I am very happy to share with you inspiring answers from three more experts. Below you can learn more about the role of process automation and customer experience in modern BPM and have a glimpse into the future!

As always, you can either read everything or use the navigation below. Enjoy!
Boris Krumrey
Clay Richardson
Steve Towers

Boris Krumrey

Boris Krumrey, the Global VP Automation Innovations at UiPath, is responsible for driving the UiPath Automation Innovation agenda to transform organisations with Agentic AI for customers and partners, showing the art of the possible with AI. Boris invented and runs the UiPath Innovation Labs, which he describes as the “Agentic Automation Kitchen” to inspire businesses exploring new customer and work experiences. In his initial role as Chief Robotics Officer at UiPath, he led the product roadmap and the integration design for RPA and AI technologies.

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1) How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

AI is pushing organizations from “process flows” toward end-to-end work systems that combine deterministic orchestration + adaptive agentic work.

• Deterministic orchestration remains essential for enterprise scale: clear execution semantics, auditability, predictable outcomes, and governance.
• AI agents expand what can be automated beyond structured tasks into interpretation, drafting, summarization, classification, exception handling, and guidance under ambiguity. But more importantly depending on the selected model and context grounding capability AI agents expand to reasoning, planning, analysis and making decisions.
• Multi-agent systems increasingly break linear process/case thinking: an orchestrating agent coordinates work while specialist agents handle different stages of a case and can reorder, revisit, or escalate steps based on context—more like humans managing real-world work.
• This increases the need for an orchestration layer (e.g., UiPath Maestro) to keep adaptive behavior inside guardrails and measurable outcomes, rather than letting execution become freeform and hard to govern.
• A parallel trend is “prompt-only workflows” (natural language specs in markdown, etc.). This can be useful for prototyping but often struggles in enterprises due to governance, auditability, scalability, and LLM cost/latency.

2) What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

Core BPM skills stay relevant—but the role expands. In 2026, BPM value comes from combining process discipline with agentic capability and operational reliability.

Skills & techniques

• Agentic design fundamentals: defining agent goals and constraints, choosing tools, designing grounding/context (RAG) plus memory, guardrails rules, setting confidence thresholds and escalation rules, and evaluating outputs.
• Orchestration-first thinking: designing for exception paths, retries, compensations, human-in-the-loop approvals, and evidence/auditability.
• Multi-agent and adaptive case patterns: understanding how orchestrating agents coordinate specialized agents across case stages.
• Case management / CMMN-style thinking: modeling non-linear, event-driven, situational work that doesn’t fit a strict flow.
• BPMN as execution backbone: BPMN remains important in enterprise automation; it provides a deterministic, inspectable model.

Behaviors & attitudes

• Prototype quickly, operationalize deliberately: experiment fast but insist on governance, observability, and measurement before scaling.
• Outcome orientation: prioritize measurable business impact over perfect modeling artifacts.
• Governance-by-design mindset: treat safety, compliance, and accountability as design inputs, not after-the-fact additions.

Important forward-looking point: to model agentic work better, BPMN likely needs to evolve (or be extended) with an “Agentic Task” concept that visualizes what’s inside the agent step: allowed tools, grounding sources plus memory, guardrail rules and internal decisioning/escalation gates.

3) What are the best resources to learn those skills?

UiPath resources (hands-on, enterprise-relevant)

• UiPath Academy – Agentic Automation Associate Training
  https://academy.uipath.com/learning-plans/agentic-automation-developer-associate-training
• UiPath Academy – Build your first agent with UiPath Studio Web
  https://academy.uipath.com/courses/build-your-first-agent-with-uipath-studio-web
• UiPath Academy – The UiPath Maestro collection (BPMN + orchestration)
  https://academy.uipath.com/learning-plans/the-uipath-maestro-collection
• UiPath Community Edition (to experiment)
  https://docs.uipath.com/overview/other/latest/overview/product-download

Broader BPM resources

Well, this community would know best

4) Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

A few things to be cautious about:

• “Prompt-only BPM” / fully freeform agent execution as the default: great for
  experimentation, often not enterprise-ready for governance, auditability, predictability,
  and cost/latency at scale.
• Fully autonomous agents for core regulated processes: still more aspiration than
  default; hybrid patterns (deterministic backbone + bounded agentic tasks) will
  dominate.
• DMN as the universal answer for decisioning: DMN won’t disappear, but in many
  cases decisioning becomes hybrid—rules where precision matters, agents/AI where
  judgment under ambiguity is needed. So DMN may be used more selectively or in
  combination.
• Notation purity without operationalization: focusing on diagram perfection while
  ignoring execution reliability, exceptions, evidence, and measurement is increasingly
  unhelpful.

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Clay Richardson

Clay Richardson is the Chief eXcelerator at Digital FastForward. Through his advisory firm, he partners with enterprise leaders to reposition automation and AI platforms as strategic growth engines. He previously served as an analyst at Forrester Research, where he helped shape how global enterprises adopt low-code and intelligent automation at scale. Today, he advises organizations on aligning platform investments with executive mandates, measurable ROI, and long-term operating impact.

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BPM Skills in the AI Era: A Field Briefing from 2028

By Clay Richardson
Founder, Digital FastForward
Former Forrester Analyst (BPM, Intelligent Automation, & Low-Code)
March 16, 2026 March 16, 2028

Intro

Given how quickly things are accelerating around AI, I decided to approach these questions from a different perspective.

Instead of answering through the lens of 2026, I’ve framed my responses below as a “Briefing from March 16, 2028”, looking back at how BPM skills actually evolved over 2026 and 2027. Based on the work I’m currently doing with clients across enterprise automation, workflow platforms, and solution design, many of the patterns shaping that future are already visible today.

Taking this lens makes it easier to separate practical guidance from hype, while also challenging BPM practitioners to move beyond BPM and into the AI era. During my time at Forrester, I pushed the industry to abandon the term BPM altogether, as it had become synonymous with long-running initiatives that failed to deliver sustained value.

What follows is not a prediction, but an open door to a different future — one that replaces BPM with a more direct and accountable practice: Value Acceleration.

1. How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

From 2026 to 2027, most enterprises rushed into what later became known as the enterprise AI-slop era. Vibe-coding tools dramatically lowered the cost of transforming business operations. Some organizations used consumer platforms like v0, Cursor, and Claude Code, while others adopted enterprise-grade environments from vendors like Pega and ServiceNow.

This led to an explosion of AI-generated workflow applications. Most were built quickly and in silos, resulting in fragmented architectures and operational chaos. Systems that worked in isolation failed when deployed across the enterprise.

By late 2027, many of these efforts converged into AI-orchestrated work platforms coordinating systems-of-work across humans, agents, and autonomous endpoints. But the damage was already done — failed initiatives, fragmented architectures, and significant technical debt.

In response, organizations began dismantling traditional process improvement programs and replacing them with value-governance teams focused on prioritization and measurable outcomes aligned with business strategy.

One of the biggest surprises was that by mid-2027, many organizations temporarily paused new AI initiatives to reorganize around AI-accelerated value and AI-driven solution design.

At the same time, the separation between design and build collapsed. AI-native development environments allowed solution designers to move directly from concept to implementation, fundamentally reshaping the enterprise solution lifecycle.

2. What skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes help practitioners create value?

Looking back from 2028, traditional business analyst and business architect roles were among the first to disappear. Organizations no longer needed teams dedicated to documenting processes once AI could generate that documentation instantly.

What separated relevant practitioners from those left behind was not documentation expertise, but capabilities like facilitation, stakeholder alignment, influence, and systems thinking.

The most important shift was from design thinking to systems thinking. As enterprises deployed increasingly autonomous systems, leading practitioners developed a macro view of how humans, AI agents, platforms, and data operate together as a cohesive system.

This shift elevated the role of the solution designer, responsible for designing complete systems-of-work rather than individual processes. By 2027, a single solution designer working with AI-native tools could accomplish work that previously required teams of product managers, analysts, designers, and scrum masters.

3. What are the best resources to learn those skills?

Looking back from 2028, the most valuable skills were the ones AI couldn’t do — the ones that didn’t scale. As knowledge became fully democratized, the differentiator shifted from access to information to the ability to operate effectively in complex systems. This made many traditional learning paths — including certifications — far less relevant.
For practical and technical skills, practitioners relied on just-in-time learning. Tools like ChatGPT and Claude, along with embedded platform guidance, enabled real-time learning and application. This was paired with experiential learning, where practitioners built systems directly using AI-native development environments. Traditional process design training largely disappeared.

For non-scalable skills, practitioners turned to more immersive approaches. Many invested in high-performance coaching to develop clarity, energy, and influence, while others took acting and improvisation classes to improve adaptability in dynamic stakeholder environments.

At the same time, learning around mindset and trust became essential. Books like The Outward Mindset helped practitioners collaborate across systems and align stakeholders around shared outcomes. Systems thinking also became foundational, with sources like The Fifth Discipline shaping how practitioners understood systems-of-work.
In the end, the most valuable capabilities were tied to trust, value orientation, and systems-level thinking.

4. Which skills are no longer relevant or are hype?

Looking back from 2028, many of the skills and capabilities foundational to BPM did not translate into an AI-native world. The clearest example was manual process modeling and documentation, which became increasingly irrelevant as AI could generate and adapt workflows in real time.

Similarly, significant effort was spent developing skills around frameworks, notations, and methodologies that had limited impact on outcomes. Certifications persisted, but did little to prepare practitioners for dynamic, AI-driven systems.

Even categories like low-code and citizen development, once seen as the future, were effectively declared dead by mid-2026. As AI-native development matured, the distinction between “builder” and “non-builder” collapsed, making these categories — and their associated skills — largely irrelevant.

Perhaps the most important shift was the decline of skills focused on process optimization without value alignment. By 2028, organizations no longer prioritized localized automation efficiency improvements unless they were directly tied to business growth mandates.

What endured were skills that prioritized designing, orchestrating, and governing systems-of-work that deliver value.

The most relevant practitioners moved beyond process thinking toward systems thinking, value orientation, and enterprise orchestration.

The future did not belong to those who mastered process — it belonged to those who could govern value across systems.

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Steve Towers

With over 40 years of experience in the private and public sectors, Steve is one of the world’s top 30 global CX experts. His courses are peer-reviewed and ranked in the world’s Top Ten (2025). He has been recognized internationally in the CX, BPM, EA, and LSS domains.

He has been awarded the
> Global Top 30 Guru CX 2025
> Top 30 Guru CX 2024
> 12 Gurus to Follow 2024
> CX Network Top 50 CX Influencers 2024
> Global Guru in CX 2023
> Global Guru in CX 2022
> Top 50 Customer Experience Influencers 2021
> Top Global Guru in Customer Service 2021
> Global 200 CX Leader 2021
> Top 150 Global CX Thought Leaders 2020
> Top 30 Guru in 2020
> Global Customer Service Expert in 2019
> OPEX Global contributor of the year 2018
inducted into the
> Enterprise Architect World Hall of Fame in 2011
In 2007, at Gartner’s Annual Summit, he received the
> Lifetime Achievement Award for Contribution to Business.

Steve has demonstrated his leadership and influence as the visionary founder of the BP Group, the world’s first and largest network for BPM and CX specialists. He also serves on the steering committees of major corporations, advises global leadership teams, and is a respected start-up investor. He has been acknowledged as an inspirational speaker with several No. 1 Best-selling books.

Steve has a proven track record of success in helping businesses & people transform themselves. He is recognised as a sought-after visionary in leading global enterprises. He uses tried-and-tested approaches from the world’s top achievers to help you codify your success, happiness & future. With hundreds of excellent testimonials, Steve is the perfect person to help you solve your customers’ experience challenges, make them work, understand and plan for them, and succeed.

Specialties include: Board Advisor | Customer Experience | Business Process Management | Business Transformation | Operational Excellence | Digital Transformation | AI for profit | Lean Six Sigma | BPM | BPR | Outside-In | CEMMethod

Steve lives with Penny, my wife of 40+ years, and family in the UK.

