Real-time business agility is the key to business success, says Emma Murray, sales manager of Enterprise Transaction Systems for Software AG.
"Companies must be able to address market challenges and implement changes to stay competitive in a dynamic global marketplace," she adds. Increasing sales, cutting costs and enhancing flexibility are the key focus areas of business strategies.
IT infrastructures are expected to support these goals by providing a quick return on investment and added value. "This is not always achievable, as inefficiencies result due to staff not having access to necessary data, which is saved in separate information silos. Because managing the data, information and processes in a uniform way is not possible, it is difficult to make good decisions and change quickly in response to market conditions," she explains.
Traditional technology architectures preclude real-time business agility, says Murray.
Even if a decision to change is made, changing a process model is different to changing a data model. If a process is modified, changes must take place at multiple levels, she adds. Since this happens manually, it costs the business time and money, and the assistance that IT can provide is limited.
Meeting the needs
Business agility has four key requirements: productivity, visibility, versatility and accessibility, states Murray.
Productivity, she says, is increased by automating inter-departmental processes, and eliminating inefficient processes and process bottlenecks.
Visibility increases customer service levels when a standardised, consistent customer approach across the business is in place, Murray explains. In addition, when information is distributed in real-time, managers can react to new market conditions and anticipate opportunities, increasing profitability.
Versatility is making changes to business processes simpler, by aligning business strategy with IT. This allows staff to quickly and easily provide services at reduced costs and in a shorter time when there is less effort needed to make changes at different levels, Murray continues.
"Accessibility to all information, regardless of where it is stored, avoids having to rip out existing systems to replace them with a standardised infrastructure. It also provides a consistent view of all information. This, together with increased manufacturer independence, leads to a greater investment security."
Service-oriented architecture (SOA) can meet these four requirements, says Murray, as it allows varied systems to be incorporated in the information flow and re-use of specialist services via platforms.
She says from the process perspective, business process management (BPM) supports SOA: "It focuses on processes and their aims, instead of leaving the sequence of process stages to fate or adapting to a pre-set standard. To achieve this, BPM follows a cycle of modelling, automation and integration of processes, followed by analysis and ongoing optimisation based on the experience gained."
Throughput times are reduced and the speed at which processes can be adapted to changing market conditions increases. In this way, the value-added chain in a company grows towards operational excellence, Murray concludes.
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