Gartner offers business process management tips

Gartner advises businesses to keep BPM simple to start with

Gartner has published a number of guidelines for businesses wanting to improve the processes by which they operate.

Managing business processes more efficiently has been a key topic since software emerged that modeled business processes and suggested ways to boost their automation, integration and collaboration.

As the recession hit in September 2008, analyst firms advised organisations to focus on improving business process management (BPM) to cut back on costs and be ready for the upturn when it came.

Now that the UK downturn has officially ended, businesses should be ready to go. However, for those that are not, Gartner has published its Seven Key Guidelines to BPM Project Success which it said organisations can use to attain BPM success.

"Compliance with these guidelines will translate into a very high probability of project success, and will be a major boost for business interest in adopting BPM as a programme," said Gartner analyst Bill Rosser.

Rosser explained that businesses just starting out on BPM should begin with small, straightforward projects of limited scope, rather than going for a major overhaul of an end-to-end process straightaway. This will allow the business to see a quick payback, and become more positive about future BPM projects.

Those wanting to drive projects forward should start out with high-value processes that are clearly aligned to business goals and that can be measured by only a few metrics, Rosser continued. He suggested a disciplined post-project review to show the project's quantitative degree of improvement.

The analyst also said that the project should involve all the relevant stakeholders for each process, who should agree on the desired performance improvement. Although this may seem obvious, Rosser said, it is not uncommon for different stakeholders to have different views about what success means for a particular process enhancement.

Getting the people who actually do the work of the process onboard can also help drive a project's success, Rosser said. Staff can offer their own perspective on how they can work more efficiently, making them feel like experts in their field and giving them a sense of ownership about what they do.

Finally, Rosser told organisations to employ an "enthusiastic business sponsor" who will not be in charge of the project but will benefit from the new level of business performance.

"This person is absolutely sold on the idea and encourages both the business operating staff and the BPM implementation staff to get things done," said Rosser.

"Once one task is completed, this same sponsor, who is ideally influential in the organisation, will continue to promote the great results to peers and superiors.

"This requirement is so vital that, if such a sponsor is not available, IT leaders should pursue another project."