Traditionally, automation of
business processes using workflow has implemented the automated process and
then finished. BPM takes this to the next level BPM is about continuous
business process improvement.
As well as automating the process, we are capturing the process in a structured way, the monitoring and optimising the process. The process repeats continuously for the life of the process.
This
introduces a culture of continual process improvement into the organisation in
a structured but easy to use way.
The
steps in a BPM Life Cycle are:
Ø
Design
Ø
Implement
Ø
Execute
Ø
Monitor
Ø
Optimise
Functions are designed around the strategic vision and goals
of an organization. Each function is attached with a list of processes. Each
functional head in an organization is responsible for certain sets of processes
made up of tasks which are to be executed and reported as planned. Multiple
processes are aggregated to function accomplishments and multiple functions are
aggregated to achieve organizational goals.
Design
Process
Design encompasses both the identification of existing processes and the design
of "to-be" processes. Areas of focus include representation of the
process flow, the factors within it, alerts & notifications, escalations,
Standard Operating Procedures, Service Level Agreements, and task hand-over
mechanisms.
Good
design reduces the number of problems over the lifetime of the process. Whether
or not existing processes are considered, the aim of this step is to ensure
that a correct and efficient theoretical design is prepared.
The
proposed improvement could be in human-to-human, human-to-system, and
system-to-system workflows, and might target regulatory, market, or competitive
challenges faced by the businesses.
The
existing process and the design of new process for various applications will
have to synchronise as such will not effect the business in major outage. The
business as usual is the standard to be attained when design of process for
multiple systems is considered.
Modeling
Modeling
takes the theoretical design and introduces combinations of variables (e.g.,
changes in rent or materials costs, which determine how the process might
operate under different circumstances).
It
also involves running "what-if analysis" on the processes: "What if I have 75% of resources to do
the same task?" "What
if I want to do the same job for 80% of the current cost?".
Execution
One
of the ways to automate processes is to develop or purchase an application that
executes the required steps of the process; however, in practice, these
applications rarely execute all the steps of the process accurately or
completely. Another approach is to use a combination of software and human
intervention; however this approach is more complex, making the documentation
process difficult.
As a
response to these problems, software has been developed that enables the full
business process (as developed in the process design activity) to be defined in
a computer
language which
can be directly executed by the computer. The system will either use services
in connected applications to perform business operations (e.g. calculating
a repayment plan for a loan) or, when a step is too complex to automate, will
ask for human input. Compared to either of the previous approaches, directly
executing a process definition can be more straightforward and therefore easier
to improve. However, automating a process definition requires flexible and
comprehensive infrastructure, which typically rules out implementing these
systems in a legacy IT environment.
Business
rules have
been used by systems to provide definitions for governing behaviour, and a
business rule engine can be used to drive process execution and resolution.
Monitoring
Monitoring
encompasses the tracking of individual processes, so that information on their
state can be easily seen, and statistics on the performance of one or more
processes can be provided. An example of the tracking is being able to
determine the state of a customer order (e.g. order
arrived, awaiting delivery, invoice paid) so that problems in its operation can
be identified and corrected.
In
addition, this information can be used to work with customers and suppliers to
improve their connected processes. Examples of the statistics are the
generation of measures on how quickly a customer order is processed or how many
orders were processed in the last month. These measures tend to fit into three
categories: cycle time, defect rate and productivity.
The
degree of monitoring depends on what information the business wants to evaluate
and analyze and how business wants it to be monitored, in real-time, near
real-time or ad hoc. Here,business activity monitoring (BAM)
extends and expands the monitoring tools generally provided by BPMS.
Process mining is a collection of methods and tools
related to process monitoring. The aim of process mining is to analyze event
logs extracted through process monitoring and to compare them with an a priori process
model. Process mining allows process analysts to detect discrepancies between
the actual process execution and the a priori model
as well as to analyze bottlenecks.
Optimization
Process optimization includes retrieving process performance
information from modeling or monitoring phase; identifying the potential or
actual bottlenecks and
the potential opportunities for cost savings or other improvements; and then,
applying those enhancements in the design of the process. Overall, this creates
greater business value.
Re-engineering
When the process becomes too noisy
and optimization is not fetching the desired output, it is recommended to
re-engineer the entire process cycle. BPR has become an integral part of
organizations to achieve efficiency and productivity at work.
Certification
Currently the certification is
being offered by Global Association for Quality Management (GAQM) the Syllabus
and Certificate is recognized, approved and managed by the International
Accreditation Organization (IAO).
For IBM technologies online training please contact : training@virtualnuggets.com
http://www.virtualnuggets.com/
No comments:
Post a Comment