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BPM - Process for the Alert Enterprise - BPM - Process for the Alert Enterprise

Monitoring Process Performance

After a process has been defined, it is important to understand how the process will be measured, i.e., what the key performance indicators (KPIs) will be. This is not as easy as it sounds. There is a tendency to either over-measure or measure the wrong things. To make genuine process improvements, it is critical to measure the correct things.

Let’s take a look at an oil refinery as a best practice of monitoring process performance. Oil refineries measure not only the quality and quantity of what comes out of the refinery – gas, diesel, jet fuel, etc. – but they monitor in real time what conditions exist during refining such as temperatures and feed rates.

As demonstrated in the oil refinery example, to learn why good or bad product may be produced, it is of chief importance to understand the conditions that applied during the creation of the output or product.

Much attention has been given to BPM simulation of business processes as a way to examine the impact of a proposed change. While there is a time and place for this, it is often more important to understand how the current process behaves. While this seems intuitive, it is the rare company that truly has this level of insight. Simulation asks, “What will happen if …” whereas current process analysis asks, “What really happens today?” There is little value to be had in addressing the former question if one cannot answer the latter. 

Today's world of latent reporting and information, such as batch reports once per week, has created a comfort zone of lax responsiveness by the accountable and responsible personnel in large corporations. Having access to real-time information and corresponding metrics would beg the questions, "Do I want more real-time, up-to-date information to make decisions? What would I do with this real-time information if I had it readily available?”

The best-run companies not only have outcome-based performance measures, as is typical with most business intelligence (BI) tools, but process-based performance measures. They use BPM to identify what needs to be measured throughout the course of the process, whether it is cycle time, volume, variability and so on. And, just as important, they use this real-time process information to pick up the pace and effectiveness of decision making, essentially resetting the metronome of their organization to a faster tempo – not more work, but more productive work.

Process Improvement with BPM: Discerning Baseline and Exceptional Process Behavior

The vast majority of companies, to the extent that they document their business processes at all, use tools such as Visio or PowerPoint to create visual depictions of processes. Because they are merely pictures of the process, and lack any link to the actual systems that comprise the process, they tend to become obsolete and forgotten.

BPM changes this. BPM establishes this vital link between business and IT. BPM establishes process standards and defines key performance measures. But, regrettably, this is where most BPM deployments leave off. And while there are substantial benefits in doing this – faster deployment of new applications and more efficient reuse of existing capabilities – let’s take this to the next step.

What if companies could not only monitor business processes as they are happening, but also learn what is normal, learn what exceptions (or defects, if you will) re-occur? In short, what if businesses could develop a clear picture of baseline behavior and identify patterns of defects or unusual activity? In many – if not most cases – this is far more valuable information than simply simulating what may occur.