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Process Centric Enterprise Architecture: Towards an Agile Enterprise and Architecture
We live in a process powered world and the only thing the customer is interested in is WIFM (What’s in-it for me?). Customers are tired of hearing phrases such as “customer centric” and “world class” and “service oriented”. If your process outcomes are not aligned to the customer’s goals and you do not provide an excellent service (note: not a superior product) – guess what?
How does this affect Enterprise Architecture?
If an organisation doesn’t change its way of developing products for more than 40 years, do we expect that organisation to stay in business for very much longer?
Rules, Decisions and… Standards?
While pondering the difficulties still faced by enterprises employing a business rule management system (BRMS) and attempting to fully enable business users, I see yet another wave of standards coming our way. Standards for rules have been attempted in a variety of ways over the years. Each attempt provided some valuable insight but none really answered the call. This got me to thinking about the how far the field has come in terms of approach and execution but not in terms of standardization.
I have been fortunate to be involved with rules long enough to see a tremendous evolution in how the technologies are labeled, presented, integrated, and ultimately utilized. We have truly seen a sweeping move across the spectrum from purely academic research platforms to a boutique niche technology to its current place as a mainstream part of everyday business.
Why Business Architects Should Operate Outside EA
I’d like to make the case why business architects should operate outside of enterprise architecture (EA).
First, business architects are “big thinkers” and more business savvy than their EA counterparts. Their cultures clash. No matter how much EAs cast themselves as strategic thinkers, trusted advisors, or business partners there still seems a stigma that EA is only all about IT. This stigma stuck for decades and may help explain why IT-oriented EAs attracted only their kind. Meanwhile, recent converts to business architecture possess a distinct left- and right-brained aptitude for stating holistic viewpoints that are rigorous, well-understood, and fact-based. Some of them are ex-product managers, ex-business analysts, ex-sales, ex-entrepreneur, or simply ex-EAs or ex-IT pros who recently earned their MBAs and a light bulb went on, so to speak.
How to Streamline and Automate IT Compliance for the Enterprise
Implementing a proactive and risk-based information technology (IT) governance, risk management, and regulatory compliance (GRC) approach enables companies to better manage compliance costs and streamline compliance and business processes through increased automation.
GRC has always been an important if somewhat abstract concern to businesses, particularly companies that are publicly traded and/or in heavily regulated industries. Within the last decade, firms have developed a new and more concrete sense of urgency, as C-level leaders have been forced to address regulations such as Sarbanes-Oxley, Basel I, Basel II, and HIPAA, as well as mounting stakeholder and public demands for stronger internal controls and greater accountability.
Business Politics Before Projects Success: The Games Executives Play
Business Politics, Organisational Politics, Workplace Politics, irrespective of what noun you place in front of the word “Politics”, an association can be drawn that there will be some decisions taken within organisations that are based on robust debates that are based on biased agenda’s and contrasting behaviours and personalities. Belsky G and Gilovich T in their book, “Why Smart People Make Big Money Mistakes”, infers that it is human nature to make decisions based on our personalities, self-motivated objectives, ego’s, peer pressure, fear and regret irrespective of the irrationality of the outcome. The inference can be generalised against any decisions we as individuals need to make and is supported by Belsky G and Gilovich T when they succeeded statements made in their book with, “financial and or otherwise”.
BPM Competence: Are We There Yet?
Industry analysts such as Gartner have estimated that the size of the BPM market was well over $2.0 billion in 2011 and some industry observers believe that the global market for BPM will surpass $5 billion by 2017. However, a rapid increase in the size of the global BPM market does not necessarily mean that companies are getting the best value out of BPM. Accordingly, some senior managers are asking the very same question that parents going on a long drive with small children typically hear, which is – “Are we there yet?”
Neuroscience Sheds New Light on Change Management Strategies
Neuroscience articles are becoming common when looking for new changes in organization change management methods. These articles shed new light on how organizational change strategy and the approaches being use may need to be modified. Some current change management methods may be causing more harm than good during change efforts. Learning about neuroscience will shed a new reality on change challenges and change management practices used today.
The Importance of Being Earnest – About Enterprise Governance
If the purpose of Government is to serve the needs of the public, as many agree, the main objective of Governance is to ensure that public needs are efficiently, effectively and impartially served.
Governance mechanisms can help to achieve that objective by providing well-defined processes and structures for all aspects of procuring, deploying, and managing the use of government resources. A recent study by the World Bank found a strong relationship between good Governance and good Government performance. Other studies have revealed similar findings[1]. The purpose of this article is to underscore the need for investing adequate resources in (and leadership of) an agency’s Governance processes.
Business Architecture Takes Major Steps Toward Maturation
A year ago, I wrote a BA Bulletin article entitled “A Business Architecture Body of Knowledge.” In that article we examined the grassroots evolution of a body of knowledge and early signs of adoption. We spoke of selected success stories, business architecture as a worldwide phenomenon, the move towards business-driven business architecture and initial automation efforts. That article also discussed the rollout of release 1.0 of “A Guide to the Business Architecture Body of Knowledge” (BIZBOK™).[1] Since that time, business architecture has matured as a discipline and in practice, moving beyond simplistic discussions that were commonplace just a couple of years ago.
Building a Process Catalog: The Journey Begins
Many large organizations lack process documentation. But how do you solve the problem of too much documentation, and not enough organization? We suggest implementing a Process Catalog.
Process awareness is growing across the company with which I am working and business units are focusing on process modeling and improvement efforts. However, this work is typically initiated by mid-level managers and neither methods nor deliverables are standardized across the company. I am working on a pilot program in a small business unit, approximately 7 departments and 50 people, to create a Process Catalog as an aid to their more detailed process modeling and improvement efforts. This and subsequent articles will chronicle the experiences and learning as this effort progresses.
