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Explore the significance, costs, and worth of Business Process Support (BPS). Learn about the components, benefits, challenges, and alternatives to traditional BPS models for optimal outcomes.
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Are There Requirements for BPS?Some questions about the value of Business Process Support Ian Alexander REBPS Workshop, Austria, June 2003
Why Support Business Processes? • It’s expensive (a whole industry, in fact) • What does it consist of ? • What do people get for their money ? • Is it worth it ?
What does it consist of ? • Business asks for improvement • BPS industry responds with analysis, modelling … with a view to automated support …with a view to improvement: 1) Interviews, observations, workshops, and AS-IS Model making … BPM (a whole belief system) 2) Optimisation by Analysis and creative modification (suggested AS-SHOULD-BE re-engineerings) … BPR (another bandwagon) 3) Identify what to Support, and build whatever ‘improved’ support mechanisms are needed (… BPI projects & their Requirements) 4) Provide that Support using the new mechanisms (… BPS), and operating and maintaining them
What do people get for their BPS money ? • Claim is the Blairite ‘joined-up thinking’ • counters the risk of ‘silo-ism’ by departments • this is either empty propaganda ... • … or it means that defensive silo walls are breached, end-to-end process thinking takes over, and is successfully put into practice throughout the organisation • local optimisation doesn’t make much sense
Why is it hard to make Business Processes Better? • Harder to do than to say! • Real BPR is limited or prevented by • perceived threat to careers & jobs (often justified) • limits of individual knowledge & competence, • fear of change & the unknown, • power politics, • trades union power & labour agreements, • personal rivalries, • empire-building • Isn’t that enough?
} one-off costs } recurring costs What does it Cost ? 1) BPM • initial elicitation & modelling 2) BPR • second phase of modelling 3) BPI • software development, • computers, networks 4) BPS • parallel running/trials, • maintenance, • operations, • helpdesk, • user & maintenance training, • hardware spares/repairs
Is BPS worth its salt ? • A simple (and narrow view) – yes, iff cost/benefit ratio is acceptable • But risk is a large part of the equation: • risk of BPM * BPR * BPI * BPS (failing somewhere along the chain) is large • risk of just doing smaller, simpler, projects (less cosmic, less end-to-end) is much less • So is change • businesses evolve rapidly (with competition and changing regulatory environment - trade rules, laws) • the longer you take on BPM, the bigger the risk that your BPI will be out of date – so, more BPM is worse
Instead of BPM - BPR - BPI - BPS • Smaller, faster, cheaper, less risky projects • Local knowledge, local optimisation • Ability to react to changes, in time • Less culture shock, less resistance • Iteration – shorter projects, each building on the success of the last one • No need to assume that things are fixed and can be modelled in great detail – they aren’t and they can’t • No guarantee of optimal solutions - that’s life