Overview of Business Process Management

Business Process Management, or BPM, now more and more driven by software, has been a management discipline for a long time, and it would seem to be rather straightforward to implement an automated system. In reality it is not. For one thing, business process management involves people to a large extent, and it can be very difficult to standardize a rather complex process in which people are deeply embedded. In addition, the terminology used in BPM is not as standard as one might suppose. In fact, if one were to specify a BPM software application, and leave it at that, Business Performance Management software could be what turns up on the doorstep.

As companies have automated aspects of their business process models, each has tended to go their own way, and today's management systems are far different from the document driven systems of 20 years ago.

Getting back to basics, where there is an area of generally common agreement, business process management is generally defined as a discipline that governs the business process environment with the aim of improving business operation performance, while at the same time providing flexibility and agility when dealing with change. Most processes in place today, especially in larger corporations, tend to be highly structured, replete with software tools, metrics, and policies and procedures designed not only carry out business but to continuously optimize the process.

An Example Of Past And Present - Highly automated business management systems that are being put into place today usually need to address both person-to-person and system-to-system processes. One only needs to visit a doctor's office to see such a system, on a smaller scale perhaps, in action. In the course of the consultation, the doctor, through his laptop or notebook, can review a patient's past history, view past and present lab tests, document exam or diagnostic results, set up appointments with other physicians, and e-mail prescriptions to the pharmacy of the patients choice. Just a few short years ago, that portion of a doctor's business management process involved locating and pulling a sometimes very fat folder containing the patient's records from the files, sending an aide to pick up lab test results, writing prescriptions, and negotiating appointments over the phone.

A business process management system used in a large corporation has to interact with many different organizations as well as outside companies, clients, and vendors, making certain among other things that all communications received are routed to the appropriate party or parties, and tracked. Since contemporary automated BPM systems are often based on preceding, non-automated processes, it is little wonder that there is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all system application.

New Mantra of Business Process Modeling and IT

In the worlds of Business Process Modeling and Systems Development as new approaches emerge they quickly turn to fads that are seen as the panacea for all of the ills that plague these worlds. These "advanced", and often unproven, approaches are quickly adopted because nobody knows how the existing mess has occurred nor has the skills to fix it - well not using existing techniques.

So the rationale is quickly formulated that the mess would not have had happened if the new approach had been available at the time it was being created, so using the approach will mend it! If the new approach is automated then it's Eureka! Technology replaces thinking! One of the latest approaches that is quickly turning to a fad in many places is Business Process Execution Language (BPEL).

The emergence of "process centric" business modeling over recent years, where everybody models everything that happens in a business as a "process", has introduced complexities that have accelerated this fad syndrome. Get this clear - not everything that happens in a business is a process, so stop modeling it as such! The problem is still further compounded because most "process" modeling tools are only suitable for modeling procedure. This statement is seen as "splitting hairs" by analysts and business managers who do not know the difference, but it is a big problem!

Procedure can, and will, change significantly over time within a business, due to changes in technology, organization, etc. Because nobody realizes that they have actually modeled the wrong thing, they mistakenly think that processes significantly change over time, which they do not. This is where approaches such as BPEL are seen as life saving solutions. Because procedure has been modeled in place of process, changes are happening all the time and there is a need to update things all the time. If this change could be automated and done quickly then the problem would be solved - wouldn't it?

This approach takes the business to the brink of the Chaos Chasm! If you have chaos and you automate it you do not get elegance, you get automated chaos! So what is the solution? Agile development approaches? BPMN? ABCD? Some as yet undiscovered miracle?

Its simple - stop modeling the wrong thing! Stop modeling complexity and trying to control it. Model simplicity by modeling the core activities of the business - Business Functions - not business processes. This will bring simplicity, power and elegance - much easier to automate. The Integrated Modeling Method describes how all this can be achieved in organisations of all sizes with far less effort and greater speed.