To kickstart your success, call Steve at +44 7429 518277 or visit him at http://www.stevetowers.com.

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Which BPM skills will be hot in 2026? (Outside-In is the divider)

You’ve heard this story.

Office full of clever people.
Screen flipped to show process map.
Someone declares. “We just need to automate it.”
And then customer reality walks through the side door.
“I had to chase you”
“I had to repeat all of that information”
“How could this take three weeks?”

That’s when BPM chooses between staying in the weeds, or becoming a competitive performance discipline.

Because in 2026, hot BPM skills aren’t about fancy new diagramming techniques.

They’re about designing operations that actually deliver customer outcomes, at speed and scale, with control.
That’s why Outside-In is never been more relevant.
And why I keep coming back to the CEMMethod.
Not as another buzzword.
As the practical foundation that keeps improvement efforts from devolving into internal theatre…

2026: BPM matures (at last)

Automation is now the easiest thing. AI assistants abound. Low-code tools are ubiquitous.
That’s great…if your focus is replacing humans.
But most businesses aren’t just trying to automate away people.
They’re trying to create customer experiences that make buyers happy, drive loyalty, and encourage upsell.
As work gets automated from top to bottom, those who rely on manual effort will get crushed.
They’ll either automate like crazy…
Or they’ll fail to change.
Here’s the new game:
1) Outside-In process architecture (don’t redesign processes, design experiences)
2) Process knowledge (use data to understand current-state performance)
3) Simplify aggresively (design experiences with humans, bots, and AI working together)
…and more!

…but let’s reality check. In theory theory works but in practice theory fails.

I’ll walk you through three examples that bring new game skills to life.
…and one punchline on why BPM + Outside-In = everything coming together.
Ready?

1) Outside-In process architecture (experiences first, processes second)

Questions you ask as an Inside-Out designer:

• “How do we run this department faster?”
• “How do we serve this product more efficiently?”
• “How do we automate this task?”

Questions you ask as an Outside-In designer:

• “What experience are we trying to create for the customer, start-to-finish?”
• “What is the Successful Customer Outcome?”

Example: insurance claims

The old way

One process force fits the customer experience.
Treatment goes from triage, to assessment, to repair, to payment.
The customer calls for an update. Rinse and repeat.
No single group owns the full experience.
Everybody focuses on their internal process.
The customer gets lost in the shuffle.

Solution: Outside-In design.

You might have multiple underlying processes internally.
But you design around one unifying claim experience.
And the internal workflows adapt to support it.
Compare that to the “customer experience” outlined above.
Faster? Sure.
Empathetic? Not exactly.
But here’s the thing.

Outside-In processes are not “softer”.

They are actually stronger.

Why? Control.

When you’re solving for the entire experience instead of your tiny process slice, you build complete ownership at the top.

• Hiccups get the attention they deserve.
• Customers aren’t handed off willy nilly.
• This is a desired outcome at every interaction.

To put people first, you need supple experiences.
That means exception handling built into the fabric of how work gets done.

2) Process knowledge (stop guessing, start measuring whats-going-on-actually)

By 2026, workshops aren’t enough.
Sure, you can hold a meeting and decide what you “think” is happening.
But the best BPM teams use data from the actual execution environment to show what is really happening.

• Delays.
• Exceptions.
• Rework loops.

Example: bank account onboarding

It feels like the credit check is the slow step.
Until you use process information to show where the pain is actually happening.
Customers are mailing in their documents…over and over.
They can’t read your instructions.
So they call, get clarification, and start all over again.
So you fix up the document request.
Simplify language, reduce ambiguity, clarify steps.
Then automate the steps that can’t be messed with.
Outside-In the secret sauce:
Elapsed and cycle time matters.
…but so does customer effort and experience predictability.
If you don’t know what your customers see, you don’t know the whole story.
So measure the process from their POV too.
Connect it back to your customer account health scores so you can act.

3) Orchestration (putting people, automation, and AI together without destroying reliability)

Holy automation, Batman.
2026 will not be framed as a battle of “BPM vs AI”.
Oh no.
BPM will become the control layer that enables AI to be safe, measurable, and scalable.

Example: contact centre
AI can write first draft replies.
Summarize customer calls for agents.
Rock your world.

But what happens if it starts autonomously triggering claims?
Escalations?
Shipping orders?
Suddenly your AI has multiplied your downstream errors by a factor of…
MACHINE SPEED.
When you’re designing processes that work WITH AI (and not merely for IT), reliability is king.
That means defining the process states.
Making decisions explicit.
Guiding AI to only do the predictable “messy middle”.
And letting people handle the high-risk exceptions.
Scales like nothing else.

4) Decision intelligence (making “why” auditable again)

As soon as AI enters the conversation…
CEOs and boards want to know one thing:
“Explain that decision to me.”
Get used to it.
That means decision modelling is about to become a red-hot skill.
Not fuzzy concepts of “policy”.
Clear definition of decision logic that can be tested, managed, improved.

Example: public sector service eligibility

Someone either gets approved or declined.
But when you’re dealing with people’s livelihoods, you need to be able to tell THEM why.
AI can help you sort documents.
Flag potential risk points.
Augment processing power.
…but the actual decision needs to be clear, logical, and above reproach.
Outside-In the secret sauce:
People chase you when they don’t understand the what and the why.
Stop failure demand from happening in the first place.

5) Process observability (management by fact, at scale)

Observability will shift from being a “nice to have” reporting feature…
To a foundational skillset.
Built into process design from day zero.
Not fancy dashboards hacked together after your app is finished.
Signals and metrics you can use to see process health.

• Detect drift.
• Catch failure modes.
• Reduce rework.

Example: retail returns
“You improved handling time by 30%!”
…but customers are MORE irritated than ever.
Why? You only measured how fast your employees work.
“We’re expediting returns but no one is getting resolved.”
“They keep transferring me to another department.”
Don’t let this be you.
Measure what customers see.
Connect back to your service experience metrics.
That’s CEMMethod in action:
closing the loop between customer experience and process improvement.

6) Experience-led standardisation (only standardise where it helps)

Experience-led standardisation is the holy grail.
Standardise where consistency adds value.
Protect flexibility where the customer experience matters most.

Example: healthcare patient discharge
Yes, some things need to happen every-single-time.
…but not everything.
So you create a standard way of working that provides consistency.
But you bake in intentional flexibility for your agents to handle exceptions.
Throw away the pillowcases.
Corridor CPR doesn’t scale.
…but built-in flexibility does.

7) Change activation (because your workers gotta use it)

You know what doesn’t exist?
Processes that no one follows.
Upload your fancy new process to the SharePoint portal.
Or…
Guide your workers at the moments of truth,

• right there in front of the customer,
• on the device they’re already using.

I’ll let you guess which drives actual change.
– – –

Conclusion

When’s the last time you saw BPM done right?
Operations execute flawlessly.
…and customers complain about nightmarish experiences.
Don’t choose BPM as a SILOED activity.
Choose BPM + Outside-In thinking.
Connect your operational efforts to the front-line experience.
…and own the entire experience from end to end.
Like we just talked about.

Simple 10-skill checklist for 2026 BPM:

1. Outside-In experience-to-process design
2. Process mining & process intelligence
3. Process observability (signals that drive behaviour, not vanity metrics)
4. Orchestration design across people, bots, and AI
5. Decision modelling & decision governance
6. Exception management & “casey” thinking
7. AI for BPM (because it helps…some. And sometimes it hurts.)
8. Experience-led standardisation (when to standardize, when to flex)
9. Change activation & adoption strategy
10. Value storytelling (connecting process efforts to customer outcomes + the triple crown)

My new book “Everyone Loves Great CX – Your Customer Experience Playbook” is now available. We review the themes here and turn them into an Actionables.

Learn more here: https://bpgroup.org/everyoneloves

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Check out the thought-provoking answers from 10+ BPM experts.

As always, you can either read everything or use the navigation below. Enjoy!
BJ Biernatowski
Marlon Dumas
Renata Gabryelczyk
Paul Harmon and Vahid Javidroozi
Thomas Hildebrandt
Michael Hill
Martin Holling
Sandeep Johal
Emiel Kelly
Guillermo Lopez
Matúš Mala
Morten Marquard

Which BPM skills will be hot in 2026

Now, let’s dive into the answers.

BJ Biernatowski

BJ Biernatowski is a digital transformation leader specializing in AI-driven process optimization, intelligent automation, and global operations. He has spearheaded large-scale initiatives at Microsoft, Amazon, UnitedHealth Group, and Nordstrom, consistently delivering measurable impact. His expertise spans process modeling, AI-assisted decision-making, and integrating emerging technologies across complex ecosystems.

Passionate about blending strategy with innovation, BJ designs scalable systems that accelerate agility and long-term competitiveness.

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bjbiernatowski@hotmail.com

How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

AI is accelerating demand for automation, but it’s also exposing gaps in how organizations design and manage their processes. Many teams are dropping AI into the middle of operations without the process architecture, governance, or delivery discipline needed to make it successful. The result is predictable: user pushbacks, inconsistent outcomes, and solutions that don’t scale.

At the same time, the top-down push for “more AI everywhere” often outpaces the operating model needed to guide workers on how to apply these tools responsibly and effectively. Without clear workflows, roles, and guardrails, AI becomes fragmented and difficult to integrate into day-to-day work.

Interestingly, the most successful AI adoption is happening bottom up. Individual practitioners are figuring out how to use AI to extend themselves, close skill gaps, and take on more responsibility. Their success highlights the opportunity and the need for organizations to build the process foundations that allow these wins to scale across the enterprise.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

AI gives experienced BPM practitioners a huge amount of leverage: faster analysis, better pattern recognition, and the ability to step into work that used to require years of experience. But it doesn’t magically give people the skills needed to adopt and scale these technologies. If anything, it makes the gaps more visible. The organizations creating real value in 2026 are the ones pairing AI with strong process fundamentals. Companies trying to “go faster” without redesigning workflows or strengthening their operating models are running into predictable issues: hallucination-driven errors, unclear system behavior, heavier workloads, and the wear and tear that comes from accelerating work without improving it.

For practitioners, the opportunity is massive. AI flattens access to knowledge-intensive parts of BPM and digital transformation, letting people move into areas they haven’t touched before. But the differentiators are still human: process literacy, critical judgment, the ability to design and govern AI-enabled workflows, and the discipline to apply these tools responsibly. Those are the skills that turn AI from a cool tool into a real operational advantage.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The best resources depend on the AI Copilot or automation platform your organization uses. We’re back in a world where vendor ecosystems matter. Microsoft, AWS, UiPath, and others all offer structured academies, hands-on labs, and certifications that map directly to the tools practitioners use every day.

University programs and executive courses can be useful, but they’re expensive and often too theoretical for practitioners who need to design, build, and run AI-enabled workflows. The work itself, infusing AI into workflow automation engines like Microsoft’s Copilot ecosystem, or UiPath’s automation fabric, is technical and requires direct access to the technology. Real learning happens inside the platforms themselves.

For most practitioners, the optimal path is vendor academies backed by certifications and hands-on experimentation. That combination builds practical, platform-specific skills that translate directly into value for the organization.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Portions of this answer were developed with the help of AI:

“AI strategy” without operational grounding
High-level AI strategy frameworks that don’t connect to actual systems, data, or workflows sound impressive but rarely lead to implementation. Organizations need practitioners who can execute inside the platforms, not just talk about AI at a conceptual level.

Fully autonomous AI agents replacing human oversight
There’s significant hype around “hands-off” AI agents that can independently design, build, and deploy workflows. In practice, no enterprise platform allows this without strict governance, human review, and guardrails. The idea is interesting, but it’s not something organizations can safely operate today.

