| The term Business Process Management (or BPM) | | | | of interfacing software with human intervention |
| refers to activities performed by businesses to | | | | needed where applications are not able to |
| optimize and adapt their processes. The activities | | | | automatically interface. In addition, certain process |
| which constitute business process management can | | | | steps can only be accomplished with human |
| be grouped into three categories: design, execution | | | | intervention (for example, deciding on a major credit |
| and monitoring. Process design This covers either the | | | | application). Due to the complexity that this approach |
| design or capture of existing processes. In addition | | | | engenders, changing a process is costly and an |
| the processes may be replicated in order to test | | | | overview of the processes and their state is difficult |
| them. The software support for these activities | | | | to obtain. Business rules are a growing area of |
| consists of graphical editors to document the | | | | importance in BPMS as these rules provide governing |
| processes and repositories to store the process | | | | behavior to the BPMS, and a business rule engine can |
| models. An emphasis on getting the design of the | | | | be used to drive process execution and resolution. |
| process right will logically lead to better results as the | | | | Process monitoring This monitoring encompasses the |
| flow on effect of problems at the design stage | | | | tracking of individual process so that information on |
| logically affects a large number of parts in an | | | | their state can be easily seen and the provision of |
| integrated system. Evolution of business processes | | | | statistics on the performance of one or more |
| requires a change to the process design to flow on | | | | processes. An example of the tracking is being able |
| into the live system. Integrating business process is | | | | to determine the state of a customer order (e.g. |
| also a current research area. Integration of software | | | | ordered arrived, awaiting delivery, invoice paid) so |
| for process design to be used both for creating | | | | that problems in its operation can be identified and |
| graphical representations of workflows and | | | | corrected. In addition, this information can be used to |
| implementing and maintaining these workflows makes | | | | work with customers and suppliers to improve their |
| evolution of business processes less stressful, given | | | | connected processes. Examples of the statistics are |
| that requirements are not as static as information | | | | the generation of measures on how quickly a |
| systems. Process execution The traditional way to | | | | customer order is processed, how many orders were |
| achieve the automatic execution of processes is that | | | | processed in the last month etc. These measures |
| an application is developed or purchased which | | | | tend to fit into three categories: cycle time, defect |
| executes the steps required. However, in practice, | | | | rate and productivity. Copyright 2007 Ismael D. |
| these applications only execute a portion of the | | | | Tabije |
| overall process. Execution of a complete business | | | | More articles from this pro: D. |
| process can also be achieved by using a patchwork | | | | |