Got Process...?

After so many years in the Business Process Management arena (11 to be exact); I am still struck by the organizations that decide to automate processes without any real business and implementation methodologies. In the worst cases, I have met companies that have tasked software engineers to download a free BPMS (such as Intalio|BPMS) and automate some processes by gathering feedback from the business team...recipe for disaster? spot on!

Especially when those companies don't understand that a Business Process Management System is not another developer framework where you have to write scores of lines of code (think about the maintenance nightmare!) but a real Enterprise Software built for handling mission critical applications which require proper training.

What do we mean by mission critical? Let's say handling all the airline ticket bookings for an entire continent or the P&L Financial closing for top 20 banks and insurance companies involving multiple countries or handling the provisioning of new products in a Telecommunication company.Each of those systems are defined by both business team and IT team through processes. Each process is actually a collection of several processes that call each other which comprised of hundreds of tasks (human tasks where we need someone to do something, systems tasks where we need to automate systems like SAP, PeopleSoft and other external applications) and internal process tasks (do I take this route or that route?). Not to mention that those processes will interact with business rules (not everything is a process!) and many external systems.

How can you manage properly those projects without a proper methodology?  BPM is not technology but a true methodology, Intalio|BPMS is just the enabler. For years we didn't need as a software vendor to push for a specific methodology as our partners were strong enough and our customers mature enough to have their own methodology. However as BPM is becoming mainstream and Intalio is now recognized as a clear BPM market leader; many of our partners and customers turn to us for advice on automating one or more processes inside their organizations.

Thus our team of Process Experts has extracted all their knowledge gathered helping scores of customers to release the Intalio Implementation Methodology. The main idea is not to release yet another BPM business methodology but to help companies that have decided to automate processes using Intalio|BPMS.  The objectives of the methodology are to answer the following questions:

• How to gather and validate the requirements for a process driven project?
• How do I define my business data?
• How to manage business rules?
• How to plan an implementation on Intalio|BPMS?
• What are the best practices for process modeling and how to design for re-use?
• How to plan and manage Intalio|BPMS project testing?
• When and how to manage 3rd party Apps integration?

Compared to traditional BPM methodology, we can definitely position Intalio Implementation Methodology as being pragmatic. The aim is not to lose you in considerations about how to change your internal organizational structure but rather to give you a checklist to follow to get your first process right and correctly implemented.

This methodology has been implemented by several of our partners and customers (among which we can list HCL, Deutsche Bank, Singapore Airlines, Asia CapitalRe, XChanging to name a few) and we are now offering public courses in Asia Pacific, Europe and soon in the Americas.  This course is available for all consultants trained on Intalio|BPMS and it will be a required course in order to take the Intalio|BPMS Certification Exam available since October 2011