“No-skills-needed” AI development
The narrative that AI eliminates the need for technical, architectural, or process skills is misleading. AI accelerates work, but it doesn’t replace the need for process modeling, data quality, governance, workflow design, or integration fundamentals. The belief that AI can compensate for weak foundations is hype that sets teams up for failure.

Prompting and generic AI literacy as career differentiators
Prompting is becoming table stakes, not a specialty. Platforms are rapidly abstracting it behind copilots, templates, and automation patterns. Similarly, standalone “AI fundamentals” courses disconnected from actual platforms have limited practical value – they don’t teach practitioners how to build or deploy anything. The durable skills remain workflow design, data modeling, integration, change management, and governance. Those are the fundamentals that let practitioners execute, not just discuss.

If you want to deliver value to organizations in 2026

Agentic AI is moving into a broader adoption phase in 2026. Definitions vary by platform, but the pattern is consistent: most agents still operate inside a single vendor ecosystem, with early signs of cross-agent integration emerging. That power comes with tradeoffs, especially vendor lock-in, but the capabilities go far beyond what traditional RPA can deliver. Many RPA use cases will be absorbed by agentic AI because agents can reason, adapt, and operate across workflows instead of following rigid scripts.

This shift aligns directly with the three phases of AI-enabled processes we outlined in Practical Business Process Modeling and Analysis (Misiak, Sinur, Biernatowski, 2025):

Phase 1: Smarter resources. Humans, systems, data, and machines are augmented with AI — pattern recognition, generative assistance, and supervised learning. AI accelerates work, improves decision-making, and frees higher-skilled resources by pushing more tasks to augmented workers and systems.

Phase 2: Smarter execution. AI begins to displace time-constrained or high-precision human work with always-on bots and snippets. Humans remain essential where judgment, empathy, and oversight are required. This is a semi-supervised world where processes and people validate AI outputs and maintain control.

Phase 3: Smarter orchestration. AI becomes the decider and controller for processes. Goals and guardrails replace step-by-step instructions. AI dynamically creates process paths, allocates work, and manages bots in real time. Process models shift to an after-the-fact role for transparency, auditability, and explainability.

Agentic AI is essentially the early expression of Phase 3. Vendors have already repositioned their portfolios around this trend, and organizations that want value in 2026 need to prepare for it. That means building living process architectures (Digital Twins), strengthening operating models, and ensuring clear guardrails so agents can operate safely and effectively.

Process models, decision models, and audit trails will remain critical, not as design artifacts alone, but as the transparency layer that explains AI decisions, supports compliance, and helps organizations manage bias, privacy, and emerging legal requirements.

The bottom line: delivering value in 2026 requires understanding where agentic AI replaces legacy automation, how it collaborates with processes and humans, and what governance is needed to keep it aligned with business goals. And as AI investments scale, the ability to demonstrate and measure business value will continue to be one of the most important skills practitioners can bring to the table.

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Prof. Marlon Dumas

Marlon Dumas is Professor of Information Systems at University of Tartu and Chief Product Officer at Apromore – a company dedicated to developing process mining and AI-driven process optimization software. While continuing to grow the Apromore product, he conducts a research backed by the European Research Council with the mission of developing AI-based techniques for automated discovery of business process improvement opportunities. He is a widely published researcher, having co-authored over 350 scientific articles, 10 patents, and a textbook (Fundamentals of Business Process Management) used in more than 400 universities worldwide.

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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

Automation is going to be again on the spotlight, driven by developments in the field of generative and/or agentic AI. There is going to be a lot of initiatives to automate at two levels. First of all, we will see a lot of automation at the level of tasks, like filling in details for a purchase order or for an invoice. Second, we will start seeing automation happening at the level of end-to-end process orchestration, like triggering API calls to automate the steps in an account opening process in a bank, or automating the orchestration of an invoice handling process.

The difference with respect to previous automation waves is that this time, automation will go beyond the level of inputting structured data. If you think about robotic process automation, it was mostly about entering data into fields in a form or in Excel sheets, by copying data from other fields of spreadsheet cells. This time, automation will also involve unstructured data, such as an AI agent reading from unstructured document and producing structured or unstructured data out of it. We are also going to see automation of certain types of repetitive decisions. These are all capabilities within the purview of agentic process automation.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

On the skills side, the most important class of skills will be and will remain critical thinking skills. The world of AI will be fertile for critical minds, who put into question ideas and thoughts that look right on the surface, but turn out to be misleading or inaccurate once you put a magnifying glass on them.

Tool-relevant specialized skills will also become very important. We are going to see a lot of new types of tools for agentic automation and orchestration coming out. Be ready to analyze their capabilities critically, and to conduct assessments and proof-of-concepts to determine if these tools really address the use-cases you need to implement.

Expertise in specific industry verticals will become highly valuable, such as deep domain expertise in financial processes, field services processes, or logistics processes.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I recommend looking at the references and pointers provided in the manifesto on AI-augmented BPM systems and more recent papers on agentic automation:

• AI-Augmented Business Process Management Systems: A Research Manifesto: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3576047
• Agentic Business Process Management Systems: https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.18833

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Skills in rule-based and script-based automation, such as Robotic Process Automation (RPA), have now become commodity. Skills on GenAI-based or agentic automation, are gaining a lot of traction.

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Prof. Renata Gabryelczyk

PhD, DSc, an Associate Professor at the University of Warsaw. She is Head of the Department of Management and Information Technology at the Faculty of Economic Sciences, University of Warsaw. Her academic experience includes involvement in research projects, research fellowships at several universities in Germany and Austria, and numerous publications in national and international publishers. Her research interests include business process management, performance management, facility management, and IT applications. She is a member of the program board of the Polish Certificate of BPMN at the Polish Academy of Sciences, a member of Polish Scientific Society of Economic Informatics, a member of the Technical Committee for Facility Management of the Polish Committee for Standardization, and a member of Polish Chapter of AIS (PLAIS). She serves as Managing Editor in the Central European Economic Journal and as Senior Editor in the Information Systems Management journal.

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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

I agree with the increasingly repeated thesis that the real impact of AI on BPM is currently often overestimated. While technologies such as hyperautomation and agentic AI undoubtedly expand the potential of BPM, many organizations still have not addressed fundamental issues such as a coherent process architecture, the quality of process data, and alignment between BPM objectives and the organization’s strategic goals. In many organizations, advanced technologies are adopted faster than core management capabilities mature. As a result, AI initiatives often reinforce existing weaknesses rather than resolve them. The expected return on investment in AI fails to materialize due to the lack of solid organizational foundations, structured data, and effective governance. Perhaps we should return to the basics and avoid automating chaos.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

Effective BPM will increasingly require the integration of three approaches: process thinking, data-driven thinking, and strategic thinking. Proficiency in working with data, as well as in applying the methods and tools of the full intelligent BPM cycle, is of course essential. For a successful integration of the process perspective with data analytics, communication between data specialists and process experts is key. Such collaboration remains rare in many organizations, limiting the ability to translate BPM competencies into real organizational value.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The most effective learning comes primarily through the practical application of theory. Hands-on experience with real-world processes, data analysis, and the implementation of improvements allows students to understand limitations, trade-offs, organizational culture, and the specific of the business environment. However, access to high-quality educational resources remains limited. It is difficult to design academic courses that prepare students for the realities of organizational complexity and chaos. Moreover, there is a lack of materials tailored to specific industries. BPM in local government, manufacturing, or small businesses requires different approaches and practices. As an academic teacher, I still believe that universities should provide a solid, ideally interdisciplinary foundation. Enabling students to work on projects in real-life conditions offers an excellent springboard for employment. Yet, achieving this continues to rely on close collaboration between academia and business.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Highly detailed models that are detached from decision-making or strategic intent tend to become documentation artifacts rather than management instruments. The capabilities of AI are also often overestimated. AI does not understand strategy and cannot take responsibility for decisions. That is why it is essential to take a critical approach to technology and focus on real business and process needs.

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Paul Harmon

Paul Harmon is a Co-Founder, Executive Editor, and Senior Market Analyst of the Business Process Trends website – www.bptrends.info – an internationally popular website that provides a variety of free articles, columns and book reviews on trends, directions and best practices in business process management.

In 2003 Paul authored Business Process Change: A Guide for Business Managers and BPM and Six Sigma Professionals (Published by Morgan Kaufman, who issued the fourth edition in 2019).

Paul is also a Co-Founder and a Principal Consultant of BPTrends Associates (BPTA), a professional services company providing executive education, training, and consulting services for organizations that are interested in understanding and implementing business process management.

Paul ’s involvement in business process change dates back to the late 60’s when he worked with Geary Rummler, at Praxis Corp., and was responsible for managing the overall development and delivery of the performance improvement projects undertaken by that company. During the 70s and 80s he ran his own company, Harmon Associates, and undertook major process improvement programs at Bank of America, Security Pacific, Wells Fargo, Prudential, and Citibank, to name a few.

During the same period he was a Senior Consultant at Cutter Consortium and edited their Expert System Strategies, Object-Oriented Strategies, and Business Process Reengineering Strategies newsletters. His book, Expert Systems: AI for Business, coauthored with David King, was a worldwide best seller during the 80-90s. and he consulted with many companies as they explored the uses of Artificial Intelligence during that period.

Paul Harmon is an acknowledged thought leader who is concerned with applying new technologies and methodologies to real-world business problems. He is a speaker and has developed and delivered executive seminars, workshops, briefings and keynote addresses on all aspects of AI and BPM to conferences and at major organizations throughout the world. He is very excited to be following the latest developments in Neural Network-based AI and BPM as they are now being integrated.

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Dr Vahid Javidroozi

Vahid Javidroozi is an Associate Professor in Smart City Systems and Digital Transformation at Birmingham City University (UK), where he is based in the College of Computing, Engineering and the Built Environment. His work focuses on business process management, enterprise systems, digital transformation, and the application of artificial intelligence in complex socio-technical systems.

Vahid’s research spans BPM, ERP systems (including SAP), AI-enabled workflows, large language models, digital twins, and systems thinking, with a strong emphasis on practical impact across sectors such as smart and sustainable cities, supply chains, transport infrastructure, and healthcare. He has published extensively in peer-reviewed journals and conferences, and his work is widely cited in the areas of BPM, smart cities, and AI-enabled digital transformation.

He is the founder and lead of the Smart, Sustainable and Green (SSG) Research Alliance, an interdisciplinary initiative that brings together academia, industry, and public-sector organizations to address urban challenges through systems-oriented, process-driven, and technology-enabled approaches. Through this work, he has led and contributed to numerous UKRI, Innovate UK, Horizon Europe, and international research and enterprise projects, including large-scale collaborations with government bodies, infrastructure operators, and technology partners.

Vahid is an invited member of the BridgeAI Standards Working Group, contributing to national discussions on AI standards, governance, and responsible adoption. He is also a certified Responsible and Ethical AI expert and has been actively involved in translating AI capabilities into organisational processes that are transparent, accountable, and value-driven.

Alongside his research, Vahid has extensive experience in executive education and professional training. He teaches and leads enterprise-focused modules on BPM, ERP, and digital transformation, and works closely with industry partners to support organizational change initiatives. He has supervised and mentored doctoral researchers, early-career academics, and practitioners, with a strong focus on systems thinking, design science research, and real-world impact.

Vahid’s work is driven by a long-standing interest in how processes, people, data, and technology interact within complex systems. He is particularly interested in the evolution of BPM from process improvement within individual organizations toward large-scale, cross-organizational coordination enabled by AI and digital platforms.

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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

We wrote in the 4th edition of Business Process Change and have written several times on the Business Process Trends website that AI is the most profound change that organizations will need to address over the course of the coming decades.

That said, it’s important to note that AI is not a single technique — it’s a large collection of new techniques that can be used in different ways and in various combinations to solve problems. AI systems include human reasoning applications, intelligent robotics, intelligent vision systems, intelligent voice systems, and much more. Like all computer software applications, AI will be integrated with existing business processes to make those processes more efficient and effective.

