Friday Review - 28th May 2010

Here are some of the links posted over on the Process Cafe Espresso Shots this week¹

Six Sigma: Friend or Foe - Adam, my friend, you are a very brave man taking on the Six Sigma boys. Oh, the comments you're going to get! Funny article, though.

Where Does a Process Start? - Another great blog post from Jim Sinur asking a pertinent question "Where does a process start?"

BPM: The Future of BPMS - Some great little items on a wishlist from Adam Deane. Not totally sure about making Outlook the central tool in the arsenal though. How many of these do you agree with?

Is There Really an Enterprise Architecture Market? - A few salient observations from Mark McGregor on the state of EA following his visit to the recent Gartner EA conference. Is he right? Is the market disappearing?

< ¹ The Process Cafe Espresso Shots is a place for linking to process related articles written by other people that don't merit a full post on the Process Cafe but are still worth your time reading. Sort of an espresso shot of 'The Process Cafe'-eine.

Top posts on the Process Cafe for the month of April

Here are the top 5 posts on the Process Cafe for the month of April. These are classified according to number of visitors.

1. Your Criteria for choosing a BPM tool
2. Review - Lombardi Blueprint modeling tool
3. Silo Thinking and why it is bad
4. My thoughts on Gartner's BPM Magic Quadrant
5.White Space and BPM - The Invisible Problem


Thanks to everyone who visited the site last month. I hope you keep coming back and finding interesting articles to read and comment on.

---

Reminder: 'The Perfect Process Project Second Edition' is now available. Don't miss the chance to get this valuable insight into how to make business processes work for you.

Click this link and follow the instructions to get this book.

---

All information is Copyright (C) G Comerford

See related info below

Is a process model more than just its picture?

This will only be a short 'Seth Godin' style post.

My basic question is this: We put together process models and we make them look pretty. We add activities, deliverables, decisions, discriminators and lots of additional items to put as much meaning as possible into our workflows.

But at the end of the day the model is just a model. It isn't the process itself. In the same way as a map is just the representation of the ground, it isn't the ground itself.

Should we be putting other things into our workflows? Should we be presenting users with text associated with the workflows? This concept (called 'interpretations' by Metastorm in their ProVision tool) adds an extra dimension to the process model. It adds some 'human' influence to the model. It adds a lot of value.

When you next discuss a process model with a user, will you talk to the picture that the model is represented by or will you talk to the text that underlies the model?

Why?

---

Reminder: 'The Perfect Process Project Second Edition' is now available. Don't miss the chance to get this valuable insight into how to make business processes work for you. Click this link and follow the instructions to get this book.

---

All information is Copyright (C) G Comerford See related info below

Friday Review - 14th May 2010

Here are some of the links posted over on the Process Cafe Espresso Shots this week¹

IBM Puts Spotlight on Lombardi at Impact - So IBM are pushing their new aquisition over their own in-house tools ? Bruce Silver has some choice words about that!

BPM Success Factors - I've only been in this business for 20 years do my perspective may be a little new but these two factors seem to be way off the mark. What about management buy-in? What about change management? What about ownership?

Social CRM as provocative disruption. - Some interesting thoughts here on the nature (and relative immaturity) of business rules engines.

Doing the Most Important Thing in an Interrupt Driven World - Jim Sinur puts his finger right on the key issue with BPM - it works by optimising your processes rather than your resources. But is this a bad thing?

< ¹ The Process Cafe Espresso Shots is a place for linking to process related articles written by other people that don't merit a full post on the Process Cafe but are still worth your time reading. Sort of an espresso shot of 'The Process Cafe'-eine.

Friday Review - 7th May 2010

Here are some of the links posted over on the Process Cafe Espresso Shots this week¹


IBM Puts Spotlight on Lombardi at Impact - So IBM are pushing their new aquisition over their own in-house tools ? Bruce Silver has some choice words about that!

The Value of Vendor Reference Checking - I, too, am astounded by the findings. Essentially Gartner are saying they are having difficulty in many cases identifying genuine vendor references for BPM Magic Quadrant participants.

Let me put this another way: one of the most respected research organisations in the world approaches you requesting contact details of people who gave successfully implemented your product and you can't provide a list of them? And yet you still want to be in their MQ?

What's wrong with this picture?

The worrying underlying picture here us that a lot of potential MQ vendors can't provide this information because they simply don't have it. They don't have a list of happy customers who've implemented the product. If this is the case, should these vendors be on the list?

A Tale of Two Processes. How process silos cause big problems. - A great little article from the Metastorm blog talking about the issues raised when internal processes are optimised within departments but are siloed across departments.

Read it and see how close to home some of this hits.

¹ The Process Cafe Espresso Shots is a place for linking to process related articles written by other people that don't merit a full post on the Process Cafe but are still worth your time reading. Sort of an espresso shot of 'The Process Cafe'-eine.

Friday Review 30th April 2010

Here are some of the links posted over on the Process Cafe Espresso Shots this week¹

BPM is Shifting into High Gear - Jim Sinur from Gartner on the evolving state of BPM. Rapidly changing business environments are calling for more agile BPM technologies. Case management goes someway towards solving the issue but more is needed.

Do You Understand the Difference Between Workflow and BPM? - Useful article. Graphic included.

Agile Methods is still an IT project - I can manage my own bank transactions and build my own website. Why can't I do the same thing in a business environment?

The Business Value of IT – there is none… - A hypotheses from Gartner stating that they believe there should be a shift from IT creating efficiencies in the business to IT adding value to the business. In related news touching hot surfaces can cause burns and running on icy pavements can lead to falls.

Process Modeling: Doing by Design - Jim Sinur at Gartner lists the different types of process modeling that can occur, from my favourite - butchers paper and Post-it notes - to complex BPMS systems. Which ones do you use?

Does EA Die By PowerPoint? - An interesting take on the use of Powerpoint in the Us Army.
Personally I think that the key take-away from this - in any field - is to keep it brief and put forward just your key points. Death by Powerpoint is a no-no, but so is putting too much detail in a lot of things.

Cricket, Lies, and....Content Management - A fascinating look at some of the issues facing the IPL and how these could have been reduced with appropriate processes.

¹ The Process Cafe Espresso Shots is a place for linking to process related articles written by other people that don't merit a full post on the Process Cafe but are still worth your time reading. Sort of an espresso shot of 'The Process Cafe'-eine.

Friday Review 23rd April 2010

Here are some of the links posted over on the Process Cafe Espresso Shots this week¹

Invensys Operations Management Acquires Skelta Software - More news on the narrowing market for BPM vendors. Where will it end?

Metastorm expands in Australia and New Zealand - After years of running operations through it's resellers BTP and iOctane, Metastorm have finally opened an office in the Antipodes. Is this a sign that the market there is becoming more mature? Or maybe they had surplus cash and felt that opening an office there would use some of that? Whatever the reason it's good to see the sentiment that Australia is a place worth investing in.

At What Price, Beauty? BPM as an Art Form - An interesting post on aesthetics and their influence on user adoption. The premise is slightly shoe-horned into a BPM context but the points are valid nontheless.

¹ The Process Cafe Espresso Shots is a place for linking to process related articles written by other people that don't merit a full post on the Process Cafe but are still worth your time reading. Sort of an espresso shot of 'The Process Cafe'-eine.