Resources in Operational Excellence (OPEX)

Our focus on Operational Excellence (OE) is on the alignment of strategies, processes, performers, measures, technologies and management to achieve and sustain outstanding levels of performance of the entire enterprise.

Our belief is that Operational Excellence is achievable only when an organization has defined the major elements that affect performance and aligned them (which often means redesigning them) to support strategies and goals.

Just as often the task of alignment also means ridding the organization of things (practices, policies, organization structures) that impede Operational Excellence.

Displaying 51 - 60 of 263 resources matching your criteria.

Which BPM Methodology is Best for Us?

Contributed by:Shelley Sweet, Faculty Member, BPMInstitute.org and President, i4 Process

There are lots of BPM Methodologies. In fact I teach a class called BPM Methodologies 2-3 times a year for BPMInstitute.org. The next one is in San Francisco, June 25. But which BPM Methodology should you organization use?

First, let’s define a BPM Methodology.

An approach with principles and specific procedures that provides guidelines for how to approach different scenarios within the Business Process Management discipline.

Most BPM Methodologies have conceptual principles, a graphic model, and specific techniques for the elements within the model.

Some of best known BPM methodologies today are Six Sigma, Lean, BP Trends, Hammer and Rummler–Brache. Below is one of these graphical models for the Toyota Production System (Lean).

The “M” is Missing in BPM

Contributed by:Andrew Spanyi, Faculty Member, DBizInstitute.org and Managing Director, Spanyi International

Business Process Management (BPM) has made a significant contribution to improving the performance of some business processes, yet the “management” part of BPM has not lived up to its full potential. Way back in 2003, I defined BPM as the disciplined definition, improvement and management of a company’s end-to-end business processes. The key aspects of this definition relate to “end-to-end” processes and the “troika” or “triumvirate” (e.g. not just one – but all three) of definition, improvement and management. In this broader context, the M is frequently missing from BPM.

When a Good Design is Not Enough

Contributed by:Andrew Spanyi, Faculty Member, DBizInstitute.org and Managing Director, Spanyi International

By: Andrew Spanyi, author of "More for Less: the Power of Process Management"

In spite of significant advances in both improvement methods and enabling technology, the success rate in implementing complex process redesign projects still hovers around 33% and has not changed that much over the past decade. When a good process design does not get implemented, it’s often due to insufficient focus and attention on accountability, governance, resources and momentum. Results can be compromised whenever there is insufficient attention to one of these factors.

Which is Best for Us? Top Down, Bottoms Up, or Middle Out

Contributed by:Shelley Sweet, Faculty Member, BPMInstitute.org and President, i4 Process

By: Shelley Sweet, President, I-4 Process Consultants

This article is the second article in this series. The first, “Why Process Sounds Stupid” was published by BPM Institute in May, 2011.These two articles look at organizational culture and three strategies to become a more process oriented organization.

Process maturity assessment has become popular in the last few years, as companies want to understand their current level of maturity and what it entails to get to the next level. But once you assess where you are on a process maturity scale, what kind of approach is best for your organization – top-down, middle-out, or bottoms-up? How would you know, what steps should you take, and what challenges might you anticipate?

Process Excellence Success: More Art than Science

Contributed by:Andrew Spanyi, Faculty Member, DBizInstitute.org and Managing Director, Spanyi International

By: Andrew Spanyi, author of "More for Less: the Power of Process Management"

Process excellence is becoming an umbrella phrase to describe the set of improvement methods such as Lean, Six Sigma, Lean Six Sigma, Business Process Reengineering, and technology driven BPM with the objective of improving operational performance. There has been a great deal of attention dedicated to the science of deploying each of these various improvement methods. Indeed, these methods of improvement have become increasingly codified and even commoditized. Much less attention has been focused on the art of succeeding with process excellence.

Process Improvement: How to start and the role of the 3-P's

By: Naveen Adibhatla, BPM, RingCentral Inc

So you have been through countless meetings and discussions with your peers, managers, executives, and anyone who would be a tad interested in Business Process Management, and how a BPM platform would not only streamline line-of business processes but also improve the overall efficiency of the organization. You tried every possible way to convince people in your organization that “process” is not just about drawing rectangular blocks on a blackboard, or post-it notes on large paper boards, but about the methodology that encapsulates process improvement and the larger gain that such a methodology could provide to the organization in the long run. You discussed how process improvement and management could provide better ROI, increase efficiency and visibility, and improve collaboration; how a BPM system, model-driven framework and Service Oriented Architecture would increase the rate of deployment of business critical processes.

Leading Process Change

Contributed by:Andrew Spanyi, Faculty Member, DBizInstitute.org and Managing Director, Spanyi International

By: Andrew Spanyi, author of "More for Less: the Power of Process Management"

Many firms are actually quite good at improving performance on projects of small scope within traditional organizational boundaries and yet they struggle in achieving sustainable improvements to large business processes such as order fulfillment and new product introduction.

What’s the problem? Lack of committed leadership typically surfaces among the top few barriers in practically every survey on the obstacles in making major improvements to organizational performance. Why do leaders continue to struggle in this regard? There are at least three reasons.

Why Process Sounds Stupid

Contributed by:Shelley Sweet, Faculty Member, BPMInstitute.org and President, i4 Process

By: Shelley Sweet, I-4 Process

Are you ready to get started improving work flow but just don’t know how? Do you want to build a process based culture? Do you want to buy a BPM suite? These are a few of the questions that organizations ask at one time in their development. But when to address these questions and how to address them depends on your purpose and company culture. And they can’t all be addressed at once.

This article is in two parts:

Standardization or Flexibility- Partners or Enemies?

Contributed by:Shelley Sweet, Faculty Member, BPMInstitute.org and President, i4 Process

By: Shelley Sweet, President, I4 Process Consulting

You probably know experts who state that standardization is critical for work and information processes. They dogmatically declare that you get reduced variability, cost reduction, better quality, and consistency across the organization with standardization. In fact if you don’t have standardization you can’t make improvements because people and business units do the process differently to start!

SOA and Process Modelling

Contributed by:John Moe, Principal Consultant, J Moe Associates

By: John Moe, Head of Business Integration, TORI Global

Being an ardent advocate of most things BPM and SOA, I am constantly disappointed, but not surprised, to find IT departments investing in development and integration tooling to support SOA that stop short of anything that contains the word ‘process’ in it. E.g. Process Modeller, Business Process Management, Process Engine, etc.