A Phased Approach for a Strategic BPM Project

BPM considers processes to be strategic assets of an organization that must be understood, managed, and improved to deliver value added products and services to clients, writes contributor Vinod Jain. But how do you get started? Successful service companies deliver value to their customers by honing business processes over time. The nuances of carrying out a particular business process are continuously measured and analyzed by management, resulting in a valuable inventory of core business processes. The value of these processes or assets is difficult to capture on traditional financial statements, yet their importance cannot be ignored as a means of differentiation in an increasingly competitive global marketplace. Thus, business process management (BPM) methodology is being applied with ever increasing vigor to consolidate and optimize companies business and operations models in order to gain a competitive edge. Organizations are consistently challenged with the need for establishing a standard processing model in order to have tighter control of businesses. This standard processing model decreases companies reaction time changes in the marketplace. A highly functional model in this context of rapid change is capable of not only optimizing company operations in a dynamic competitive environment, but it is also capable of capturing the changing regulatory demands and technological advances. The difficulty in creating such a model is the complexity of the business processes involved. This paper will provide a framework for analyzing a business process from a high level managerial perspective. We will attempt to cover all the bases for making an informed decision on how to deploy resources when applying BPM to a given business process. For most companies, current BPM initiatives and approaches are still in the evolution phase as organizations decide which approach will be best suited for their needs. So how do you initiate a new project to resolve the above needs?

Phase 1:
Identify & Understand the Business Need In the first phase, the overall aim is to identify the business needs and unravel the complexities of the business processes. The first and foremost step in initiating any BPM project is to understand the needs of clients, and key expected outcomes (list of current issues) As a managerial approach, BPM considers processes to be strategic assets of an organization that must be understood, managed, and improved to deliver value added products and services to clients. BPM is an approach to integrate a "change capability" to an organization - both human and technological.

Figure 1 shows a complete lifecycle of BPM project. Critical steps involve performing Advanced Process Analytics, Positive ROI, Process Simulation and Scenario Analysis. Figure 1: Lifecycle of a BPM Project

Phase 2
Selecting the Appropriate Analytical Techniques In the second phase, the overall aim is to select appropriate techniques to help you understand the business at a modular level. There are multiple ways to incorporate these changes and it is hard to define a specific implementation schema. The benefit and approach may vary by industry, business type, history, etc. Adopting BPM strategies (Agile approach) is very beneficial for financial organizations, for instance, because of its ability to analyze troublesome, complex and distributed business areas as well as being able to start with smaller approaches. BPM modeling provides a quick and visual overview of any gaps and issues associated with given business processes. Analytical data collection through multiple interviews helps to identify sub-functions and systems across front, middle and back office. Synthesize all information to develop a conceptual future state business process map, highlighting major functional areas. Successful adaptation of these practices then depends on company size, culture, exposure, flexibility to adapt changes and balance sheet strength. Figure 2 below shows 4 different analytical techniques to initiate a new project. Selecting your best approach depends on the type and complexity of your business. Figure 2: 4 different analytical techniques to initiate a new project

Phase 3:
Implementation Modeling for a complex system is difficult, time consuming, and expensive for multidimensional (embedded) financial business. However, most complex operations can be defined by breaking it into smaller domains modules or dividing into functional areas easily (using any of above mentioned 4 approaches). Through BPM we can turn external and internal clients relationships into strategic partnerships, this allows financial institutions to work effectively with changing requirements in the market. BPM allows us to deliver integrated value added solutions. Aligning client strategic needs into operational service delivery model where outcome can support requirements like event monitoring, compliance, quality, process improvements, SLAs and transformation goals. Each business and process must be guided along the process maturity model. Every step in maturing BPM capabilities leads toward optimization and improvement to core processes. Authors Note: This educational article is provided purely for your information only and you should check other information before taking any action based on any of the content in these articles. This document is not a legal interpretation or advice in any form. The authors or any affiliate does not make any claims of legal advice or support for the assumption & information contained in article or any of the site's articles.

About Vinod Jain

Vinod Jain, Transformation strategist (VP) for Financial Market Treasury services and responsible for handling business and operational strategies, optimization and transformation projects. His expertise includes security servicing like Tri Party Repo, OTC Derivatives, Trade settlement and custody business. Vinod holds M.B.A in Finance and Marketing from Fordham University, NY, M.S in Computer Sc. From FDU. NJ, PMP and other awards. He recognized by "Omicron Delta Epsilon" (American & International Honor society in economics) and Who's Who among American Universities. Please note my writing expresses my personal opinions and does reflect the views of my employer. Vjain_99(@yahoo.com I invite you to join as a member of the PEX Network Group http://tinyurl.com/3hwakem, you will have access to Key Leaders Globally, Events, Webinars, Presentations, Articles, Case Studies, Blog Discussions, White Papers, and Tools and Templates. To access this free content please take 2 minutes for a 1 time FREE registration at http://tiny.cc/tpkd0 PEX Network, a division of IQPC, facilitates access to a wealth of relevant content for Process Excellence, Lean, and Six Sigma practitioners. Further enhanced with an online community of your peers, we will provide you with the tools and resources to help you perform more effective and efficiently, while enhancing the quality operations within your organization. As our industry becomes more and more dependent on the Web for information, PEXNetwork.com has been developed to provide Six Sigma professionals with instant access to information. Leveraging our strength and foundation in education, IQPC and the Process Excellence Network are uniquely positioned to provide a comprehensive library of webcasts gathered from our events, as well as exclusive content from leaders in the industry.