Think of just one possible application: automated trucks that can move materials from one warehouse to another without a human driver. Such an application would involve specific applications of robotics to load the truck in an efficient manner, an application to see the road and the environment around the truck and to provide information on what’s happening in real time, applications to define the location of the truck (GPS) and to plan its course forward toward some goal, an application to define and enforce laws of the road, an application to quickly define changes in the environment that require changes in plans (an emergency stop, for example), robotic devices to control the steering and movement of the truck and management systems to direct them. It would also require an overall management system to coordinate everything, and perhaps talk with people having questions. Complex visual, robotic and reasoning systems will need to be created and integrated to generate a safe, reliable automated truck that a business will feel confident to use.

In reality, of course, the company managing the use of the warehouse and the trucks will have nothing to do with developing or integrating AI into the driverless truck. They will buy the truck from a vendor and it will come with AI enhancements, just as it comes with a motor or a radio. The warehouse company will need to worry about dealing with transitioning from its existing trucks and drivers to driverless trucks: how to schedule them, maintain them and deal with problems associated with their use. In other words their main concern will be with redesigning the trucking/warehousing process.

In passing, while interested in how AI and process improvement work together, we have also become fascinated in the broader BPM transition between what we term (1) first generation process work — process change that focuses on specific process improvement with a specific business environment (improving or automating an auto production line, for example) and what we increasingly refer to as (2) second generation process work — processes that integrate multiple business processes within or across companies to allow more complex coordination. A worldwide supply chain involving several companies that change in response to real time events provides an example of such a second generation process. While logically independent, we are convinced that AI techniques will increasingly become the key to the design of second generation business processes. Teaching the skills and analytic techniques to facilitate the design and implementation of such second generation processes will be a key challenge to the next generation of process practitioners. And many will require a knowledge of AI techniques to make it possible.

From our perspective, this shift also brings BPM into closer contact with socio-technical complexity. AI does not simply automate tasks; it reshapes decision rights, accountability, and coordination across people, processes, data, and technology. The real BPM challenge is not “adding AI” to existing processes, but redesigning processes so that humans and intelligent systems can collaborate effectively, transparently, and responsibly in increasingly uncertain environments.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

The techniques involved in the development of specific AI applications of all kinds are of little concern to business process practitioners. As far as process professionals are concerned, AI is just a collection of new software and IT techniques that allow them to improve (automate) business processes — just as relational databases, in their time, simply provided a better way to access data and relationships between data. The challenge for process practitioners is to identify opportunities to use AI techniques for process improvement, and then to work with IT to create and implement new systems that incorporate those new improvements.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

This is a new area, and there is a lot of nonsense being offered as wisdom. Keep in mind what we have said. Process work is process work. Automating processes using computer applications is something we already know how to do. AI just provides a lot of new automation options. The key is to learn what can be done, today, with the AI techniques currently available. Reading articles and attending conferences — studying case studies — is the best way forward right now.

In particular, practitioners should seek out examples that include both successes and failures, as many AI initiatives fail due to poor process design, unclear ownership, or unrealistic expectations rather than technical limitations.

• Book: Harmon, Paul. Business Process Change (4th ed.). General introduction to process work with a chapter that focuses on using AI in BPM projects.
• The 5th edition, currently in preparation, will expand this, especially in relation to AI-enabled processes and large-scale coordination.
• Javidroozi, V., Tawil, A.-R., Azad, R. M. A., Bishop, B., & Elmitwally, N. S. (2025). AI-Enabled Customised Workflows for Smarter Supply Chain Optimisation: A Feasibility Study. Applied Sciences, 15(17), 9402. https://doi.org/10.3390/app15179402

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

It isn’t a matter of identifying process techniques that are no longer relevant — since all techniques are useful in the context for which they were designed. It’s more a matter of looking at what a given organization is emphasizing today. If you are still working on measuring specific small-scale processes (e.g. processing an order by hand or operating an auto production line with human workers), Lean or Six Sigma may be very relevant.

Most organizations, however, have completed their basic process analysis work — by themselves or by buying applications from companies like SAP. Their emphasis today is on integrating and managing large scale processes — like whole value chains — that stretch across whole organizations, or even multiple organizations to integrate their responses in more-or-less real time. This is an area in which AI techniques are going to prove incredibly valuable.

There are a few organizations that have the people and the knowledge to explore these challenges today. Most do not and to urge them to do so would be to urge them to attempt efforts that would probably end in failure.

For most organizations, this is a time for exploration. Hire new people with some AI experience. Launch small-scale projects that involve AI applications. Grab the low hanging fruit. Attend conferences and listen to what the leading companies are doing. And plan.

Much of the current hype assumes that technical capability automatically implies organizational readiness. In practice, fully autonomous, end-to-end AI-managed processes remain aspirational for most organisations. The near-term value lies in augmentation, learning, and resilience rather than wholesale replacement of human judgement.

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Prof. Thomas Hildebrandt

Thomas Hildebrandt has since 2018 been full professor at the Department of Computer Science, Copenhagen University and founder of the research section for Software, Data, People and Society. Thomas has been working as PI and co-PI on inter-disciplinary research and development projects jointly with industry partners in the area of technology and methods for business and workflow management systems for more than 20 years and has and has been a senior PC member of the BPM Conference for several years. Thomas initiated the research on DCR Graphs in 2008 and has since then led the research in collaboration with his research groups and Morten Marquard, the CEO at DCR Solutions. Thomas is also an active speaker on AI and digitalization for industry and public sector organisations and is member of the Danish Standards group for AI, who is part of the European (CEN/CENELEC) and Global (ISO) standardization bodies.

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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

The introduction of widely available LLMs and chatbots based on such has resulted in high expectations from both citizens and directors towards enabling conversational interfaces to the business processes of organizations and companies both internally and externally. While RAG (Retrieval Augmented Generation) solutions dominated the scene last year and still are being tested in many places, the new buzz is agentic AI, where the use of LLMs is no longer limited to question answering but promoted to carry out processes. However, while the introduction of a chatbot is celebrated in the news, many, if not most, are subsequently silently removed because they go off the track.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

A fundamental attitude towards AI for BPM that can help BPM practitioners to create value for their organizations in 2026 is to cut through the hype an realize the fact, that LLMs by design are unrealible and therefore should not be trusted to control any process nor to answer questions that cannot be verified by other means. This does not mean that language models are useless: LMs can be used to generate drafts of business processes from natural language descriptions and also to develop natural language user interfaces to knowledge based, symbolic AI models, rule and process engines, if one ensures a human in the loop to validate respectively the generated process drafts and the translated user inputs. The former is an example of AI for the engineering of business processes, which is most efficient if the target modelling language is close to natural language and has a formal semantics or execution and validation engines (making it possible to automate the validation of the generated processes), such as the declarative DCR Graphs language. The latter is an example of neuro-symbolic AI, or using a less hyped term: Hybrid-AI.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The Hybrid-AI approach is described in https://research.nvidia.com/labs/lpr/slm-agents/. The failures of LLMs for reasoning (and thus trustworthy execution of processes) is described in https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.06176. Information about the DCR graphs technologies can be found here: dcrsolutions.net. The use of DCR graphs for legal reasoning is described in a chapter of the recent book: https://www.routledge.com/Artificial-Intelligence-Humans-and-the-Law/PalmerOlsen-LivingstonSlosser-AddoRavn-Eddebo-HultinRosenberg/p/book/9781032934556 along with other chapters on the use of AI for Law. The use of LLMs for translation of law into symbolic DCR Graph models and then using LLMs to develop a natural language user interface is the goal of the XHAILe research project initiated in 2025: https://di.ku.dk/english/research/research-projects/xhaile/

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

A skill that has never really been relevant for professional use is that of prompt “engineering”, which is a misnomer from the outset, since you cannot engineer something that is not grounded in scientifically validated laws or rules.

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Michael Hill

Michael Hill is an experienced editor and journalist. He is the former editor of PEX Network overseeing a range of content including news, features, interviews, blogs, and industry reports.

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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

Organizations are being pushed to rethink processes from the ground up, not just automate steps, but redesign how work gets done, who does it, and how decisions are made. Whether its new technology like AI, changing customer expectations, or emerging regulatory requirements, modern businesses are under increasing pressure to be data-driven and resilient while remaining agile and human-centric – and that’s a fine balance!

Before, organizations designed processes upfront, documented them, and enforced compliance. Now, AI enables processes that learn and adapt in real time. Humans move from ‘doers’ to ‘orchestrators’ as AI changes roles, not just workflows. Employees supervise, validate, and fine-tune AI outputs Managers focus on outcomes, not micromanaging steps Process owners manage human–AI collaboration, not just SOPs.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

You simply can’t ignore AI and data literacy and understanding – it’s impacting pretty much all roles and industries. However, there is so much more to successful AI use and implementation than just technology. That’s where change management becomes essential.

In 2026, BPM practitioners create value less by drawing perfect process diagrams and more by shaping how work actually adapts, learns, and delivers outcomes. The role sits at the intersection of business, data, technology, and people. Great BPM practitioners are business translators and system designers who use data, AI, and human insight to continuously steer how work delivers value, rather than just documenting how it flows.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

PEX Network, of course! Joking aside, we pride ourselves on regularly publishing timely, high-quality content that not only keeps our audience up-to-date with the latest shifts in the industry but also supports learning and development. Of course, process excellence has long been associated with training and certifications, and this hasn’t changed even in the burgeoning AI/automation era. Methodologies like Lean Six Sigma and Agile still have value, but it’s about applying the core (and timeless) qualities of these approaches in a modern context.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Great question! This is where BPM maturity really shows in 2026. The biggest risk for BPM practitioners right now isn’t missing new skills, it’s over-investing in skills that no longer create value or that are still mostly hype.

Today, BPM practitioners lose value when they over-invest in heavyweight process documentation, rigid lifecycle models, centralized ‘process police’ governance, and tool-centric modeling skills, as these can’t keep up with fast-changing, data-driven work.

At the same time, much of the hype such as fully autonomous processes, AI-generated models as ground truth, digital twins of entire organizations, and perfect predictive BP remains impractical beyond narrow use cases due to data, trust, and regulatory limits.

The real risk is clinging to control, certainty, and ‘one best way’ thinking, rather than embracing adaptive, insight-driven, human-AI-orchestrated process management focused on outcomes and continuous learning.

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Martin Holling

Industrial Engineer with 25+ years of experience in Business Process Management from operational implementation and improvement over QM, strategic development, process design and consultancy mainly in global corporations from small to more than 400.000 employees, focusing on Culture, people and continual improvement. Making use of broad experience in QHSE auditing, process documentation and project management implementation.

For further information about me and my ideas on BPM, you can have a look at both my LinkedIn profile and my website: https://living-processes.de/home-en/

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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

As organizations figure out that AI on its own does not result in a success, they will get more attention to their processes on how they are implemented and run in their business before they can successfully implement an AI initiative/solution. My hope is that there will be more focus on continual improvement and culture change in the processes to prepare for successful AI implementation.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

Soft skills, specifically in Change Management, People Integration and Moderating groups will separate the successful BPM practitioners from the ones that focus only on technical/technological skills and knowledge. These achieve much better process and implementation quality in the business that gives a fruitful basis for successful AI initiatives and even more efficient and effective processes that are much easier to automate.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

For sure there are courses and books out there on soft skills, but I think it is best to adapt your behavior by getting in touch with as many colleagues out there as possible. Go, get together with fellow BPM practitioners in active communities and learn from each other, might it be online or even better in personal meeting. Books can help to verify behavior and get initial ideas on what to change but meeting the people will get you to learn.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

It is not that these skills are getting irrelevant, but process modelling and documentation will be more and more a thing that AI can do for you. You need to be able to understand it in depth and fine tune and correct the AI created process models and documents, but for example “translating” a process model from one notation to another one, might become an automated thing pretty soon.