Spread Sheets versus BPMS for Managing Processes
It is common place to find managers of complex, high risk, and business critical processes, making operational decisions using data gathered and manipulated within a series of spread sheets that have grown organically over a period of time.
Technology is clearly not a pre-requisite in developing and maintaining good processes. However, when it is used, I believe that a BPMS should be the first choice for managing processes rather than spread sheets.
Limitations of Spread Sheets
Spread sheets were designed to support modelling and they are fantastic for this purpose. They were not intended to manage operational processes where the requirement is to track task assignment and completion versus targets (granted that many managers would disagree with this). They present a number of key challenges when they are used in this way, including:
Capability Mapping – Part 2
Leveraging a Foundational Business Discipline
Capability mapping is commonly recognized as a business-oriented foundation for communication and collaboration, issue analysis and resolution, and prioritization and roadmap creation. Capability mapping is not hype and it is not an IT discipline. Rather it is a rapidly growing business practice that establishes a common business vocabulary that enables an organization to articulate an actionable vision, state a clear direction, focus investment priorities, address merger, acquisition, divestiture and outsourcing challenges, and focus technology investments on clearly articulated business demands. To begin leveraging this powerful discipline, attend this half-day workshop. The session will allow you to jumpstart or accelerate the mapping and use of business capabilities for a variety of business initiatives. Half-day workshop topics include:
Process Made Simple – Part 2
Many organizations are seeing revenue and profits slip through their fingers because of the operational gaps between departments. As customers, partners, employees or suppliers move through your business operations, new “socially aware” tools can prevent them from getting trapped in complex processes, or finding themselves on the receiving end of inadequate customer service. Otherwise, a lack of synchronization of business operations can negate many of the key benefits derived from applying Business Process Management, Business Rules Management, Event Processing or other solutions that promise operational efficiency and effectiveness.
Achieving Process Innovation – Part 1
Many organizations are seeing revenue and profits slip through their fingers because of the operational gaps between departments. As customers, partners, employees or suppliers move through your business operations, new “socially aware” tools can prevent them from getting trapped in complex processes, or finding themselves on the receiving end of inadequate customer service. Otherwise, a lack of synchronization of business operations can negate many of the key benefits derived from applying Business Process Management, Business Rules Management, Event Processing or other solutions that promise operational efficiency and effectiveness.
Capability Mapping – Part 1
Leveraging a Foundational Business Discipline
Capability mapping is commonly recognized as a business-oriented foundation for communication and collaboration, issue analysis and resolution, and prioritization and roadmap creation. Capability mapping is not hype and it is not an IT discipline. Rather it is a rapidly growing business practice that establishes a common business vocabulary that enables an organization to articulate an actionable vision, state a clear direction, focus investment priorities, address merger, acquisition, divestiture and outsourcing challenges, and focus technology investments on clearly articulated business demands. To begin leveraging this powerful discipline, attend this half-day workshop. The session will allow you to jumpstart or accelerate the mapping and use of business capabilities for a variety of business initiatives. Half-day workshop topics include:
Capability mapping efforts not getting you to your destination?
The drum beats are echoing across the Global 2000 about the value of business architecture, and more specifically business capability mapping. Business capabilities – in other words “What a business does” – are in vogue. Business capabilities, in conjunction with value stream (process layer) mapping and business service to IT service transition (service layer) mapping, are supposed to lead businesses to a state of nirvana.
BPM Outlook: Gartner Outlines 2013 Trends
BPM is more important today than ever before. Only the most agile enterprise stands a chance in today’s constantly-changing business environment. Many are struggling, even more are falling behind. Janelle Hill shares Gartner’s perspective on the top BPM trends and opportunities for 2013.
Janelle will also share’s the results of a Gartner survey in which chief-level executives identified the approaches they are using to achieve their business objectives.
Learn how leading BPM teams are:
BPM and Big Data – Why it Makes Sense
A lot has been written about Big Data in the last few months. Most companies are trying to make sense of the large amount of data they have to serve as an input to both strategic and operational decisions. In this article, I’ll discuss a couple of reasons for the obvious link between BPM and Big Data and how they can co-exist with BPM implementations helping drive adoption of Big Data.
Most BPM platforms have built-in capabilities to collect process parameters and key process related data during process execution. Most also provide some form of rudimentary to sophisticated analysis of the data, perhaps not run time, (yet), but on a post facto basis.
Process owners use this data to gain insight into the process, for example:
Which BPM Modeling Notation Should We Use?
Should we use flow charts, swim lanes, value stream mapping, proprietary software notation, or BPMN? Yes, there a number of notations you could use, and you want to pick the right one for your organization.
The first question to ask is what is the purpose of the process diagramming notation? Since there are several purposes for process diagramming at different stages of a BPM/ process improvement project, you may switch to one type of notation or another at different times.
Purpose 1: A high level map to scope the project and as part of the charter. Here I suggest using a simple flow chart with 6-10 steps using rectangle for activities/steps, diamond shaped decision diamonds and directional arrows. You could actually create it in PowerPoint, but I usually do it in Visio. The purpose of this map is to get people understanding what a process looks like.
A high level process map is:
Business-IT Aggregation versus Alignment
Business and Information Technology (hereafter referred to as business-IT) alignment is so passé. Welcome the (relatively) new concept called Business-IT aggregation. The phrase “business aggregation” sometimes refers to a corporation that’s controlled by several key investors tasked to manage the corporation based on a succession plan. The word “aggregation” means the sum of the parts, the totality of components, or simply “the whole”. One dictionary (AllBusiness.com, 2010) defines it as “any bringing together of parts or units to form a collective whole.”
