Want your business to be competitive? Then you need more than just smarts strategies. You need streamlined and adaptable processes. This is where Business Process Management (BPM) comes into the picture.
Now, BPM isn’t just about improving workflows. It’s much more than that. It’s all about creating a continuous cycle of optimisation. Think of it as a roadmap for you to design, implement, monitor, and refine your processes to achieve maximum value. In this blog, we’ll explore the key stages of a typical BPM life cycle plus a lot more.
Business Process Management: What It Is?
First, let us demystify what a business process is. It is a series of tasks designed to help your organisation achieve its objectives. An objective could be anything from boosting profitability to creating a fully inclusive workplace.
So, BPM is essentially a structured approach to enhancing these series of tasks (aka workflows) so that your organisation can operate more efficiently and deliver business value consistently.
BPM focuses on improving these tasks by
- Evaluating their performance
- Modelling potential scenarios
- Implementing necessary changes
- Tracking outcomes
- Refining them continually to achieve optimal results.
As you would have guessed, BPM is a diverse and ever-evolving discipline. A successful BPM adapts to shifting organisational goals, roles, and strategies.
Why It Matters?
Plenty of reasons! Here are the top ones –
- Helps organisations streamline their workflows and improve efficiency
- Helps organisations adapt to changing business environments.
- Enables businesses to reduce the cost of operation by promoting better resource utilisation
- Minimises errors, leading to higher-quality outcomes.
- Provides a framework for continuous improvement, ensuring that processes remain aligned with organisational goals
- Enables organisations to respond quickly to market demands and regulatory changes.
Different Stages in the Life Cycle of Business Process Management
Here are the different stages in the life cycle of business process management:
Stage One: Design – Mapping Out Business Goals
The phase serves as the foundation for your BPM initiative. In this, you analyse your existing processes and plan the enhancements based on the business goals. The key stakeholders in this stage include business analysts, process owners, and subject matter experts. They typically evaluate workflows, identify inefficiencies, and determine processes that require adjustments to meet the business goals. Their goal is to ensure that the redesigned workflows address the needs of all stakeholders.
For instance, the finance team would want faster approval processes, while customer service might focus on simplifying issue resolution. Developing tailored business cases for these teams with anticipated benefits and associated costs can help secure early support from leadership.
Stage Two: Modeling – Crafting Scenarios for Success
This stage builds upon the design stage by creating detailed visual representations of workflows. Stakeholders involved in this stage will test the workflows under different scenarios to identify opportunities for improvement. They will define the inputs and outputs for each step and use flowcharts or process maps to outline the sequential flow of tasks.
This phase also explores automation opportunities for repetitive or rules-based tasks. It also identifies options to customise workflows to meet specific departmental needs. For instance,
automating ticket routing in IT or streamlining approvals in HR.
The goal of this phase is simple – Helping teams identify and address bottlenecks early so that processes are optimised before advancing to implementation.
Stage Three: Execution – Turning Plans into Action
This is the stage where your planned workflows are put into action. It majorly focuses on implementing processes and assigning responsibilities to ensure a smooth transition. You can always start with a small-scale pilot. This allows you to identify potential challenges and make necessary adjustments before rolling out the changes to the larger audience. Additionally, automation tools can be integrated and made to function to handle repetitive tasks.
Customised dashboards play a crucial role in tracking task progress during this stage. You can use them to be mindful of deadlines and gain visibility over the process. During this phase, it’s important to observe how well employees adapt to the new workflows. You can always offer the necessary support where needed to encourage adoption.
Stage Four: Monitoring – Keeping a Pulse on Performance
This phase focuses on tracking the performance of workflows in real-time. It lets you identify inefficiencies and uncover opportunities for improvement. This step ensures that processes continue to align with business goals by keeping a close eye on key performance indicators. Common KPIs used in this stage include cycle time, error rates, throughput, and customer satisfaction. You can also gather feedback from employees and stakeholders for insights into roadblocks and potential areas for enhancement.
To make this stage effective, you can use dashboards to visualise metrics specific to each department. It is also advisable to set alerts and notifications to address issues promptly, minimising disruptions and delays. Ultimately, this stage lays the groundwork for the final optimisation phase, where processes are refined for peak performance.
Stage Five: Optimisation – The Never-Ending Quest for Efficiency
The phase is dedicated to refining processes to achieve the best outcomes. This continuous improvement approach enhances efficiency and reduces costs. Ultimately, it makes sure that the workflows remain effective as your business needs evolve. Insights gathered during the monitoring phase will come in handy in this stage to implement targeted changes that address inefficiencies.