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Sandeep Johal

Sandeep is a Managing Director & Principal Consultant at Nano Business Technology with over 15 years of Business Process Management and Digital Transformation experience, specifically in enterprise wide system implementation process design, process improvement, strategic sourcing, capability uplift, strategy alignment, thought leadership in energy, utilities & resources; finance; and government bodies across Australia, New Zealand, Middle East, and North America

Sandeep’s consulting takes him to both national and international destinations including the Americas, Middle East, New Zealand and the UK. He is often invited to speak at national and international conferences and is regarded as a contributor to the Business Process Management body of knowledge. He holds a Masters in Information Technology (BPM), an honours in Business Management and a diploma in Mechanical Engineering.

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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

Organisations are feeling fatigued by the astonishing rate of AI progress and the pressure to keep up. Some have chosen to ‘watch this space’ before taking bold steps. Fortunately, solution vendors are aware of the AI race and are taking proactive steps to introduce the technology progressively.

2026 is often described as the year of the AI Agent. Trends point towards AI‑augmented process execution, where an AI Agent is constantly listening and contributing when required. Some predict that processes will eventually be AI Agent‑led and human‑augmented. Personally, given the rate of organisational adoption and the security implications, organisations are more likely to embrace a human‑led approach that is augmented by AI Agents.

Human‑led process execution will continue to involve automation. Humans will remain in charge of efficiency. AI Agents will continue to be integral to automation and efficiency, with the added capability of proactively addressing process improvements. Learning from these improvements will enable self‑correcting processes. Achieving this milestone will mark a true step towards intelligence in process management. Achieving this milestone will mark true intelligence in process management.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

AI literacy is no longer optional. Equipping BPM practitioners with AI basics and an understanding of the ever‑changing landscape of capabilities is essential. This allows practitioners to speak the language and understand what AI technology can and cannot do.

Foundational skills in process workshopping, problem definition, and modelling or visualisation are still relevant. In fact, the interest of major solution vendors such as Salesforce and SAP in acquiring process‑mining tools indicates that process visualisation and modelling remain highly relevant in 2026. Organisations still lack effective ways to bring together processes from disparate systems. BPM practitioners should view this as an opportunity to develop unifying mechanisms such as Process Architecture.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

One of the most interesting resources I’ve come across is the design of AI Agents in a visual studio that resembles traditional process‑modelling tools. AI Agent design platforms such as Zapier and Microsoft Copilot Studio employ drag‑and‑drop functionality to create agents, with options to connect to popular web services such as Gmail. There are heaps of video tutorials on YouTube about these platforms—well worth exploring.

For those interested in deep technical process design (for example, value stream mapping), a useful resource is the book Operational Excellence in Your Office: A Guide to Achieving Autonomous Value Stream Flow with Lean Techniques by Kevin J. Duggan and Tim Healey.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Unlike in previous years, I’m not aware of any BPM practitioner skill that is no longer relevant. Most skills remain essential, although some are applied differently. For example, creating the As‑Is of a process is often seen as wasteful. However, repositioning the As‑Is as a baseline validation for future improvement means that focused As‑Is detail is still required—just not exhaustive detail.

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Emiel Kelly

I have been working “in BPM” for more than 25 years. Most of his time as a consultant and trainer at a BPM software and consulting organization. I helped all kind of companies in their BPM journey. From companies with 5 employees till companies with thousands of employees. From city councils, till investment companies and manufacturers of satellites.
Eight years ago I decided I want to make more impact on one company and joined an Insurance company (5 minutes cycling from my home). Of course I am still ‘doing BPM’ but with a much higher impact because I am part of the team now and fully responsible for the results of my implementations of ‘process things’. I can’t get away with leaving a slide deck behind, anymore
As a hobby, I started my blog ‘Procesje.nl’ in 2011. The goal of this blog is to address the “nonsense” I run into in BPM world. Mainly brought with some irony, but always with the goal to help organizations make their processes perform better and stay away from the non value adding things.

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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

AI solves all problems! At least that’s what a lot of companies (at least the C people) think.

That’s nonsense of course. But with a BPM way of working in mind it can really help to improve things. On all levels of BPM.

On process design level AI can be a sparring partner to help you make clear
– the Why of a process?
– Useful KPI’s of the process
– What is needed to implement the process?
– What data is needed to check process performance?

I’ve also seen AI that models processes. If that just leads to a picture of blocks and arrows, it has not much value. If it helps to create implementable workflows; yes!

On process execution level AI can execute some steps on it’s own or support the people in the process.

On case management level AI (if the data is available) can operate as some kind of flight control; keeping track of all the cases in the process and if they are still meeting their goals. If not, maybe AI can take some action or send out a warning.

On process improvement level AI can act as process mining on steroids; understand where bottlenecks arise, but more important what are the causes of those bottleneck, as bottlenecks are just symptoms of a bad process implementation.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

Still my number one is “strategic thinking”. BPM and processes are only a means. A means to solve the problems of customers. So always keep in mind if you are still solving the right problems. Help your company to implement useful processes. Help them make clear the why of the company an it’s processes.

It’s easy to dive in to process implementation very fast, but try to prevent that with your strategic view.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Ask some generative AI. Pretty sure it will come up with my blog

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

My answer for many years has been high level modeling of processes. Of course those models are always right because they don’t tell the real story. Real processes are detailed. Very hard to catch in models. Happy that AI can help me now to really understand the dynamics of execution in a process. Having said that; without useful process data, AI lies to you. So I used it practically, but also had to apply a lot of common sense to not implement wrong improvements.

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Guillermo Lopez

Working in the BPM Competence Center at the European Commission, I have spent the last eight years leading a team of experts to drive digital transformation and the modernization of EU institutions. I hold multiple certifications, including Professional Scrum Master, as well as specialized training in digital transformation, artificial intelligence, and process mining.
My core competencies include business process management, enterprise architecture, artificial intelligence, and agile methodologies. My mission is to help the EU deliver better services and outcomes to its citizens and stakeholders by leveraging state of the art BPM and EA technologies and methodologies.
I bring over 30 years of experience successfully leading BPM and EA projects across various domains and sectors—such as finance, retail, the public sector, and the environment—achieving significant improvements in efficiency, quality, and innovation.

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X: @GoreML

How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

I don’t think AI will lead organizations; it will always be – or should always be – a technology under human supervision, with clear visibility into its reasoning and decision criteria. If multiple companies use the same kind of AI to shape their strategy, there’s a real risk they end up making very similar decisions and losing competitive differentiation. I’m also concerned about a “copycat” effect: erroneous strategies generated by a model being replicated uncritically across different organizations.

I don’t believe today’s generative AI will radically transform the world of processes and organizations, because it lacks deep context and doesn’t truly understand the world it operates in. When other kinds of AI emerge – like the family of approaches LeCun has proposed – that can build a solid representation of the environment and learn from it autonomously, then they may be able to lead and run truly autonomous enterprises. The current generation of models looks more like a powerful tool in the toolbox, not something that should play a leadership role.

Where I do see clear room for improvement is in case management: a constellation of agents helping you make better decisions and suggesting the most reasonable next steps to reach a given goal. AI can also add value in process mining analysis, process simulation, synthetic data generation, and similar tasks where its ability to explore scenarios and combine information is genuinely useful.

I’m particularly worried about three risks: removing the human-in-the-loop (HITL), starting from incorrect or biased input data, and the ultimate human responsibility for automated executions they may not fully understand. All of this makes me doubt that the current AI paradigm is the right path if it’s adopted as-is. On top of that, I see strong pressure to “move fast” and accelerate AI initiatives, and I think that’s a mistake: before making the whole organization “dance” to the tune of AI systems, we should first put in place strict governance, with clear rules on where, how, and under what constraints these models are used.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

In 2026, professionals will need to shift their mindset from a reactive stance to a clearly proactive one.

Aptitudes
• Ability to work with a far greater number of data sources (data fluency).
• Skill in interacting with and “questioning” AI systems with sound judgment (AI literacy).
• Significant strengthening of interpersonal and communication skills (soft skills).
• Deep understanding of the organization and its context: less of a “diagrammer” and more of an enterprise translator between business, technology, and people.
• Focus on responsible AI and governance: treating AI as a co pilot, not an oracle; demanding transparency, clear guardrails, and well defined accountability for AI influenced decisions and automations.
• Openness to change: viewing new tools (AI assistants, intelligent automation, unified BPM platforms) as leverage rather than threats and continuously updating one’s own methods.
• Customer and employee experience orientation: measuring success not only in cycle time or cost, but also in reduced friction for customers and frontline staff.
• Collaboration over control: moving away from a “central BPM police” model towards enabling process ownership in the business, with BPM acting as coach and backbone.

Core skills and techniques
• Strong command of BPMN and DMN, which will remain essential, and the ability to review and refine AI generated models.
• Process mining and analytics: ability to formulate the right questions, interpret variants and bottlenecks, and propose concrete redesigns based on the findings.
• Automation and orchestration: knowledge of BPM engines, RPA, event driven architectures, and the ability to design flows with human in the loop as a central element, avoiding AI based black boxes.
• Simulation and experimentation: use of scenario simulation, what if analysis, and A/B testing to compare process designs and quantify impact before large scale implementation.
• Data and AI literacy: understanding what LLMs, ML models, and analytical models can and cannot do, how they depend on data quality, and where they fit in the BPM lifecycle (from documentation authoring through to decision support).

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

• Academic–practitioner bridges for developing data fluency will remain very important, through initiatives such as bpm education or MultiProcessMining.
• It is also worth regularly following process mining and BPM trend blogs (for example, BOC Group, PrimeBPM, or PEX), as well as communities centered on commercial platforms (ARIS Community, Celonis, SAP Signavio, etc.).
• Another very good option is to follow leading voices in the field, such as Wil van der Aalst, Ian Gotts, or Jim Sinur.
• In addition, more and more university programs are emerging on BPM, the combination of BPM with AI, and process mining, such as some of the programs offered by the Universidad Internacional de La Rioja (UNIR), among others.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

No longer relevant
• Static documentation as the main deliverable.
• Highly centralized BPM acting as a “process police” function.
• Modelling for the sake of modelling, with no clear link to real decisions or change.
• KPIs defined and maintained manually or without backing from operational data.
• Process discovery done only through workshops, without cross checking against execution data.
• Treating processes purely as technical problems, ignoring people and business context.
• Endless discovery and modelling sessions with no hypotheses and no measurable outcomes.

Not really applicable yet (mostly hype)
• A fully autonomous enterprise with no transparency, no clear guardrails, and not well defined accountabilities.
• “In AI we trust” as a principle, delegating critical decisions to AI without questioning them.
• No one being accountable for what AI does: lack of an explicit framework for AI responsibility and accountability.
• Processes run without any visual representation that people can understand.
• Autopilots and black boxes “running the company”, without explainability or effective human oversight.

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Matúš Mala

I’m Matúš, co-founder of the Process Academy, organizer of the BPM-Münich Meetup, podcast co-host of “The Process Philosophers” and an absolute BPM enthusiast.

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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

I think that by 2026, we should accept that AI is here to stay. The first disruption phase is over; AI is changing the way we work, prepare for meetings, communicate, think and live.

To me, it’s a new infrastructure technology similar to the internet in its early days, and now we have the opportunity to forget about FOMO (fear of missing out) and focus on real use cases.

I think that AI implementations by ‘end customers’ will slow down; they will no longer create new LLMs, RAGs, etc. without a target or purpose. Instead, they would focus on real improvements to their business processes, “How can AI help my core processes?”

On the other hand, I think there will be a ridiculous amount of new features in “tools/software”, creating “co-pilots” for almost everything, and I must say that I love it.

By the end of 2026, I think we will have much better tools and software solutions that will make it easier for us to create processes and solutions in our special BPM area.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

That’s a great question!

