According to a recent publication by Gartner, business process management (BPM) has matured from an earlier IT vendor-driven focus of implementing `BPM` systems and technologies to a holistic business practice and management discipline aimed at driving increased employee and customer value.
Although IT definitely continues to play a key role in enabling a BPM-driven operating and management approach, there is much more required to fully embrace and derive benefits from a true BPM approach.
The strong underlying theme of BPM is that of creating a `process managed` organisation. In simple terms, this means viewing and operating an organisation as a set of end-to-end processes, as opposed to a set of independent departments or `silos` each concerned with their own isolated performance.
The BPM approach moves towards focusing on the overall end-to-end processing performance, thus unlocking significant improvement opportunities and enabling a drive towards an improvement in the overall customer experience. Achieving this shift is not easy and requires the establishment of new roles and responsibilities within an organisation, as well as the establishment of new practices and competencies.
Also key to BPM is the establishment of the ongoing practice of process improvement and alignment. Whereas earlier improvement approaches (eg BPR) were often focused on one-off projects to radically overhaul processes, they did not focus on the ongoing maintenance of the processes thereafter. The holistic BPM approach does this with ongoing continuous improvement of processes being a key component. If companies can achieve the agility promised by many vendors via their BPM suites, IT can certainly make it easy to continuously adjust processes as required over time.
However, a more basic approach of having clear information about how the processes currently work, for instance, via an up-to-date and accurate process repository, can also enhance business agility in that it facilitates improved and speedier decisions with respect to improvements that need to be made to processes. Irrespective of how sophisticated one gets with BPM automation tools, establishing an up-to-date accurate database of all existing processes is a logical starting point for implementing a BPM approach.
Another area where BPM has an edge over previous improvement approaches is in the area of day-to-day operational management. BPR may have achieved improved processes, but did not address improvements in day-to-day workforce management. Having end-to-end processes, together with accurate and up-to-date information of what is happening in the processes, enables much improved workforce management, thus unlocking further benefits through improved productivity and staff utilisation levels. With accurate information on what is happening in the processes, staff can be relocated as and when required to ensure balanced production lines and elimination of bottlenecks. Although IT systems play a key role in enabling improved workforce management, new management practices and methods are needed to entrench it and so drive improved productivity and output, and hence better customer service.
According to Kem Tissiman, MD of Rethink Management Consulting, key factors for gaining the full benefits of BPM include:
* Ensuring it is approached as a holistic and ongoing management approach and not just a series of IT or business improvement projects.
* Setting up a dedicated BPM function to drive and promote it.
* Ensuring that BPM has executive management support and that its principles are incorporated in the operational strategies.
Gartner states that the main benefits that can be expected from BPM are:
* Reduced inefficiencies, errors, complexities and risk.
* Real-time factual reporting.
* Improved agility.
* Better alignment of resources.
For further information, please contact Kem Tissiman at telephone +27 82 413 6044; fax +27 11 285 0054; e-mail kem@rethink.co.za.
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Rethink Management Consulting is an independent company that provides a set of integrated services that are aimed at helping organisations with their ongoing business improvement and development initiatives. Rethink works closely with its clients to help identify and design business change initiatives, as well as with the management and execution thereof. Rethink`s end objective is to help its clients achieve improvements in the areas of financial performance and customer service. The core services offered are process engineering, production management/productivity improvement and project management.
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