If there's anything valuable I have seen dramatically confirmed during 2008, and especially during The Big Meltdown, it's that the common key to success with BPM, BI, analytics, and almost anything related to these is collaboration. The crazier things get, the more critical it is that every decision-maker and stakeholder have a seat at the table and a voice and a vote regarding what gets done and how.
And this is equally true in smaller and larger enterprises. Smaller companies may have fewer layers of decision-makers, but that can make it easier to ignore rather than include all involved stakeholders, especially those beyond the walls of company facilities. And I probably don't have to recount any of the multiple ways relevant stakeholders can be ignored or, even worse, inaccurately represented or interpreted in larger, more complex organizations.
Of course, effective collaboration involves its own combinations of processes, intelligence (business and personal!), and technologies. These, in turn, require their own process-driven management, measurement, and monitoring, to make sure they're all working effectively, to fix them when they're not, and to improve their performance and effectiveness over time. All of which require effective collaboration.
If you aren't doing so yet, make sure to engage current and candidate providers of BPM, BI, analytics and IT infrastructure solutions and services around collaboration. Get to know more about their support of it, their road maps for it, and their internal use of it to solve your problems. Then, use this information to add depth to your evaluations of those solutions and providers.
Shameless Self-Promotion / Come-on Department: By the way, I'm undertaking a major Aberdeen Group study of collaboration, and am fielding a survey about it. If you take it, you get a free copy of the report when it's published in late January, AND my immense gratitude. (The more survey responses I get, the more valuable and interesting the findings and resulting analysis, to me and, I believe, to you.) You can find the survey at http://www.aberdeen.com/survey/collaboration -- and do please tell all of your colleagues!
Oh, and Speaking of What Really Matters...
On Nov. 30, an industry colleague I and many others respected and liked very much, John Fontanella of AMR Research, died suddenly and unexpectedly. If you knew him or only read his research, I'm sure you'll miss him, as I will. Those interested are encouraged to make donations in John's memory to Rehabilitation Hospital of the Cape and Islands, Development Office, 311 Service Road, East Sandwich, MA 02537.
Little more than two weeks earlier, Michael Dahl Doane, the 18-year-old son of another industry colleague I like and respect very much, David Doane, died in a tragic accident. He will be celebrated and commemorated in a series of events being held in conjunction with the Salt Lake Marathon in Utah. Said events are described collectively at the Web site "Running for Michael," at www.runningformichael.com.
Those who care about you and those you care about - after all, THEY are what really matters, in every personal (and even almost every professional) collaboration that involves you. Try to keep that in mind, during the impending end of year "holidaze," in 2009, and beyond.
And this is equally true in smaller and larger enterprises. Smaller companies may have fewer layers of decision-makers, but that can make it easier to ignore rather than include all involved stakeholders, especially those beyond the walls of company facilities. And I probably don't have to recount any of the multiple ways relevant stakeholders can be ignored or, even worse, inaccurately represented or interpreted in larger, more complex organizations.
Of course, effective collaboration involves its own combinations of processes, intelligence (business and personal!), and technologies. These, in turn, require their own process-driven management, measurement, and monitoring, to make sure they're all working effectively, to fix them when they're not, and to improve their performance and effectiveness over time. All of which require effective collaboration.
If you aren't doing so yet, make sure to engage current and candidate providers of BPM, BI, analytics and IT infrastructure solutions and services around collaboration. Get to know more about their support of it, their road maps for it, and their internal use of it to solve your problems. Then, use this information to add depth to your evaluations of those solutions and providers.
Shameless Self-Promotion / Come-on Department: By the way, I'm undertaking a major Aberdeen Group study of collaboration, and am fielding a survey about it. If you take it, you get a free copy of the report when it's published in late January, AND my immense gratitude. (The more survey responses I get, the more valuable and interesting the findings and resulting analysis, to me and, I believe, to you.) You can find the survey at http://www.aberdeen.com/survey/collaboration -- and do please tell all of your colleagues!
Oh, and Speaking of What Really Matters...
On Nov. 30, an industry colleague I and many others respected and liked very much, John Fontanella of AMR Research, died suddenly and unexpectedly. If you knew him or only read his research, I'm sure you'll miss him, as I will. Those interested are encouraged to make donations in John's memory to Rehabilitation Hospital of the Cape and Islands, Development Office, 311 Service Road, East Sandwich, MA 02537.
Little more than two weeks earlier, Michael Dahl Doane, the 18-year-old son of another industry colleague I like and respect very much, David Doane, died in a tragic accident. He will be celebrated and commemorated in a series of events being held in conjunction with the Salt Lake Marathon in Utah. Said events are described collectively at the Web site "Running for Michael," at www.runningformichael.com.
Those who care about you and those you care about - after all, THEY are what really matters, in every personal (and even almost every professional) collaboration that involves you. Try to keep that in mind, during the impending end of year "holidaze," in 2009, and beyond.
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