Digital Transformation is one of the most important trends shaping BPM currently. To give you overview of how does it link with BPM and what are the other hot topics in BPM I invited for an interview Pedro Robledo.
Below you can read the transcript of the interview or listen to it.
About Pedro Robledo
Pedro Robledo is Editor-in-Chief, Publisher and BPM Marketing Advisor and trusted Networker at BPMteca.com, who publishes unique books on business process management and the e-magazine “World BPM Magazine”; it provides services of translation of BPM documents from English to Spanish, and it provides marketing services oriented to lead generation for BPM providers and trusted Networking for all people who is interested on BPM.
Pedro has more than 24 years of professional experience in Enterprise Software Market with a complete background and skills in sales, marketing and business development, focused on the company strategy, lead generation and oriented to objectives with the commitment and consecution to results. He is one of the most influential Spanish thought leader in BPM, as for 10 years has been dedicated to promote industry awareness of Business Process Management in Spain and Latin America – also as a Professor.
Since 2013 he is Judge of WfMC Awards for Excellence in BPM and Workflow.
Interview
Hi this is Zbigniew Misiak from BPM Tips and I am very happy to speak today with Pedro Robledo.
Pedro, could you introduce yourself for our listeners and tell how do you help people interested in BPM?
I graduated in Computer Science, but with an important background and skills in online and onsite training, IT, sales, marketing and business development, focused on the company strategy, lead generation and oriented to objectives with the commitment and consecution to results. More than 15 years I have been dedicated to promote industry awareness of Business Process Management.
Currently I know that I am one of the most influential Spanish thought leader on BPM, Business Transformation and Business Improvement. I have in mind that people need help when they want to start a BPM initiative or when they don’t know how to improve their BPM maturity. So I am focused on help them as BPM Interim Manager in their BPM projects and as BPM teacher to provide BPM training in customer site or online.
From BPMteca.com, we publish books and magazines, and we provide different services to BPM vendors and BPM consultancy companies, on translation of BPM documents from English to Spanish and marketing services oriented to lead generation.
I am professor of some Spanish Universities, as for example I am Director of BPM Master in UNIR, a complete postgraduate studies on BPM covering all BPM cycle focused on business and IT BPM skills, more than 1700 hours of training in 1 year.
And since 2013 I participate in judging the annual and prestigious WfMC Awards for Excellence in BPM and Workflow.
On your blog you provide a great overview of what is happening in BPM. What are the most important trends that you see?
As you know, all companies have to adapt to meet the business challenges to be able to achieve their goals and develop their innovation capabilities if they want to survive to the global economic changes and customer expectations.
To do this, they need to be able to make changes quickly. But in addition to that, traditional industries are being disrupted every day by new business models and technology which is empowering the consumer like never before and digital transformation is the most important trend for all companies, if they want to be competitive and survive.The process is a key component to get the digital transformation, so BPM market has a great opportunity to growth. If we take a view to BPM market size, this is estimated to grow from 4.460 millions of euros in 2015 to 12.012 millions of € in 2021. In 2016 the BPM market size will reach to 5.277 millions of euros. That represents a Compound Annual Growth Rate of 14,2% to 17,9%. In terms of regions, North America is expected to be the biggest market, followed by Europe and APAC.
Now Cloud Computing is a great help for all companies when they want to start with a BPM project, as they do not have to invest in on premise licenses so the cost is cheaper. The average investment for BPM software in a project with 50 users is around 35.000 € for on-premise licenses and 3.850 € by month using Cloud. But I like to be clear, as the BPM software represents only the 25% of the investment of any BPM project (the other 75% is dedicated to hardware, consultancy services, human resources…).
Another important consideration is that there are not enough BPM professionals for all BPM demand. My research says that more than 65% of BPM professionals are not possible to cover today. It is required people with skills in all BPM cycle but with knowledge on Process Management Social Networks, Streaming Analytics, Big Data, Mobile Process Management, Event Processing, Robotic automation and Internet of Things.
