Business process management software has much to live up
to. Suppliers claim it can automate business processes - whether
that be finance, marketing and sales - integrate different existing
processes quickly and help the IT department design new
applications.
They also claim a company can implement business process management
without scrapping all its legacy systems. The software will find,
integrate and use data from multiple systems which can mean
significant cost savings.
This sounds great in theory but closer analysis should raise some
concerns for IT directors considering investment in this
area.
Business process is a vague term used to mean several things: work
practices, procedures, functional requirements and outcomes. The
term is confusing because it means different things to different
people.
Ask 10 people what a business process is, and you are likely to get
10 different answers. This is problematic because what is automated
by the business process management software is unclear. To overcome
this lack of clarity, people talk about "end-to-end processes".
I am also told that business processes start and end with a
customer. Which customer? The one who pays or the one who consumes
the product or service? Or both? And what about suppliers,
regulators and shareholders?
The issue is confusing and tricky for IT directors to deal with,
because each of these stakeholders is accompanied by a host of
vested interests within the organisation. If each stakeholder
demands change to some part of a business process, business process
management software could make things more, not less,
complicated.
Another source of concern is that the term business process often
refers to current activities, practices and procedures. Much of the
information that is automated by business process management
software may no longer be relevant to the most pressing immediate
or future challenges.
Automation brings with it some of the most insidious guises of
legacy: outdated tacit knowledge, rules and assumptions embedded in
"the way we do things around here".
Business process management software can deliver substantial
benefits to the organisation but IT directors need to be clear
about the shortcomings of their organisations' business processes
before overhauling them with business process management software.
It is not a quick fix.
Ashley Braganza is senior lecturer in
information systems at Cranfield School of Management