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September 20, 2006Live from Brainstorm - The Central Role of Leadership in BPM
I am attending the Brainstorm BPM/SOA/Rules event in Washington DC this week and blogging as I go.
Next was Andrew Spanyi on The Central Role of Leadership in BPM. Andrew wrote both"Business Process Management is a team sport" and "More for Less". Andrew described his biases as being enterprise-focused and people (process don't do work, people do). A couple of years ago he did some qualitative research with Babson - his hypotheses about companies doing process improvement were:
- They would have a map of their business process
- They would measure what's important to customers
- They have a plan
- Would have appointed some process owners
Biggest problem is the dominance of the traditional mindset but successful process companies have:
- A receptive culture ready to use a new approach especially a willingness to learn and improve
- A competitive threat forcing change - there needs to be a sense of urgency
- Passionate about customers
- Supportive CEO - did not start the effort but seemed necessary
He identified 5 things that made a difference to becoming process centric.
-
Took time to frame and communicate in process terms
Not just a functional, organizational view of the organization.This can be done with a very simple model or a standard framework e.g. Nokia only had 4, Air Products 15. All very clear, none of the leaders had a confusing framework. -
Measured success
Must measure the process and focus on the small number of key metrics, including some focused on customers. In successful companies these are used for performance and reward and expressed impact of measures in operational/financial terms. -
Moved the conventional wisdom deliberately
Added the process dimension to the way people thought - businesses or organization, function and process. Lots of training, explicit focus on process as something to be managed. -
Carefully selected projects and tools
Leadership engaged in selecting projects, tools, approaches etc. Took a structured approach and had the management team participate in selecting projects. Also used integrated methods -a range of methods, some flexibility so can select what is needed. -
Process Governance
Various different approaches (matrix, process owners, etc) but invested in getting it right and gave them some bargaining chips (such as the IT budget allocated to processes or discretionary compensation). Most importantly were leadership actions that showed it was important to manage processes. Questions, objectives, sensitivity to dependencies, less finger pointing etc.
Interestingly CIOs never led the initiative, but a good CFO-CIO relationship was key. Successful projects tended to talk about the outcomes not the business/IT divide or about tools and technology. Engagement and collaboration made a big difference. Takes time and effort but in terms of a journey from one-time projects to something enterprise-wide he identified measuring what customers care, link to strategic issuesand collaboration as key actions.
Wish he had longer. Will have to dig up his books.
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Interesting comment about CIOs. Traditionally, CIOs and IT have been responsible for "information". The new concepts of processes and decisions / rules and business management thereof is much more than "data processing". CIOs should rename themselves Chief Business Automation Officers, and IT departments should be Business Automation Departments... (some would suggest the abbreviation fits too!).
Posted by: Paul Vincent at September 21, 2006 01:23 AM
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