I truly think that we have a lot of great methodologies, techniques and more in BPM that will still be needed in 2026. The way we understand processes will not change. The opposite would be true: we are currently challenging new workflows in agentic orchestration, where requirements engineering and methodological questions arise, and the ‘old-school’ methods of understanding processes would be important here.

However, we should not cling to outdated methods; we should start to “refresh” our approach. Everything in our work is changing, so I think it’s extremely important that “old” experts and “new” newcomers develop updated BPM methodologies that will help in 2026 and beyond. We should work on questions such as: What kind of workshops do we need? What kind of structures do we need? Do we need new, ‘modern’ process landscapes? How can we improve requirement engineering? How should we describe processes (not only with BPMN)? And how can we spread BPM skills faster and more widely?

There are so many workflow tools, not only BPM tools, with diverse ways of creating and modelling workflows. I don’t think we will reduce them, so we have to adapt and make it easier to understand processes and create solutions using diverse tools, frameworks and more.

If I had to pick one skill: Flexibility would be key.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

That’s a difficult question.

The problem isn’t that we don’t have enough resources. Just go online or use an AI chatbot and you will find enough. The challenge here is that only people with intrinsic motivation do it. For those people, the form of knowledge is not that important; they want to learn and accept bad resources, difficult explanations, and so on. People learnt like this in the past and would continue to do so.

BPM, processes, data, AI… All of these topics are now important for everyone, for every employee. Now more than ever, it is important that everyone understands what AI is for, what they can and cannot do, and so on. The same applies to company governance, processes and data. These people are not usually intrinsically motivated to “learn” independently. It is therefore becoming increasingly important for companies to motivate them to learn, because the world is changing so quickly at the moment. Pure study is no longer enough; lifelong learning is essential.

I am not sure if we will see any improvements in the next couple of years, because normally companies don’t invest in these important topics, which is sad. They create some “learning paths” and short videos, but I just don’t see employees enjoying them. In fact, I think it’s worse than it was in the past. At least there were 2–3 days of workshops away from the office, and people were happy to learn and enjoy other places — it was a win-win situation. Currently, we just say, “Here are six 30-minute videos. Take a look…”

My advice: Until companies change their philosophy, find your favourite source and don’t push yourself: conferences, podcasts, your favourite YouTube channel, shorts, etc.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

AI-only skills

For the last two years, we were somehow flying in the clouds, thinking that you don’t need anything but a prompt. You don’t even need to understand processes, data or anything else, just prompt.

Surely, people with less experience or technical knowledge can achieve more, but they need extremely high-level engineering skills to describe their “problem” or “solution”.

A poor process would be poor in AI as well.

Focusing only on prompting would not be that important anymore. A better understanding of problems and processes would be important. However, many technical disciplines would become less important. It is much easier now to create custom services and UIs. And it will improve even more. As with BPM, I think software engineers will become more “coordinating” agents. In the future, there will be fewer pure code solutions and more low-code or AI-engineered code solutions and models.

In short: A strong focus on one discipline (e.g. I am a Java programmer, I am prompt engineer, I am modeller …) is not future-oriented.

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Morten Marquard

Morten Marquard has dedicated his entire professional journey to addressing the challenges faced by knowledge workers, including lawyers, social workers, and other professionals dealing with complex work processes. The struggle to navigate these processes efficiently while complying with ever-changing laws and regulations has been a persistent issue. Traditionally, compliance has relied on laborious reading and understanding of lengthy paper-based documents—a cumbersome task that often hinders productivity.

Recognizing the need for a transformative solution, Morten embarked on a mission to leverage technology for the benefit of knowledge workers, not only enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of employees but also alleviating the burden of manual compliance checks and reducing stress levels.

Morten realized the limitations of using Business Process Model and Notation, BPMN, to streamline process digitalization as the rigidity of the processes failed to meet the requirements of end-users. It was during this critical juncture, approximately 15 years, that Morten collaborated with professor Thomas Hildebrandt, and together, they propelled the development of dynamic condition response graphs, DCR. This innovative approach has since been embraced by over 40 different customers, primarily in Denmark, with expanding reach into international markets such as Italy and the United Kingdom.

Morten’s journey exemplifies a commitment to pushing the boundaries of technology to empower knowledge workers, offering them a more streamlined and stress-free approach to managing their intricate work processes. The impact of his work extends far beyond national borders, contributing to a global shift in how organizations approach digitalization and compliance in the modern age.

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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

We are moving away from ‘Digital Theater’, where we just put PDFs on a screen, to the Agentic Stack. We use Generative AI to read the mess of regulations, but we don’t let it run the business. Why? Because LLMs are statistical; they guess! If you’re a student in Cambridge, a chatbot might say ‘yes’ to a beer, forgetting you’re at Cambridge Massachusetts, not England. In 2026, we manage processes by marrying LLMs for language with Symbolic AI for logic. This is the Business Operating System or Agentic AI: hardware-independent, sovereign, and 100% deterministic AI platform.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

Stop being a ‘Translator’ and start being a ‘Rule Architect.’ The most dangerous person in an organization is the one ‘building bridges’ between IT and Business. Bridges just keep the gap wide, and often widens it. We need to close the gap completely. The winning behavior in 2026 is Business Process Re-engineering (BPR) with a red marker. Michael Hammer: Don’t automate, obliterate. Don’t ‘digitize’ your old habits. If your process requires a person to manually type data into a CRM, don’t build an integration, kill the task! Practitioners must learn to empower business experts to own the logic directly through Declarative Process Modeling. We don’t need more ‘electronic’ paper; we need ‘Digital Twins’ of the organization where the logic is live, explainable, and hosted on European infrastructure.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Stop reading generic “Success Stories” and start studying the intersection of Process Science and Computational Law. As Edsger W. Dijkstra famously warned, treating computers like humans is a sign of “professional immaturity.” We must stop pretending AI “thinks” or “understands” and start enforcing the formal logic our businesses depend on.

Real professions, like Law, Math, and Physics, developed specific languages precisely to avoid the ambiguity of “natural” language. Relying on the “vibe” of an AI is a step backward. For a practical deep-dive into how we fix this, look out for the upcoming book by Professor Thomas Hildebrandt and myself. It is the definitive guide to moving beyond “vibe coding” and into production-ready, rule-based engineering. We’ve been “too busy” in the trenches with our customers to finish it until now, but the era of “guessing” is over.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Retire the ‘Happy Path’ and stop ‘Building Bridges.’ The ‘Happy Path’ is a myth. As Professor Wil van der Aalst notes, 80% of cases follow their own unique paths. If you are still teaching ‘Lean’ flowcharts that break the moment reality hits, your skills are obsolete. People aren’t stupid; they deviate because they have to.

But the biggest ‘skill’ to unlearn? Bridge building. For years, we’ve hired ‘translators’ to sit between Business and IT. All they do is facilitate an expensive, digital game of telephone. The expert explains the law, the analyst writes a requirement, and the developer codes it. By the time it’s finished, the law has changed and the logic is lost in translation.

Also, stop the hype around RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation). Asking a chatbot to ‘read your manuals’ and guess an answer is irresponsible for Law, Finance, or GovTech. In 2026, the ‘Vibe Coding’ era is over for production. If your AI can’t provide a symbolic, explainable audit trail for its decisions, it’s just a toy. We don’t need ‘probably correct’ business processes; we need Compliance by Design.

In 2026, we don’t build bridges; we close the gap. The future belongs to the Business Operating System where the expert who knows the law is the one who defines the logic. IT should deliver the secure, sovereign infrastructure (Open Source and Kubernetes), but the business must own the execution. If you are still ‘translating’ requirements in 2026, you aren’t helping, you’re just slowing us down. Stand Tall Europe by letting the business take back the baton.

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What to expect in 2026? Many companies are investing heavily in AI. New models are becoming increasingly powerful and are outperforming humans on many benchmarks. AI can be used to build agents and power humanoid robots, which could dramatically change how work is done.

On the other hand, not all AI initiatives have been successful (to put it mildly). Add to this changes in global supply chains and greater unpredictability in the business environment, and it feels like “interesting times,” to borrow the phrase.

How will these changes affect the role of BPM, and what do BPM practitioners need to do to stay relevant?

Check out the thought-provoking answers for the usual set of questions from 20+ BPM experts plus few extras: answers from a perspective of a Business Analyst and advice for organization leaders.

As always, you can either read everything or use the navigation below. Enjoy!
Wil van der Aalst
Tony Benedict
Lloyd Dugan
Scott Francis
Ian Gotts
Paul Holmes-Higgin and Joram Barrez
Caspar Jans
Mathias Kirchmer
Mirko Kloppenburg
Harald Kühn
Amy Van Looy
Madison Lundquist
Jan Mendling
Nathaniel Palmer
Brian Reale
Adrian Reed
Björn Richerzhagen
Pedro Robledo
Michael Rosemann
Serge Schiltz
Jim Sinur
Roger Tregear
Roland Woldt

Which BPM skills will be hot in 2026

Now, let’s dive into the answers.

Prof. Wil van der Aalst

Prof.dr.ir. Wil van der Aalst is a full professor at RWTH Aachen University, leading the Process and Data Science (PADS) group. He is also the Chief Scientist at Celonis and part-time affiliated with the Fraunhofer FIT. Currently, he is also deputy CEO of the Internet of Production (IoP) Cluster of Excellence and co-director of the RWTH Center for Artificial Intelligence. His research interests include process mining, data science, process intelligence, business process management, workflow automation, Petri nets, process modeling, and simulation. Many of his papers are highly cited (he is one of the most-cited computer scientists in the world and has an H-index of 188 according to Google Scholar with over 169,000 citations), and his ideas have influenced researchers, software developers, and standardization committees working on process support. According to Research.com, he is the highest-ranked computer scientist in Germany and ranked 8th worldwide (ranking 2025). He previously served on the advisory boards of several organizations, including Fluxicon, Celonis, ProcessGold/UiPath, and aiConomix/Automaited. Van der Aalst received honorary degrees from the Moscow Higher School of Economics (Prof. h.c.), Tsinghua University, and Hasselt University (Dr. h.c.). He is also an IFIP Fellow, IEEE Fellow, ACM Fellow, and an elected member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Royal Holland Society of Sciences and Humanities, the Academy of Europe, the North Rhine-Westphalian Academy of Sciences, Humanities and the Arts, and the German Academy of Science and Engineering. In 2018, he was awarded an Alexander-von-Humboldt Professorship.

WWW: http://www.vdaalst.com
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Twitter: @wvdaalst

How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

AI is dramatically accelerating digital work, but it also exposes a long-standing weakness: organizations often lack a reliable, real-time understanding of how their processes actually function.

Generative, predictive, and prescriptive AI bring powerful capabilities, but only if they are connected to operational reality. AI needs process context, structured event data, and end-to-end visibility. Without these, AI will make processes faster, but not necessarily better. We risk accelerating inefficiencies, fragmenting responsibilities, or automating tasks that shouldn’t exist in the first place.

The most important shift is conceptual: moving from reactive process management, focused on dashboards and after-the-fact reports, to proactive and even autonomous operational steering. This shift requires:

• object-centric event data covering many interconnected processes,
• continuous monitoring rather than one-time analysis
• AI assistance that works on process models (not only text), and
• automated predictions and recommendations grounded in data semantics.

When processes become digitally transparent across objects, systems, and departments, AI can be used responsibly to suggest interventions, prevent bottlenecks, and optimize operations holistically. But if AI is used locally, optimizing individual tasks or documents in isolation, it can inflate work, obscure structures, and overwhelm people.

