Tammy Adams is a certified process facilitator specializing in Team Facilitation and Business Process Analysis. She guides teams in transforming their process knowledge and business requirements into viable project and system deliverables that incorporate quality principles consistent with quality methodologies such as TQM, Six Sigma, and Lean. She is co-author of, “Facilitating the Project Lifecycle: Skills and Tools to Accelerate Progress for Project Managers, Facilitators, and Six Sigma Project Teams.”

I’ve been speaking at BPM conferences for – well, too long, probably – but long enough to see the evolution of BPM’s essential value proposition, as expounded by consultants, industry analysts, and BPMS vendors. Consistent with Darwinian theory, this evolution has not followed a simple linear thread but has branched into multiple lines, some destined to die out and others – hopefully – to flourish. Today I would say there are three distinct branches, three different statements of what BPM is and is trying to do. Each has its own natural constituency and ardent advocates.

There’s something wrong with BPM, something terribly wrong. Although the past five years have witnessed great progress in the theory and practice of business process management, if we go back to business-process basics, a fundamental problem with BPM becomes clear.