There are some significant trends that I see in the BPMS market: companies are using BPM to power their digitalized processes, not only the traditional structured process but also the unstructured processes where you need to manage different cases when the process instance is created (now it is called Dynamic BPM or Work Object Centric BPM). Organizations have a bigger need to reinvent themselves while also driving improvements in efficiency. And the disruption of SMACT (Social, Mobile, Analytic, Cloud and Things) and digital transformation are currently a significant strategic challenge for all organisations.
How can BPM support the Digital Transformation?
Over the last few years, we’ve seen an explosion of disruptive technologies such as mobile, cloud, social media, big data and internet of things.
Becoming a digital enterprise is critical, is not an option, and it is a journey and there is no finish line as the technology creates a constant change. Companies must transform themselves to provide a proactive customer service, smarter products, agile services, more speed…
The evolution of digital technology presents opportunities and threats for all businesses, so digital becomes a top agenda item for most executives. Digital transformation is a business process transformation, so BPM (business process management) is the right instrument for that objective. Companies are finding several challenges to realizing their strategic goals: transformation is a challenge, business agility is critical to delivering the digital transformation, and the internal complexity of the organization undermines success. With BPM the companies get operational agility to business, achieve the adaptability that they seek, get higher levels of customer expectation, get rapid customer-centric innovation, achieve their desired business outcomes, get strategic cost and resources saving and speed of response to adapt processes to support new digital demands.
What are the best practices you see in companies embracing the Digital Transformation and what are the common errors to avoid?
In order to avoid pitfalls along the digital transformation journey is required a clear understanding of transformation drivers and their associated risks for your business, as well as of organizational and cultural resistance to change, the agility of existing infrastructure and business and technology alignment.
The top success factors to help enterprises achieve digital transformation are:
– review all core processes as they are the key of digital transformation which joins business, people and things
– rethink the business according to strategic goals and digital vision
– clarify the business outcomes they need to achieve in the next three to five years, and determine the kind of processes they need to successfully drive these outcomes
– engage customers consistently across multiple digital channels, so they will need modernization, application rationalization and simplification
– empower operations, business and IT in the digital enterprise
– use of agile best practices and BPM discipline
– improve and automate processes using BPM technology
– take advantage of new emerging technology trends as Internet of Things, Robotic Process automation, Cognitive Process Services…
– make a pilot of BPM before to decide for one BPM suite
– define a team with enough resources and budget, with enough sponsors to lead the project
– define a Director Plan with milestones of quick-win to motivate people and to validate the journey, so do not forget to define new metrics for that.
– evaluate your BPM maturity to identify any missing capabilities
– expand BPM teams with new digital business skills
– manage the Cultural Change Impact of the organizationIn summary, it is required strategy, sponsors, resources, analysis, budget, training, communication, methodology, techniques and technology.
And the last question: What useful resources would you like to recommend to people interested in BPM?
Of course I have to recommend my own blog pedrorobledobpm.blogspot.com.es where I write about BPM providing news, concepts, success stories, market analysis, trends, and so on.
There is a great book with more than 121.000 readers, which is called Why BPM? It is a free bilingual ebook (English & Spanish) to explain why a company should implement BPM in their organizations, using the voices of the CEOs of 11 BPM vendors.
Now anyone can get free the pdf joining to the LinkedIn Group “World BPM magazine” https://www.linkedin.com/groups/8123279There are another useful resources as BPTrends, BPMtips.com, Process Excellence Network, BPMLeader and the websites of the main BPM vendors.
Social Links
Linkedin http://es.linkedin.com/in/pedrorobledobpm/
Twitter @pedrorobledobpm
Resources mentioned in this episode
Blog: pedrorobledobpm.blogspot.com.es
LinkedIn Group “World BPM magazine”: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/8123279
BPTrends: www.bptrends.com
Process Excellence Network: www.processexcellencenetwork.com
BPM Leader: www.bpmleader.com