Ultimately, the organizations that will benefit from AI are those that combine automation with process awareness and operational grounding.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

A practitioner in 2026 will require a combination of process expertise, data fluency, and responsible AI thinking. The following dimensions will matter most:

Skills and techniques

• working with object-centric event data and multi-object process views
• process-aware predictive and prescriptive analytics
• data extraction, transformation, and semantic modeling
• real-time monitoring and operational process control
• integrating AI/LLM components into structured process contexts
• reference model use and domain-specific process standardization
• optimization, simulation, and scenario evaluation

Behaviors and attitudes

• evidence-based reasoning rooted in actual event traces
• critical assessment of automation proposals
• resistance to local sub-optimization
• interdisciplinary communication skills (IT, business, data science)
• comfort with hybrid intelligence – orchestrating humans + AI systems
• attention to unintended process consequences

The practitioner needs curiosity, scepticism toward purely technical promises, and confidence in working with high-dimensional process data across systems.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I’m currently working on a new version of the process mining book. This will appear in 2026 (published again by Springer).

Moreover, I recommend reflecting on our recent BISE editorial “Process Mindlessness: When we Lose Sight of What AI is Supposed to Improve”. Bus Inf Syst Eng 67, 771–775 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12599-025-00972-0. Here, we discuss three potential problems that arise when applying AI naively. When applied without process awareness, AI may unintentionally worsen operational processes rather than improve them. Three effects illustrate how the misuse of AI can undermine process performance and transparency.

A short summary:
1. Bloating: inflating process artifacts rather than streamlining work.
Generative AI makes it effortless to produce text, reports, tickets, emails, and documentation. Instead of clarifying process steps, AI can flood a process with additional artifacts, status updates, autogenerated logs, long explanations, masking the true flow of work. The result is process noise: more events and documents without added value.

2. Blurring: dissolving precise process information into ambiguous text.
Organizations maintain structured data representing objects, lifecycle transitions, and constraints. When AI converts such structured information into free-form text to generate recommendations or actions, semantics are blurred. Decision logic becomes implicit and probabilistic rather than explicit and verifiable. Blurring erodes the “single source of truth” required for process intelligence.

3. Blasting: scaling local automation without process constraints.
AI systems can act rapidly and at scale, generating messages, tasks, or transactions far faster than human agents. When such actions are not governed by process models, workloads shift downstream, overwhelming teams and breaking throughput assumptions. Traditional capacity constraints, once natural brakes, vanish, and without monitoring, the process destabilizes.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Some established skills are losing relevance, and some emerging skills are still hyped because they lack grounding in operational reality.

Declining relevance

• ability to generate text, reports, and PowerPoint presentations,
• case-centric process thinking as the dominant process lens,
• manual KPI dashboarding detached from the underlying event data,
• modeling-first approaches without factual logs, and
• single-task automation without systemic process awareness.

Not practically applicable yet or overhyped

• autonomous AI process agents without human oversight or auditability,
• workflows delegated entirely to generative models without grounding,
• AI that converts structured process data into text only to re-interpret that text,
• unbounded automation that scales communications and actions without constraints, and
• simplistic claims that AI eliminates the need for process understanding.

These trends tend to ignore unintended consequences such as bloating, blurring of semantics, and blasting effects that overload process participants.

AI offers unprecedented opportunities for process excellence, but only when it is grounded in factual event data, connected across objects, and aligned with process goals. The skills that matter are those that combine process science, data science, and responsible automation, while guarding against naive forms of AI adoption that accelerate fragmentation rather than improvement. If you automate nonsense, you just get automated nonsense (faster).

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Tony Benedict

Tony Benedict is a Partner with Omicron Partners, LLC, a strategy advisory firm. He is a senior level operations executive best known for transforming organizations, improving operational excellence and profitability. Most recently, he served as Interim Vice President of Operations for Rising Pharma, managing all phases of complex $200M post-merger integration of 2 acquired companies (36 CMOs, 2 3PLs) within expedited timeframe, while concurrently launching a state-of-the-art pharma distribution center. Consolidated 3 ERP systems into a single SAP instance within 6 months. Benedict previously worked at HonorHealth as Vice President, Procurement and Supply Chain where he was responsible for over $600M in spend management. One of his accomplishments was in the restructuring of the procurement and supply chain organizations post-merger within 12 months and consolidating two ERP systems within 18 months while implementing $60M in cost reduction initiatives. Previously, he was Chief Information Officer, Vice President of Supply Chain for Tenet, and Vice President, Supply Chain, Vanguard Health Systems at Abrazo Community Health Network in Arizona.
He is currently serving as President and Director, Board of Directors for the Association of Business Process Management Professionals International and is a co-author of the Business Process Management Common Body of Knowledge versions 2, 3 and the recently released version 4.
WWW: http://www.abpmp.org
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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

The failure rate for AI projects to date has been over 70%. Companies have learned that injecting a new technology into your business shouldn’t be the primary strategy, rather that AI should augment business strategy. The challenge will be for more selectivity and prioritization for where the investments in AI should be made. The larger the company, especially multi-nationals, the more complexity, making AI models larger and implementations extremely difficult. I believe that successful companies will start where they have thoroughly documented their processes. The logical areas would be customer and supplier facing processes with customer facing taking priority given the impact on revenue. Companies can achieve quick wins within these two areas while they concurrently work on the major cross functional processes that touch the customers and suppliers to fully streamline and optimize internal operational efficiency.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

Building algorithms and language models will largely be left to technical analysts and developer types who are working on smaller scope projects. There is a tremendous need for a Business Architect Strategist to oversee enterprise level transformational efforts. The competency and skills required for practitioners will focus on greater depth and breath of business architecture strategy, integration and governance. The full list of competency areas are Strategy, Operations, Enterprise Performance Management, Human Dynamics, Enterprise Modeling, and Enterprise Governance inclusive of all the skills within each competency area. A complete competency matrix will be available at TheEssentialBusinessArchitect.org or at ABPMP.org

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The BPM CBOK is a good start for those Director level practitioners who want the foundation for BPM. The best training is “on-the-job” training where the practitioner actually learns by doing. Every transformation is different and the diversity of experience will be the best teacher. Make every effort to increase the depth and breadth of your project experience while increasing scope to the enterprise level. If you do the same project work and the same scope then you’re not growing as you should in this profession. Find a very senior practitioner who can mentor you. Enterprise Governance will be more important now and in the future. Also, The Business Architect Consortium will be publishing “The Essential Skills of the Business Architect” in mid to late January 2026 which will outline what competencies and skills are needed for enterprise level transformation. Find our more at TheEssentialBusinessArchitect.org or at ABPMP.org

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

The BPM profession is not a “throw away” profession where certain skills are not longer relevant or applicable It’s always a question of what skills to use and why/when. As mentioned in the previous question, What is becoming more important is a greater depth and breadth of certain skills, many of which are non-technical and Business in nature. Competencies like strategy, systems thinking, operational integration, governance, etc.

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Lloyd Dugan

Lloyd Dugan is a widely recognized thought leader in the development and use of leading modeling languages, methodologies, and tools, covering from the level of EA and BA down through BPM, Case Management, and SOA. He specializes in the use of standard languages for describing business processes, systems, and services, particularly BPMN, CMMN, and DMN from the OMG. He has developed and delivered BPMN 2.0 training to the U.S. Department of Defense and large consultancies. He has nearly 40 years of experience with public and private sector clients, and has an MBA from the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University. He is a past member of the Workflow Management Coalition and its BPSim Working Group that produced the process simulation standard, and also a past member of the OMG’s BPMN Model Interchange Working Group (MIWG). He is a Contributing Member (author) and Collaboration Team Member for the BA Meta Modeling and BPM-BA Alignment Groups of the Business Architecture Guild. He represents the Guild on the OMG Task Force for the BA Core Metamodel (BACM) standard. He is a frequent speaker at national and international conferences on BPM, BPMN, Case Management, Decision Management, SOA, and BA. He is a published author or co-author on BPM, BPMN, and BA. He led the effort to develop a new OMG certification for integrating BPMN, DMN, and CMMN, known as BPM+. He serves as the Chief Architect for Serco, NA, on its CMS Eligibility Support Program, which provides back-office processing of applications to access the Federal Health Care Exchange created under the Affordable Care Act, and where he has led award-winning efforts to build intelligent document processing, dynamic work assignment queuing, RPA for case management, use of AI/ML, process mining, and migration of all Program elements to the AWS Cloud. He still delivers BPM-related training, and when asked also provides client advisory services on BPM-related matters/technologies.

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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

It is truly swimming against the tide when it comes to attempting to convince folks to NOT think about AI as anything other than a monolithic black box straight out of “2001: A Space Odyssey”. In other words, there is not a simple, one-size-fits-all answer to this question, but rather specific answers that support distinct and identifiable use cases.

For example, AI technologies and the models that power them are now sufficiently capable of doing time-saving and productivity-enhancing activities for the analyst such that one can vibe-review/engineer models and code constructs, create documentation and design artifacts, summarize findings, etc. via well-targeted prompting. This saves on the effort to do the leg-work previously needed, but I think this is first-cut stuff that still warrants a practiced eye’s review…at least for a while longer. However, this says only so much about using such things as part of business process automation.

Regarding those use cases, AI technologies and the models that power them are increasingly capable of automating the execution of more complex tasks with more reliability, such that human-in-the-loop (HITL) is becoming more of a bug than a feature. New design patterns have emerged, such as Agentic AI, where the probabilistic logic of AI and deterministic decision logic combine into adaptive behavior by systems. The advent of retrieval-augmented generation (RAG)-based systems is making for more domain-specific results with less likelihood of hallucination, and now with the underlying knowledge bases of the business better understood and implemented. This helps the business to decide between pre-trained and to-be-trained models for risk/reward payoff.

Some use cases have always been there, but AI now provides stronger and more available tools to address them. An example of this is fraud detection, which is not a new need but is now better enabled via the latest AI. Of course, this is all part of the escalation where AI feeds both fraudsters and fraud-detectors in a never-ending race.

As with any impactful IT, all of this needs to be under some kind of governance, and there is substantial literature out there on this topic. As usual, the US is lagging behind Europe in tackling this because of pervasive and misguided laissez-faire takes on how best to advance the development of AI. It is not rocket science nor regulatory overreach to apply common sense requirements to the use of AI. It is simply sound thinking.

So, in conclusion, AI is part of the IT stack, fitting in where it can provide the best value. Sounds like any other IT that’s come along over the years. And like any other IT, we must come to terms with its use, and align management practices accordingly.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

The usual things are still true – namely: operational modeling and simulation, process and data analysis, an abiding intellectual curiosity about how to improve how things work, etc. – but the value gap between what the experienced practitioner can provide vs. what the noobie can provide is continuing to shrink as generative AI tools mature. However, greater reliance on such tools comes at the cost of losing the deep understanding that powers the discipline of BPM, widening the divide between those that simply produce artifacts for base level consumption by others and those that produce constructs that are intended to execute in production as automated processes.

One way to navigate the tensions created between these two Scylla-and-Charybdis forces is to be able to exploit domain-specific knowledge and to professionalize the deep understanding of BPM as a discipline – at least as long as there is value-add to practical experiences over AI “smarts”. The deep understanding needed is built around operational modeling, such as with BPM+ (BPMN/DMN/CMMN) and Value Stream Modeling (Value-generation), and knowing how best to capture the behaviors of AI in such models, making its role explicit rather than tacit. For example, work out how best to represent AI-enabled moments in an operational model that support automation without confusing (too much) business stakeholders. This can be done and taught.

Better understanding of the domain can come through use of knowledge graphs about the business, which AI and associated models should be built around. This should all be seen as just another thing about AI that BPM practitioners can get smarter about.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I have found this book a great primer for AI/ML, but there are plenty of books to read: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/knowledge-graphs-mayank-kejriwal/1137268183.

I have found this book to be a great primer on governance, but other books exist: https://www.amazon.com/AI-Algorithms-Mastering-Ethical-Compliance/dp/1634624564.

For operational modeling with BPMN, there is an abundance of options available that a simple Internet search will reveal (including one for the author of this very website). Fewer, if just focused on DMN, but that continues to be a hot one, so also too many to cite. Few for CMMN, but I still have hopes that that turns around. BPM+ is about the unification/integration across all three, and there are some options, and even an integrative exam that I and others helped craft. Advanced Value Stream Modeling remains criminally underserved, but I’m hoping to turn that around in the future too.

