This is the first article in a 4-part series presented by the BAInstitute.org.
For many new business and IT professionals entering the field of Business Architecture (BA), an exciting opportunity is at hand. However, these new entrants must consider beginning their career expanding endeavors with a clear and solid foundation in architecture principles. In this article, the reader is asked to participate in a visualization exercise in order to understand real Business Architecture in action.
Over the past year, our Business Process Excellence practice has been working to develop an Enterprise Business Process Management (BPM) Framework for our organization, with implementation beginning this year. We utilize Lean, Six Sigma, Workout, Kaizen and facilitation methods to improve business processes that drive measurable business outcomes. BCBSNC is an $8 Billion dollar business with over 4500 employees and have had an established Business Process practice since 2008. We have a very strong brand and have driven over $80+ million in results since inception.
Each quarter, the American Customer Satisfaction Index issues an update of overall U.S. customer satisfaction. The national ACSI score for the period 1994 through 2015, as depicted below, reflects an aggregate of customer satisfaction with companies that comprise a large cross-section of the economy.*
hot button word – Noun
i. a word that triggers a highly charged emotional or political response
Author’s Note: I originally learned about the laws of subtraction some years ago when I was leading a research and innovation organization. The six principles in this article came from The Laws of Subtraction: 6 Simple Rule for Winning in the Age of Excess Everything by Matthew E. May. Business architects can apply these principles to produce more value and raise their level of success in any organization.
The Process Bulldog is a lynchpin role at the heart of a healthy process culture. This role is the connection layer of your process governance structure – linking the vision of the leadership team with the creativity of the process owners and participants, the people who are involved in process challenges every day. Every organization needs one.
We previously called this role the Lead Process Champion, but at our Promapp User Summits this year the term ‘Process Bulldog’ was used to describe the attributes needed to succeed as a process champion – and everyone loved it.
Traditional metrics have historically focused on financial and operating factors. What is newer is organizational process metrics or metrics that measure how a process works from the company point of view and the customer point of view. How is the company doing at meeting a customer needs (such as accuracy, responsiveness, service, speed, completeness) and how is the process doing being efficient and effective so the company can be competitive in the market place at a good price?
This article lists five key pitfalls that organizations face as they start an Organizational Process Metrics initiative and implement it across the company.
Pitfall #1 – Where’s the Decision and Action?
“Our guidance takes major steps in ensuring CIOs have a seat at the table for technology-related budget, procurement, and workforce matters. [It] is centered on a ‘common baseline’ that outlines the roles and responsibilities for agency chief information officers and other senior agency officials. More importantly, it establishes a groundwork for productive partnerships among these leaders to make IT decisions that better support [their business] mission.” – U.S. Chief Information Officer (CIO) Tony Scott (upon releasing the final Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act (FITARA) guidance from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB)
Passed by Congress in December 2014, the Federal Information Technology Reform Act (FITARA) grants more influence and control over investments in information technology (IT) to agency’s CIOs.
Practitioners in our field have long been evangelizing on the critical link between decision management and predictive analytics. As James Taylor accurately and succinctly stated “Decision Management operationalizes predictive analytics. Traditional approaches to analytics are hard to scale and hard to use in the real-time environment required in modern enterprise architectures.”
On cue I noted with great interest several writers predicting analytics trends for 2016. These included:
I suspect we all agree that it’s very important for business architecture to demonstrate valuable results in a reasonable timeframe. There is nothing more discouraging for business architects and their sponsors than effort spent on modeling for its own sake, or continuous planning to plan the plan. Here, in this article, we have a method that quickly leads to tangible results, while building the foundation for a continuous flow of valuable results from business architecture.
Everyone starts here.
You're looking for a way to improve your process improvement skills, but you're not sure where to start.
Earning your Business Process Management Specialist (BPMS) Certificate will give you the competitive advantage you need in today's world. Our courses help you deliver faster and makes projects easier.
Your skills will include building hierarchical process models, using tools to analyze and assess process performance, defining critical process metrics, using best practice principles to redesign processes, developing process improvement project plans, building a center of excellence, and establishing process governance.
The BPMS Certificate is the perfect way to show employers that you are serious about business process management. With in-depth knowledge of process improvement and management, you'll be able to take your business career to the next level.
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