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Module 2: BPM Discipline

jBPM5 Community Trainingversion: 1.0-SNAPSHOT

Release Date: 01/28/2011Under The Creative Common License

Module 2: BPM Discipline

jBPM5 Community Training Course by Mauricio "Salaboy" Salatino is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution

3.0 Unported License.Based on a work at salaboy.wordpress.

com.Permissions beyond the scope of this

license may be available at http://salaboy.wordpress.com/.

Agenda

What is a Business Process? Why do we need them?Advantages of knowing your business processesBusiness Process Management Introduction

Stage #1: DiscoverStage #2: FormalizeStage #3: ImplementStage #4: RuntimeStage #5: MonitorStage #6: Improve

Conclusions

Process? What?

Process[pros-es; especially Brit. proh-ses] noun, plural proc·ess·es

–noun A systematic series of actions directed to some end: to devise a process for homogenizing milk.A continuous action, operation, or series of changes taking place in a definite manner: the process of decay.

–verbTo treat or prepare by some particular process, as in manufacturing.to convert (an agricultural commodity) into marketable form by a special process, as pasteurization.

What Process means for Us

Process

Set of ordered actions that tends to transform an input to a desired output

Business? What?

Business   /ˈbɪznɪs/ Show Spelled[biz-nis] –noun

The purchase and sale of goods in an attempt to makea profit.

–adjectiveOf, noting, or pertaining to business, its organization, or its procedures.

What Business means for Us

Business

Relative to a domain, company or a scoped scenario, where certain rules and actions needs to be applied to

achieve a goal.

What Business Goal means for Us

Business Goal

Objective to be satisfied inside the business scope that gives to the company a profit/benefit in some way.

Business Process

Business ProcessSequence of actions performed by humans and systems to achieve a business goal.

Sequence of Actions

Sequence of actionsWell defined set of actions that are executed/done in a specific orderThe sequence can be repeated multiple times for different situation but the goal of the process must remain the sameThe sequence doesn't change frequently (let's say doesn't change every second, but it can change every week or every month)The actions are atomic and well focused

Performed by Humans and Systems

Performed by Humans and SystemsHumans and Systems behave differentlySome mechanisms are required to make them work together seameslyWe need to understand deeply the requirements for these types of interactions

To achieve a business goal

To achieve a business goalThe most important part of the definition We need to understand why the process was created and the results that the company expect from itWe need to keep the process goal updated in order to validate that each activity inside it is contributing to achieve the objective We can measure how and which are the costs of achieving the proposed goal in order to improve the profit/benefits.

Business Process Management

Business Process ManagementHistoryIntroductionMain StagesBest Practices

Some recommendationsTips and Tricks

Business Process Management History

Business Process Management HistoryWas born more than 30 years agoFocused on improve how companies workWorkflows, person to person interactions come firstA business related approach come later with high level conceptsThe BPM discipline was created to provide a framework where business processes can be discovered and improved over the years

Business Process Management Stages

Business Process Management StagesStage #1: DiscoverStage #2: FormalizeStage #3: ImplementStage #4: RuntimeStage #5: MonitorStage #6: Improve

BPM Stage #1: Discover 

BPM Stage #1: Discover key pointsFind how the work is being doneInterview every person involved with the process under analysis.Explain the reasons and the purposes of the interviews Find the information that persons and systems are handling for achieving each activity.Find out the paper work that it's being done inside the process.Collect and structure the interviews answers to find out a textual description about how the work is done in the company.

BPM Stage #2: Formalize 

BPM Stage #2: FormalizeUse a formal language to model the discovered process.This is usually a business analyst task.Use business language to describe the activity names inside the processDon't use technical/obfuscated language to describe business activitiesKeep in mind the process perspective and the process goal Validate the formal model with business people

BPM Stage #3: Implement 

BPM Stage #3: ImplementCreate and add all the technical details needed to run your business process definitionIdentify and setup users and groups informationDefine and implement User Interfaces for Human Tasks InteractionsCreate third party and internal system connectorsDefine a dictionary that contains systems, applications and services and the developed connectorsDefine a dictionary that contains users, groups and the services or data structures that are being used to retrieve their information

BPM Stage #4: Runtime 

BPM Stage #4: RuntimeDefine and setup an execution environment (usually centralized and accessible via network/internet)Define a small group of users that will be responsible to do their activities using the implemented users interfacesAssist the users in their first experiencesTake notes about common problems and exceptional situations and their solutionsMeasure the amount of completed processes and activities

BPM Stage #5: Monitor 

BPM Stage #5: MonitorCreate and setup business specific widgets to monitor relevant metrics from the process executionsMeasure process specific metrics

Completion Time, Number of activities completed, etc

Create dashboard-like screens that helps for decision making processesTake notes about improvements that can significantly change process performance (business related performance)

BPM Stage #6: Improve 

BPM Stage #6: ImproveBased on overall notes scope the next iterationDefine next interation's goalFocus your proposal into maximize business benefitsBe ready to improve all the created assets

BPM Cycle

BPM Iterative cycle

BPM Some Recommendations

BPM Some RecommendationsThe success of the BPM initiative is highly related with the culture of the companyA mind shift from all company levels is requiredFind a good internal sponsor that backs you up during the BPM stagesTeach people about how to participate in the BPM practice, most of them want to improve the way of working

BPM Tips and Tricks

BPM Tips and TricksGet involved with the people that do the work everydayDiscovering new business process is not an easy task, be careful Understand the goal that each business process has in real lifeScope your iterations wisely Try to get something working from end to end in first iterations, you can improve it laterBe there for end users, answer questions, help them to adopt the new proposal

Conclusions

ConclusionsBPM will guide you to an iterative and continuous improvement of your business processesYour business processes are a very important business asset that gives to all the company visibility about how the work is being doneBPM is not about technology is about improvement You need to define and understand perfectly the company, the people and the goal that you are trying to achieve with the projectBPM will not fix everything

Next Modules

Stay tuned for the next modules that will explain important topics such as:

The Business Process Modeling and Notation V2jBPM5 first steps and hands on labs (after the release) Human Interactions inside our processesetc.

Related Links

You can find more information, examples, tutorials and more in:

BPM Books: Business Process Management, Second EditionBusiness Process Management: Concepts, Languages

and Architectures Salaboy Blog

http://salaboy.wordpress.com Plug Tree Blog

http://www.plugtree.com

  

Questions?

Enjoy! and be patient for the first Hands On Labs!

  

Contact us atwww.plugtree.com