PEX retrospective series: Trends in BPM in 2020
Looking back at 2020 we consider the trajectory that the field of BPM has taken during the pandemic
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Business process management (BPM) has been a well-known discipline in the field of process excellence for many years, whereby practitioners apply various methods and technologies to discover, analyze, optimize and automate business processes.
The team at PEX Network set out to uncover how the various BPM tools, technologies and approaches have evolved over the past year, and whether this is in line with several predictions made by industry experts in 2020.
The execution of BPM initiatives needs to be more strategic
It was revealed in PEX Network’s How BPM is enabling business transformation report published in September 2020 that BPM was essential for organizations to navigate their way through the pandemic while maintaining business as usual as much as possible.
However, Comidor CEO Spiros Skolarikis did make the prediction that if organizations were to get the most out of BPM initiatives, then implementation would need to become more strategic going forward.
“Many organizations are applying only single components of BPM like process modeling or workflow automation, while managerial components such as strategic alignment, governance, people and change are neglected or overlooked,” Skolarikis remarked.
What Skolarikis was referring to is the tendency of organizations to latch on to individual technologies or methodologies that catch their eye or solve a certain solution, but their implementation fails to consider the context of how these updates will impact overall business objectives and culture.
We have seen support in 2021 for the strategic use of BPM in scaling initiatives from some leading industry experts, such as Katy-Pierre-Line Murarotto, head of BPM, transformation at Asahi Europe and International. Murarotto believes that BPM should “absolutely” be the starting point for any large-scale transformation project.
“It is fundamental to understand and agree on the vision and what our target processes should be before starting to design and implement them,” she explains. “Even if we use the technology as an accelerator to design a process, we cannot go very far if we lack a strong vision and a strong business process framework.”
BPM remains key in driving innovation and new technologies
BPM is an approach that, when applied strategically, can optimize outcomes across all areas of a business. Brent Harder, head of automation at Fiserv noted in PEX Network’s How BPM is enabling business transformation report that a successful approach to implementing technologies, such as automation, requires that businesses first understand the workings of their processes to gain an idea of how the technology will integrate.
Harder predicted that BPM would be key for organizations looking to achieve this going forward, as solid process management is conducive to process visibility.
“BPM is about understanding how you are performing before jumping straight to the adoption of technologies,” remarked Harder.
We have seen this specific application of BPM evidenced by oil refining company Neste, where BPM has provided an increased amount of relevant data that has guided the business in identifying where the most valuable opportunities for automation lie.
In PEX Network’s How BPM builds business resilience report published in June 2021, Markko Rajatora, vice-president of business processes at Neste, stated: “We have been able to address areas of the business where we can make changes to improve human-to-human interaction and human–machine collaboration [thanks to analytical capabilities brought in by BPM]. It is faster and easier to address issues and is a good support for continual improvement of processes and reengineering.”
This application of BPM, to gather relevant data, can be applied to the implementation of any technology, as the increased visibility that this data offers gives organizations a more accurate idea of how these technologies will integrate and how its efficacy can be maximized.
Further use of BPM driving innovation came from Maersk, where BPM has become an integral part of workflows in transformation teams, driving innovation in the improvement of processes, systems and policies.
Vikram Mehta, head of continuous improvement at Maersk, stated in the report that: “BPM tools, machine learning and RPA linked to Salesforce helps us pre-empt customer sentiments and deliver a ‘WOW’ customer experience”.
This application of BPM to drive innovation across all areas of a business gives further evidence of the versatility and power of BPM technologies.
Mobile BPM technology will only become more prevalent
With the Covid-19 pandemic forcing closures of stores and offices and necessitating lockdowns, many organizations found that the way they traditionally conducted business and executed BPM initiatives was not going to cut it in ‘the new normal’.
According to Eric Hedman, former global managing director, head of lean management office at S&P Global Ratings in PEX Network’s 2020 BPM report, forecasted that the pandemic would increase the reliance on remote technologies in the execution of BPM initiatives.
“Mobile technology that facilitates BPM and large-scale initiatives will become more important,” remarked Hedman.
He predicted that mobile-enabled BPM platforms and initiatives would become part of the new normal for process excellence and that mobile capabilities would only become more common. The trajectory of the mobile BPM market appears to support this prediction, as the market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 6.5 per cent between 2021 and 2026 before reaching a value of $2.26 bn.
As noted in PEX Network’s How BPM builds business resilience report, the rise of mobile BPM has been supported by its ability to scale self-service capabilities through web apps and allow employees to access process knowledge on the “shop floor”, according to Ed Maddock, chief evangelist at iGrafx. Maddock argued that mobile BPM enables employees to guarantee quality and consistent execution of activity.
“We have seen an uptick in the use of technology, such as QR codes, that allow handheld devices to zoom in quickly to the data they need to do their jobs,” he said.
As the myriad ways that BPM can be applied are continually implemented by organizations, we will continue to see new predictions and trends in the BPM space. Here we have analyzed the trajectory of various BPM predictions and how they have played out in reality. The industry has seen increased strategic priorities for BPM implementation, an enhanced focus on mobile-first BPM and the use of BPM for driving innovation. As practices and technologies advance we will likely continue to see such trends reshaping organizational approache to BPM implementation.
This article is part of PEX Network’s Retrospective Series, which looks at how the pandemic impacted the process excellence industry.
Let us know what your predictions for the future of BPM are in the comments below.
