INFS5604 | Management | The Steps Of Building A Business Case For BPM

er, 2017). Projects intend to create a change in the process while the processes intends in avoiding variation in the results. Project management necessitates innovative thinking while process management ensures the achievement of the desired outcome with the occurrence of the appropriate steps. Irrespective of the lifespan of organization, the priority lies in the management of the processes. For instance, whether one is operating a multigenerational business or start up, the customers relies on the production of dependable, higher quality service or product made possible by the process undertaken. Project management represents the key of taking the business to next level and is successful with the proper management of the business processes. Nevertheless, the emergence of the advanced technology ensures easier management of processes.

3. Success factors of BPM include (Vom et al., 2014):

1. Improvement in Business Performance and Attainment of Sustainability: This is done in quest of attaining strategic objectives.

2. Traceability of the Business Performance: This involves translation of the strategic intent into subset of manageable and integrated programs and strategies.

3. Alignment of Capabilities and Actions of an Organization: This involves using business process for integrating strategies, technologies, performance, information, rules, knowledge, human resource, facilities and equipment.

4. Satisfaction outside Stakeholder Requirements: This involves using business process management in finding an optimal balance amongst external stakeholders like the consumers, customers, regulatory bodies, suppliers, competitors, owners and staff.

5. Consistency of Architecture with Structured Semantic Vocabulary:  There should be well-defined interconnected and interconnected map for business process that provides common language for work.

Pitfalls of BPM include (Scarborough, 2016):

1. Caught Unprepared in Demonstrating Delivered Value: This happens due to the failure of maintaining records or undertaking routine communication to the ones who matters

2. Deployment of the System without Understanding BPM as Discipline: This implies that BPM needs to be a part of the discipline of an organization

3.  Launching BPM Efforts on the Perceived Platform without Validation: This involves the gathering of metrics before occurrence of process improvement

4. Development of BPM capabilities without the delivery of business value: This implies building of capabilities with a touch of realism

5. More Focus on Mapping Process rather than improving them: This implies that the mapping process might get lost so the team should communicate and keep a track of the values delivered.

4. The five steps of building a business case for Business Process Management (BPM) include (Sekaran & Bougie, 2016):

1. Process Alignment: The first step in building of a business case for BPM funding involves determination of the process that requires focus. This step involves focusing on the process that leads to quicker results so that there is exists no risk of losing the potential sponsors in case of early failure.

2. Establishing Benchmarks for Functioning of the Current Process: This involves the determination of the benchmark for gauging the progress. The benchmark might simply involve outlining the person responsible for every project aspect and the time for which it is due.

3. Establishment of the Metrics for Defining Success: This involves defining predetermined criteria for success of the project besides clear set of goals at any particular stage.

4. Monitoring of New Process: This involves synthesis of information that leads to the creation of an overall mapping for the determining the means of functioning.

5. Refinement of the Process: This is also known as process transformation and focuses primarily on the improvement of the performance, reduction of the costs, meeting of the customer needs and nurturing of the relationship.

5. Five Stages of BPM include (Chang, 2016):

1. Modeling Phase: The identification of the process helps in testing certain scenarios for instance, in the Human Resource (HR) department and simulation with the used cases thereby allowing understanding of what actually works.

2. Implementation Phase: This phase involves the implementation of the process and the way it is used. This involves dealing with suppose a vacation request by an employee.

3. Execution Phase: This represents the running of the process. For instance, the process undertakes the verification of accrued leave of an employee based on a vacation request and automatically sending the request to supervisor through an email.

4. Monitoring Phase: This phase ensured determining the achievement of the goals. The process seemed successful in implementation as it allowed the HR department in reducing the resource requirement and in saving time and money.

5. Optimization Phase: The process worked as it motivated the HR department to automate complex processes like the performance review and hiring and termination.

6. People

The success of a business depends on the customer service due to the availability of the purchasing options at the fingertips (Stark, 2015). BPM systems can excel by providing the employees with the necessary tools for delivering excellent service. This involves:

• Blend the operations directly into the task management
• Offer necessary data for both the real time and the analytics.
• Provide right work to right employees through assigning of tasks based on the skill sets.
• Putting all the information in a single platform so that there is no wastage of time in loading innumerable systems

Process

Business process can stay either with a single department or spans across multiple departments and requires necessary inputs from the customers and the other parties (Wong, 2013). The BPM systems excel through mapping of the existing processes that aids in finding the ideal places for applying automation.

Technology

BPM represents an integral part of various digital transformations simply through the expansion of the technology integrations. This enables in streamlining access to required information necessary for the completion of operations (Karim & Arif-Uz-Zaman, 2013). For instance, the user dashboards help in displaying information collected throughput the organization thereby providing access to real time data.

7. Process Modeling helps in representing a process through digital means transferred via live automated process (Laguna & Marklund, 2013). It helps in the elimination of the inefficiencies and the redundancies and thereby setting a clear start and end to a process. Process modeling helps in grouping together similar processes and in anticipating how they operate.

Automation represents the approach that businesses undertake for systemizing the process with the help of technology and organizing the personnel via workflows (Sen, 2014). The BPM technology makes process automation not only faster and less costly but also effective and better.

Process Mining focuses at automatic construction of the models thereby providing an explanation for the behavior observed in event log (Van, 2016). Process mining gained enhanced significance because of the change in business dynamics.

The challenges of business process analysis include (Salmela, 2016):

Conflict in Requirements: Irrespective of the context and scope of the project there might be over three-stakeholder group whose needs and requirements needs proper handling

Customers Solely Unaware of their Want: This acts as a challenge for requirement gathering.

