venerdì 14 novembre 2008

Il dilemma: con chi parlare di BPM? IT o User


Riprendo integralmente un post di Fahad Osmani, Manager del gruppo BPM Consulting in Lombardi, che contiene delle interessanti osservazioni sulla strategia da adottare quando si parla di BPM in azienda.

"" Like all enterprise software solutions, the person implementing a BPM strategy must contend with a chasm between the business and IT. The two speak different languages, have different priorities and tend to justify results in a different light.

So which side do you approach first?

There’s a tendency for enterprise software to gravitate to IT. And why not? IT gets it, right? They understand the technology and the inherent benefits it brings to the table. And IT is constantly justifying new software, hardware and services through the annual budget reviews. So it seems natural for anyone wishing to see a BPM solution deployed to look at IT first.

I believe this is a mistake.

Despite conventional thinking, the right place to begin conveying the benefits of a BPM deployment is on the business side of the house. That’s because BPM has to be looked at not for the technology, features and specs, but for its ability to change and improve the business.

If you’re implementing a BPM strategy, you have to lead with the person who can ask questions like, “What are all the touch points. How does this affect our business? What is the value we are getting out of this? How do you actually measure the benefits that we are going to get out of this?” These questions and answers are best addressed by the business.

On many occasions, when I have engaged with IT department, I struggled with knowing the business benefits of the BPM deployment. Typically, IT is reacting to a request from the business. And being the IT department within a company they don’t always care what the business benefits are. They have a mandate to fulfill those requests to the best of their ability. So I feel like we can work better with our customers when we engage directly with the business.
Conversely, the business side sometimes has an unnatural understanding of what IT does. Most technical strategies are not for the business to drive and, in fact, by bringing the business to the table as part of these strategies, you bring into effect an unnatural alliance where natural departmental goals are subverted.

I think that part of that is good because they are both trying to talk the same language. And it’s not that IT isn’t talking the business language, it’s that the business is trying to talk the IT language. This can lead to increased communication between the two houses, but under a vision of making each other’s jobs easier, which isn’t really the point. The point is to realize business value and add to the bottom line of the organization.

I still think the business side is the best location to gain advocacy and support. But when you engage with the business, strive for the enterprise level over the department level.

That’s where you’re going to find the people with the broader business goals and ultimately the people who are going to provide approvals and sign the checks. But if that’s not possible, strive for a connection at the higher end departmental level. Get a foothold there and try to showcase some value.
Once the initial process success is achieved, BPM finds the largest welcome mat on multiple departmental doors. The results of a well-executed BPM campaign are far more compelling than a canned demo. And while it’s good to start on the business side when beginning a BPM project, you have to ultimately have both sides working together for success. BPM should unite the two groups. Not just serve as a communications conduit between the two.""

Mi piacerebbe aprire una discussione sull'argomento che reputo fondamentale per chi, come noi, cerca con fatica di portare i concetti BPM tra i propri clienti.

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Disclaimer

Questo blog non è una testata editoriale perciò non viola gli obblighi previsti dall'articolo 5 della legge n.47 del 1948 in quanto diffonde informazioni con periodicità occasionale. Il presente blog risulta conforme alla vigente normativa sulla editoria (legge n. 62 del 7 marzo 2001) non trattandosi di pubblicazione avente carattere di periodicità.