Some of the key optimisation strategies include:
- Automating additional tasks to minimise manual effort
- Eliminating redundant steps that no longer add value
- Tailoring improvements to meet the unique needs of specific departments.
For instance, finance teams may benefit from automated invoice tracking. Similarly, procurement workflows could be streamlined for faster approvals.
BPM Tools and Technologies: A Game Changer for Modern Workflows
BPM tools help you navigate all the stages with great ease. Among the plethora of BPM tools available today, Salesforce stands out. It seamlessly infuses advanced Business Process Automation (BPA) and Robotic Process Automation (RPA) capabilities into your business ecosystem.
Salesforce’s BPA capabilities, powered by tools like Flow and Omniscript, are designed to build end-to-end automated workflows. They can automate approval processes, such as sales discounts or budget requests. They can even integrate disparate systems like CRM and ERP to ensure consistent data synchronisation. Salesforce also enables personalised customer engagement through Marketing Cloud Journeys. This triggers customised interactions based on real-time actions.
Similarly, Salesforce leverages MuleSoft to automate repetitive, rule-based tasks across legacy and modern systems. MuleSoft RPA mimics human actions to handle tasks like data entry and extraction using tech like Optical Character Recognition (OCR), web and image search, and APIs. It can also retrieve and process data from spreadsheets, emails, web pages, and scanned documents, creating a unified automation approach for your business processes. By combining BPA and RPA, Salesforce delivers a robust solution that integrates workflows and ensures seamless data handling.
The Human Factor: Aligning Teams with Process Goals
Here is a little secret – for a successful BPM strategy, you cannot put all your faith in tools and technologies. Yes, they are important, no doubt, but so are the people who execute the processes. And that’s why it is important to make sure that your employees see the value of BPM in their daily work from day one. Whether it’s through reduced repetitive tasks, streamlined workflows, or improved decision-making.
Involve team members early in the BPM lifecycle and align them with the process goals. Right from the design stage to the execution stage, make sure their insights and feedback are acknowledged, and their pain points are addressed.
Provide proper training and support to improve adoption and minimise resistance. Additionally, leadership should emphasise a culture of collaboration and continuous improvement. In other words, you need to empower your employees to suggest enhancements. When teams understand how their roles contribute to broader business goals, BPM initiatives are more likely to succeed.
Challenges in BPM Implementation: Pitfalls to Avoid
Despite its many benefits, BPM implementation is a tall order for most businesses. They can encounter major roadblocks from time to time. Here are three common challenges that most businesses might face during BPM implementation:
- Resistance to change: This happens when the employees perceive process adjustments as disruptive or unnecessary. Without proper communication and involvement, teams may lack buy-in. Ultimately, it will lead to low adoption rates.
- Complex workflows: Many businesses end up tackling too many processes at once. This can result in cumbersome workflows that are hard to maintain. Similarly, underestimating the importance of technology integration can lead to misaligned systems and inefficiencies.
- Lack of clear metrics: The inability to measure the success of BPM management is another issue. In other words, it is not easy to determine whether the BPM initiatives are achieving desired outcomes or not. Organisations should set measurable goals, regularly monitor progress, and adjust as needed to overcome this challenge.
Future Trends in BPM: What’s Next for Process Management?
It’s difficult to discuss future trends of any process without discussing about artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, and process automation. These technologies have carved a name for themselves in almost every industry due to their ability to improve accuracy, speed, and scalability in managing workflows. For instance, AI-powered analytics can identify inefficiencies and suggest improvements on its own. Similarly, machine learning enables systems to adapt dynamically to changing conditions.
Another emerging trend is the rise of low-code and no-code platforms. They enable non-technical users to design and modify business processes without relying heavily on IT departments. This democratisation of BPM will lead to a broader point of view and a better scope for innovation.
Finally, the focus on sustainability and compliance is also driving process innovation. More and more businesses are looking to align their BPM initiatives with environmental and regulatory goals.
About Brysa
Brysa is a trusted Salesforce consultant and a managed services partner based in the UK. We specialise in assisting businesses to optimise their operations and drive digital transformation through Salesforce. By using Salesforce’s powerful automation tools, we ensure that your automation strategy and BPM requirements are met and align perfectly with your business objectives. Ready to transform your operations with expert guidance? Get in touch with us today!