Unavailable Stakeholders: Irrespective of the techniques chosen, consultation with the stakeholder is necessary who might be unavailable.

Change of Priorities: This acts as a challenge as the customer keep on changing their mindsets.

Non-Supportive Stakeholder: This happens when the stakeholder do not support the change undertaken.

8. The techniques of business process analysis include:

Gap Analysis:

Strength:  The method helps in assessing the difference in performance between software applications or business information system for determining the fulfillment of business requirements (Suriadi et al., 2014)

Weakness: Most of the value provided by the analysis would be lost if there complete information about the process is unavailable.

Opportunities: The process allows the managers in determining the present and the future state of the business.

Threats: It represents one of the oldest forms of modeling technique.

Value added Analysis:

Strength: This is the process through which a product or service is reduced to one of its essential benefits and attributes (Miles, 2015).

Weakness: It is necessary for evaluating each activity for delivering actual value to process.

Opportunities: The technique finds an application as the starting point with business

Threats: The benefits or the attributes that appeals the customers are improved and retained while the others are reduced or eliminated

Root Cause Analysis:

Strength: This ensures performing thorough analysis of a procedure for defining a problem (Black & Vernetti, 2015)

Weakness: Emergence of system failures from the confluence of the occurrences and the conditions

Opportunities: The technique helps in describing a range of tools, approaches and techniques for uncovering the causes of the problem

Threats: Presence of casual factors that needs analysis for determining the root causes.

The technique of Root cause analysis seems appropriate for the organization since it solves problems through the identification of the root cause of a particular problem.

9. Differences between ERP and BPMS

ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) focuses primarily on the organizational functions while BPMS implements an approach that is process centric. Thus, BMPS is a process intelligent layer that might or might not have integration with the ERP (Prades et al., 2013). Compared to this, ERP is designed with the process functionalities that can be configured and customized for suiting the operations of the organization.

Similarities between ERP and BPMS

Both ERP and BMPS consist of elements of integration and process definitions. If an organization cannot afford ERP module, the BMPS is implemented for managing the process across the disparate system (Kraljic & Kraljic, 2014).

Ways through which ERP and BPM is Advantageous Combination to Business

The combinations of ERP and BPM are advantageous to the business in the following manner (Hassanein, 2013):

1. This enables filling of the gaps in information caused due to the spread of data across the disparate systems thereby enhancing the efficiency of the process

2. The combination allows innovation and enables newer processes for integrating ERP with the systems designed for processing the newer forms of information like for  example the unstructured data

3. It also enables easier and cost effective extension of functionality to the existing system of the enterprise like for example the CRM (Customer Relationship Management)

10. People:

Modern BPM helps in driving transformation and at the same time keeping with the trends of mobile, social, and the cloud-focused business (Hammer, 2015). The BPM capabilities helps in the creation of people focused work environment. To boost the employee customer relation, the BPM ensures the elimination of various red tape procedures and tedious operations.

Processes:

Process refers to the set of transactions or activities that get completed on a consistent basis. The process will require the input from the multiple stakeholders and potentially involve both the external and the internal users (Harmon, 2014). It also has demand for a wide range of data along with the incorporation of the repeatable automated workflows. Thus, BPM solution allows companies in establishing internal policies and rules and thereby enforcing them.

Technology

BPM evolved into an enabler of digital transformation through the addition of technology to its equation (Stavenko,  Kazantsev & Gromoff, 2013). The key ways through which the BPM incorporates technology includes incorporation of data into the user dashboards, acceleration of the app delivery, aligning the processes and the application functionality.

11. Lean referred to a production practice that took care of every facet of manufacturing business from the quality assurance to the human resource (Arfmann & Barbe, 2014). The primary objective remained in elimination of waste and the reduction of the production cost and time. For the lean to be effective there should exist cultural change within the organization where best practices remains ingrained amongst the workforce which needs to undergo merging through business silos and thereby receive undisputed backing not only from the employees but also the management.

Six Sigma represents one of the widely used methodologies for the process improvement that allows the enterprises in using data for the elimination of any defects in the process (Evans & Lindsay, 2014). The two project methodologies of six sigma are DMAIC and DMADV. The DMAIC stands for Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve and Control and DMADV stands for Define, Measure, Analyze, Design and Verify, and they depend on the Deming’s Cycle of Plan Do Check Act. As Six Sigma represents a multifaceted technology, so it caters differently for each of the process.

Business process management (BPM) represents an approach that has a holistic approach towards the whole business process for the creation of effective and efficient workflow. It is capable of adapting to the newer market demands for the accomplishment of the organizational goals.

12. Both the lean and six sigma can leads to the process improvement through bringing in constructive financial improvements for an organization by means of return on the investment. Using lean and six sigma helps ion achieving the operational excellence. With the sole focus on the people, purpose and the process lean six sigma helps in achieving the value stream that ensures delivering highest value to customers with the lowest cost and the highest quality (Assarlind, Gremyr & Bäckman, 2013). Thus, lean six sigma ensures providing differentiation and competitive advantage needed by most of the companies.

BPM accelerates the Lean Enterprise Tools by providing platform for the work and process management used directly by people. The most exciting portion of the digital transformation remains in the customer facing the end of the operation where the presence of the multiple touch points enabled people in interacting with organization and collect the necessary big data. Innovation acted crucial to the business performance and success and the digital transformation acted as the precursor in the creation of the environment within which the innovators thrived. Thus, digital transformation acted as the pre requisite for the future business as it opened the doors for innovation and the ability of breaking the mould. 

References:

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