A spate of supplier acquisitions has highlighted
increased interest in the business process management (BPM)
approach to running IT systems, according to Butler
Group.
The analyst firm will be speaking at an event in London later
this week on how BPM could help IT directors to make a direct link
between IT integration and what the business wants to achieve.
Acquisitions include search engine provider Autonomy announcing
earlier this month it was to buy rival Verity. Last month, BPM
supplier Metastorm said it would be acquiring BPM specialist
Commercequest.
BPM is also a key component of Oracle's Fusion middleware
strategy; and IBM is also enhancing its own BPM product, Websphere
Process Manager.
Mike Thompson, principal analyst at Butler Group, said,
"Integration and business process management are growing closer
together." This is because IT integration needs to focus on adding
business value, he added.
Butler Group believes the best approach to aligning an IT
integration project with business needs is to consider each
individual IT system as a defined service, then combine each of
these using a service oriented architecture.
Butler analyst Tim Jennings recommended users should adopt a
process-centric methodology for their IT integration projects.
"This allows line-of-business managers to set an integration
project in the context of operational activities, while enabling
technical staff to map these activities to the underlying
services," he said.
"Business Process Management is a natural partner for an SOA,
providing the necessary capabilities for the business to define,
simulate, execute, and monitor business processes, built on the
foundations of the integration layer."
Butler: BPM takes work but is worth it
Butler Group analyst Tim Jennings said, "While the SOA-BPM
combination is a powerful proposition, we should not underestimate
the work required to achieve the desired results.As with previous
IT models this should be viewed as a long-term strategy, rather
than this year's project.
"It also requires careful attention to both business and
technical issues, new methodologies and strong management, because
IT history shows that it takes relatively little to turn a
promising concept into a false dawn.
"This is something worth persevering with, and it is encouraging
to note that the industry is now starting to address practical
issues of implementation, and moving beyond the hype."