As BPM technology has gained popularity, demand has grown for better access to the information in the BPM system. Companies are looking for ways to get intra-day performance metrics in front of decision-makers so they can take immediate actions to improve their processes, remove bottlenecks and keep the information flowing.

Operational BPM dashboards have emerged as the leading way to provide this level of visibility into business processes. Unlike traditional dashboard-style interfaces that only offer a static snapshot of business conditions, BPM dashboards display continuously updated information from the BPM system in a way such that line managers and decision-makers can immediately know what is happening in the key areas of their operations.

A dashboard view into the workflow is an essential component of a BPM system. The point behind implementing BPM is to effectively automate a manual process and optimize the process so that it runs more efficiently. But in order for process automation and optimization to work, companies need insight into the system. Companies need to be able to track process metrics, such as the cycle time between steps in a particular process, in order to understand how the process is performing. They also need a way to see where bottlenecks are occurring and be proactively alerted to critical issues.

For example, let's look at a home loan application. A typical loan application process might have 18 or so steps from initiating the loan process to granting the loan, including a rate lock, the credit check, the title report and others. While BPM helps manage these steps and move the document through the many different decision points along the way, it is critical to understand how each step in the process is working. We need to be able to ask questions such as "where in the process are we spending the most time, and how can we reduce it?" or "how often are we exceeding the time limits for a rate lock, and why?"