste, let’s see how we can help. Cybersecurity Framework

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Business Analysis is a critical, underrated and scarce skill on app implementations

Business Analysis is a critical, underrated and scarce skill on app implementations

Author(s):

Founder & CEO, Elements.cloud

Increasingly any business change is tied to new systems implementation or an upgrade. So it naturally was left to the IT department; “it’s software, right” But to exploit technology, an organization needs strong business analysis skills. As companies implement multiple cloud based apps enable faster and more significant change, the new breed of business analyst must have a broader combination of skills: business, analysis and problem solving, technology implementation & project management.  Those with the right blend of skills are in short supply.  Those with these skills can command higher salaries or consulting day rates.

Leveraging your business analysis skills

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How to Link Process and Organization Structure?

How to Link Process and Organization Structure?

Author(s):

Mr, Ashridge Executive Education

In the last twenty years we have become very good at mapping and improving processes; but we still have poorly structured organizations. Can we use our understanding of processes to improve organization design? A process exists to deliver a positive outcome to a customer or beneficiary. Sometimes the beneficiary is the person who does the work, as when you make a cup of coffee for yourself. But most processes in organizations exist to do something of value for an external or internal customer, who is not the person doing the work. This principle, deliver value to the customer, lies behind one of the great developments in process work – Lean. By analysing a process with a focus on what is needed to deliver value to the customer and eliminating everything that is not needed, a process becomes Lean. But Lean tells us little about how the work and people involved in delivering the process should be structured into an organization. So let me try to make a connection.

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Innovating your Operational Excellence Program

Innovating your Operational Excellence Program

Author(s):

Managing Director, Ephesus Consulting

Inside the four walls of most companies today, you will find Operational Excellence (OE) or Process Excellence (PE) programs aimed to accelerate the improvement activities of a business. The titles of the programs may or may accurately depict the actual work, as there are no universal definitions for OE or PE. In general, OE programs improve the scalability, reduce cost, increase flexibility, improve quality or adjust the strategic focus of the value creation engine. PE programs historically focus on similar goals, but using processes as the foundational improvement construct. Many consultants and process practitioners speak of the convergence of the realms of OE and PE. This is an important change in business improvement planning. Many of us have learned that processes are very effective tools to use as the basis for planning and executing strategic and operational improvements.

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