Getting Started With Business Process Management

The set of ideas, tools, and techniques that deal withthe critical success factors for BPM.
business processes, known in short as BusinessIn order to support both process improvement and
Process Management (BPM), has been around for aoperational management, it is essential that the
couple of decades. Even though forward-thinkingvarious capabilities of BPM form a set of cohesive
professionals in business and IT recognize thetools for modeling, analysis, workflow design,
importance of BPM, it does not get the mainstreamuser-interface design, governance, and metadata. A
attention it deserves.BPM platform that has a strong integration
Large-scale ERP and client/server implementationsinfrastructure moves processes from design to
absorb the attention of IT departments and distractautomation with minimum code and manages their
the innovators. The underestimation of therun-time infrastructure. This facilitates rapid
importance of integration in connecting end-to-endimplementation of process improvement projects.
business processes, coupled with proprietaryBusiness processes originate with the customer,
application architectures, continues to make it difficulttraverse various functional departments of the
to realize the promise of BPM.company, and flow back to the customer. In this
In the last couple of years, there has been anjourney, the processes rely on both systems and
increasing recognition of the role played bypeople for handling business transactions. To the
integration, enterprise service-oriented architecture,extent these processes are successful in their goal of
and mature process management platform in creatingdelivering value to the customer, they are essentially
agile business processes that confer competitivecustomer-centric value chains. BPM therefore deals
advantages.with both process improvement and operational
Companies are realizing that functional excellence andexcellence. It plays a role in the various phases of
product commoditization are not sufficient to ensureproject lifecycles (such as requirements gathering,
customer centricity and innovation. Visionarymodeling, analysis, design, improvement,
executives consider the set of integrated capabilitiesdevelopment, and deployment), as well as in the
that deal with the full lifecycle of business processespost-project phases of processes (such as control,
as the key to an accelerated evolution towardsmonitoring, maintenance, and management of
process maturity.business processes).
Two of the major roadblocks to adopting andA true BPM platform handles not only the
implementing BPM are the lack of understanding ofcomponents of business engineering such as modeling
Business Process Management Software, and notand analysis, but also the components of software
knowing how to get started. Understanding andengineering such as integration, connectivity to
implementing need not be sequential activities. It isexisting IT infrastructure through adapters, and
critical to get started with BPM, since adoption andenterprise-class middleware management.
implementation will continuously enhanceHuman-centric workflows that seamlessly integrate
understanding.with system-centric processes must support the role
Most important, companies that make a beginning willplayed by people in business processes.
realize that BPM's expense and risk are several ordersBPM platform that has a strong integration
of magnitude lower than traditional IT development.infrastructure moves processes from design to
There are different entry points for BPM, ways ofautomation with minimum code and manages their
ramping up process initiatives, organizational andrun-time infrastructure. This facilitates rapid
cultural challenges that BPM practitioners face, andimplementation of process improvement projects.