What is Business Process Management

Business process management is defined as a discipline that helps you improve your business processes. It analyzes your processes from beginning to end. BPM can give you a unique perspective by modeling your business processes in different types of scenarios.

BPM implements changes gradually, while constantly analyzing the improvements and monitoring how the changes are affecting the processes. It is about optimizing processes constantly. 

Every process consists of a set of activities that work together in union toward one goal. BPM is not about doing it once. It is about reinventing the process all over again.

It is a common misconception that BPM is a technology. BPM revolves around task automation and provides a better end result.

How business process management can help your business thrive and how it can ignite your digital transformation? Let’s dive right in!

Uses of BPM 

The primary drive behind BPM is business process improvement. Basically, it can bring order to the chaos. It is about regaining control over the numerous processes going on simultaneously. It helps with improving efficiency and making sure that your services and products are delivered right on time.

If you are a business owner and you are trying to grasp this concept, you may ask is business process management in any case connected with task management or project management? The answer is no. Task management is about organizing tasks connected with the ongoing project. Projects are often non-repeatable. 

Business process management is focused mostly on repetitive tasks that are ongoing. It discovers certain patterns and analyzes them.

If you implement BPM it can lead to numerous benefits. For example, some big wins will be optimizing operational efficiency, improving service and products, cutting costs, saving time and reducing waste. 

Your processes don’t need to stop so you can apply your changes. It is an ongoing process. It is about evolving. 

Why is business process management important today?

In order for everything to work in a perfect balance, all your processes need to be adequately systematized. It is sometimes really hard to see a much bigger picture of the entire process, people are often familiar only with the segments and activities. BPM helps with a better understanding of the process, locating potential bottlenecks.

When your processes are left unmanaged in a proper way, it could only lead to chaos. For example, these are the most common consequences:

• Time is always one of the most important resources. If one process fails to deliver other intertwined processes will also suffer a delay. As the butterfly effect goes on, things get gradually worse.
• Increased risk of mistakes - human error is always present. If you don’t know the basics of every process, there is always a risk of costly errors.
• Blame game - when something goes wrong, who is there to blame? This in the end leads to more pressure at work and demoralized employees. When they are not appreciated enough - your employees won’t give their best and then again you have a decreased productivity and efficiency.

Types of BPM systems

There are three types of business management systems:

A human-centric BPM  is a type of system where humans are at the very core. Humans are executing most of the tasks and it mostly revolves around a lot of approval processes.

Document-centric BPM is when the processes are revolving around important documents, various contracts for example. 

Integration BPM systems are integrated solutions consisting of different solutions connected with different connectors and API. They don’t require as much human involvement.

Benefits of implementing BPM in your company

If you are still trying to think about how business process management will benefit your business, we will mention a few important benefits that can be an ideal food for thought.

• You will regain control over your processes and locate potential problems in the functioning.
• Mapping and analyzing the processes from end to end.
• Improving the operations on a daily basis
• Work toward bigger goals, seeing the much bigger picture and how you can reach your goals in a timely manner.
• Digital transformation is happening already and implementing BPM will inspire the change.
• Make all processes work together 
• Track, analyze, and modify at all times.

Business process management segments

Business process management consists of a few simple steps. There is an ongoing discussion whether there are 5 or 6 of them but it is not important. It is important that it can segment your process to the simplest activity and work on it on the cellular level.

Business process management steps are the following:

• Design: it is thinking about the ideal case scenario for your process. After you determined your ideal case, now it is time for analyzing the current state of your process. How far is it from ideal?
• Model - try presenting the sequence of events visually in different types of scenarios. What is happening with data flow in different scenarios?
• Implementation of changes - process systematization and standardization. Automation is also included during this step.
• Monitor the progress - measure the operational efficiency and make sure which metrics will help you determine the success of your implementation.
• Optimizing again - it’s about continuity. This process shouldn’t be stopped. Get back to the previous steps if needed.

Conclusion

Business process management is a relevant discipline and it will remain that way for years to come. BPM is an important part because it can help you look at things from a different perspective, re-think and re-innovate your business processes. 

Uses of BPM are numerous - from the HR sector to finances and sales. And remember that every business will always have room for improvement. If you continue to evolve along with the changes on the market, embracing the digital transformation - your business will remain relevant.

If you are ready to improve your workflow and automate tedious tasks - you can always count on our help. BPM and automation combined can do wonders for your work. You can save time and resources while focusing on your growth.