Regarding AI/ML, there is all sorts of material out there. AWS, whose Bedrock set of services present a strong foundation (but not for the noobies) in AI/ML, has a set of training options, and given the cloud vendors investment here should be considered: https://aws.amazon.com/ai/learn/.

For a more contextual and philosophical take, I’ll plug something from an early source of BPM inspiration for me, Tom Koulopoulos, that he recently started (though I have yet to take) and a book from him and my long-time friend, mentor, boss, and collaborator Nathaniel Palmer: The Future of AI: Humanity’s Next Frontier and https://www.amazon.com/Gigatrends-Forces-Changing-Future-Billions/dp/1637589808.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

AI is rendering the background technical architecture for accessing data and application logic increasingly like a utility that one knows is there but doesn’t have to know too much about to use – think about how you don’t need to understand too much about electricity to use it in one’s household. As an example of this, note that one of the things that BPM technologies still have a lot to say about is service orchestration, but model context protocol (MCP) is moving to claim that space.

Deep technical knowledge may be receding in importance, but deep understanding of how things work remains key. I hope that strong – and especially domain-specific – understanding of how things work and can be improved for processes remains just as vital as it has for decades. I see in this a parallel with data science, which is more about understanding the meaning of data and the patterns therein than about where it resides and how to access it.

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Scott Francis

Scott Francis is President of Westslope Advisors, providing advisory and board services to growing and scaling firms and sharing what he’s learned from 30 years in Technology. Scott formerly led BP3 Global, Inc, and held senior roles at Lombardi Software and Trilogy Software. You can find his writings on Substack and Medium.

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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

A major impact of AI has been to slow budget spend on everything that isn’t “AI”. I highly recommend rebranding and reframing your process work as critical AI work. Organizations that try to manage and run their processes with AI today will have serious issues with hallucinations and inconsistencies, which are unacceptable for businesses. We do not expect calculators to be right 85% of the time. They are right 100% of the time, or we don’t use them. Generative AI asks us to lower our standards for what constitutes successful automation – but that error rate will lead to either bad business outcomes, or inordinate spending on “fixing” the AI results. Neither is acceptable.

What does work, is letting your processes manage AI. You use AI in the context of a business process with all of its inputs, outputs, and process flow context. You put AI algorithms into processes the same way. This gives you the scaffolding to make AI a productive and useful part of the systems that participate in your processes. AI is not a substitute for understanding your business processes and operational processes. AI is not a substitute for designing them, though you may well consult with AI tools on how to design them, and how to improve them.

Harking back to BPM the third wave: first, there’s the process instance and how you execute it (think, a single order). Second, there’s another dimension that is the collection of all the process instances of that process, and how they are managed collectively (think, all orders being processed). Third, there’s the dimension that is evaluating and improving the process definition for the future, based on what you are learning from the work that is happening now and in the past. AI can play a role in each.

In the first, it is subsidiary to the process instance and should be controlled by the process definition. In the second, AI can help identify problematic instances (orders for example), or highlight trends, or offer advice in response to queries from a manager for example, with respect to load management or likely risk. In the third, AI can provide advice on improving the process definition for the future based on past results.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

The traditional skills, techniques, behaviors and attitudes will continue to provide value in 2026. In fact, if you exhibit those values, you may find yourself an increasingly rare commodity. My advice is to continue to focus on designing for humans in the business – AI and process, when done right, greatly improve the human experience and customer experience in a business.

Another skill that is incredibly important in today’s world: the ability to estimate when an AI-focused project or program will complete. As an industry, many tech executives and IT executives have lost the ability to estimate when AI is involved, because it doesn’t follow the old rules for estimation in software. I’ wrote a whole post about this here: https://sfrancisatx.substack.com/p/we-are-terrible-at-estimating-progress Because I think this is a real challenge to many companies and executives, I recommend really working on how to estimate and when a good estimate is not possible. It’s a long read, but hopefully worth it.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I can recommend two great resources:
1. Enterprise Process Orchestration – this is the book I wish I had written, and that I would recommend to every single BPM practitioner, and every single person who cares about process orchestration. https://www.amazon.com/Enterprise-Process-Orchestration-Hands-Technology/dp/1394309678 – by Berndt Rücker and Leon Strauch.

2. Irresistible Change, by Phil Gilbert https://www.amazon.com/Irresistible-Change-Blueprint-Buy-Breakout/dp/1394367759/. One of the main reasons we do this work is because we are effecting change within large organizations with complex processes. Phil gives here the how-to on making change – at scale – irresistible. It’s an amazing read.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Vibe coding. You can vibe code one-off utilities and single use programs. But if you vibe code ATM Clearing transactions, bad things will happen. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t use AI assistants for coding, validating code, understanding code. But don’t confuse vibe coding with professional software development, with production use in mind.

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Ian Gotts

Ian Gotts. Speaker : Analyst : Advisor 

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Business Analysis 2026: Why Domain Expertise is Your New Superpower

TL;DR

By 2026, we’ll have crossed the Carbon-Silicon Divide and the Business Analyst role will have bifurcated. Artificial Intelligence will automate the “mechanics” of analysis—mapping, documentation, and basic requirements gathering. This leaves the human BA with a binary choice: become a deep domain expert who directs the AI, or face irrelevance.

The rise of “vibe coding” and autonomous agents means building solutions is faster than ever. But speed without direction is just chaos accelerated. The future belongs to those who can provide the precise context, nuance, and industry expertise that AI lacks. That is the critical thinking that great Business Analysts provide, in teh context of the deep domain expertise.

Crossing the Carbon-Silicon Divide

For over two decades, the holy grail of Business Analysis was to capture a process and have the application generate automatically. We tried utilizing standards like UML and BPMN, but they largely failed for one reason: we were forced to describe business in terms computers understood—”silicon”. To make the logic executable, the resulting diagrams had to be so dense, rigid, and complex that often only their creators could decipher them .

AI has finally shattered that barrier. We no longer need to learn the syntax of the machine; the machine has learned ours. We can now describe business needs in natural language—”carbon”—and trust the AI to handle the translation into code and logic. As noted in my Forbes article “Silicon Vs. Carbon: Finally, Computers Are Speaking Our Language“, this doesn’t absolve us of critical thinking; much like delegating to a skilled intern, we must still be specific and clear about what we want. But the friction is gone. We have finally crossed the carbon-silicon divide, moving from a world where we serve the syntax to one where the syntax serves us.

The “Vibe Coding” Trap

We are entering the era of “vibe coding,” where anyone with an idea can describe it in natural language, and an AI will generate the code. While many current examples are prototypes, the trajectory is undeniable. The barrier to building software is collapsing.

However, the determining factor in the quality of these apps is no longer coding skill—it is the quality of the description. In the old world, a human developer might push back if a specification didn’t make sense or lacked organizational context. An AI vibe coding platform will not. It will build exactly what you asked for, errors and all.

This shines a harsh spotlight on the quality of Business Analysis.

• The stakes are higher: If you describe a flawed process, you get a flawed app instantly.
• Requirements are critical: You must “bottom out” the specification. What are the specific business processes? What is the data model?
• Architecture matters: If the app is destined for production, who is considering scaling, maintenance, and compliance?

As application generation becomes effortless, the rigor of the analysis becomes the only safety net.

Programming with English: The Rise of Agents

We are already managing a digital workforce. At Elements.cloud, we have deployed agents to support teams in every department. They have employee records, formal onboarding, and scheduled reviews. They aren’t replacing people; they are liberating them.

Take “Fin,” our support agent. Fin is now answering 90% of inbound customer questions accurately. For the 10% it cannot answer, it passes them to a human support team with a full analysis already complete. Furthermore, our internal “case to bug” agent has reduced resolution time from 23 days to 5, increasing documentation quality from 0.8/10 to 9/10.

But here is the catch: Agents are literal. An agent has limited common sense and zero organizational intuition. It will read a 200-page policy document in seconds and execute instructions precisely. If those instructions (your business processes) are loose, ambiguous, or rely on “tribal knowledge,” the agent will fail .

The ability to “agentify” an organization relies entirely on the quality of your process documentation .

• Process as Code: You are essentially programming with natural language .
• The Detail Gap: Humans cover up gaps in bad processes with workarounds. Agents do not.
• Documentation: If your agents are unreliable, it is almost always a failure of business analysis, not the technology.

The Death of the Generalist

We have built a Business Analysis (BA) Agent. It is impressive. It can interview stakeholders, identify missing steps, suggest improvements, and draw the process diagram automatically . It leverages the collective knowledge of Large Language Models (LLMs) which have “read” about every industry on earth.

So, what is the future of the human Business Analyst if an agent can do the heavy lifting in a week?

The answer is deep domain expertise.

The “A” in AI stands for Augment. A BA Agent is only as good as the context it is fed. If you ask it to define a field service process for upstream oil and gas, it will give you a technically correct, generic answer. But it won’t know the specific compliance nuances of your geography, your company’s specific operating model, or the political landscape of your stakeholders.

• The Generalist’s Risk: If you are a generalist BA who simply transcribes what people tell you into diagrams, you are at risk. An agent can do that faster and cheaper. When asked your ara of expertise, it cannot be “Oil and Gas”. THat is too broad. “Downstream Oil and Gas” whilst narrower is again is huge domain. “Filed Service for downstream Oil and Gas” is a tighter area, but still has a huge scope.
• The Expert’s Opportunity: If you are a domain expert, AI makes you the smartest person in the room. You can use the agent to handle the drudgery—drafting, mapping, checking for consistency—allowing you to focus on high-value strategy and complex problem solving. So take time to assess your experience to pinpoint your area of expertise and work out how to deepen that.

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Paul Holmes-Higgin

Dr Paul Holmes-Higgin, Fellow and co-founder of Flowable. Previously, as co-founder and CPO of Alfresco. Paul brought Activiti to the fore of the company’s innovation. A long-time Open Source advocate, he believes it has an important role to play in making today’s innovation more widely available. His PhD and background in AI gives him a deep understanding of the opportunities and realities of Machine Learning. Paul sees innovation around the standard models of BPM as the best way to bring together his passions for human-centred software and intelligent automation in today’s highly dynamic business and social environment.

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Joram Barrez

Joram Barrez is a Business Process Management and open-source expert, working as a principal software architect at Flowable. With over fifteen years of real-world BPM experience, Joram is known for his contributions to the field, constantly pushing the boundaries of innovation and efficiency. He’s one of the founders of the Flowable open-source project and Activiti before that, and has worked on JBoss jBPM early on in his career. Throughout the years, Joram has worked with numerous global companies, helping them optimize their processes and drive digital transformation.

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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

[PHH] Are there any other trends apart from generative AI? I think the “introducing AI with guardrails” trend in BPM is now dated, but what modern BPMs have always been doing is showing up as things get real with AI. That is, managing business processes that interact with external services, mixed with human interaction; all auditable and secure.

The automation focus is now far more on declarative, agentic behavior, rather than procedural flows for business solutions.

[JB] Agreed. I’m a big believer of declarative approaches. Instead of trying to map every possible path upfront, we can now describe the problem and let an AI agent determine the steps to reach a solution. In enterprise settings, though, it only really works with strong governance in place: clear boundaries, auditability, and explicit rules around what an agent is allowed to decide on its own.

That’s why I see context engineering as the real differentiator going forward. In many ways, this is not new to BPM. We’ve been doing it for years through processes, and even more through case management. The goal has always been the same: make sure the right information reaches the right person or system at the right time. Each interaction adds context, which then drives the next action, whether human or automated.

[PHH] One other trend is the build v. buy software selection decision changing to AI code-generated prototype solutions, before even thinking about a vendor. Liberal open source BPMs (Apache, MIT-licensed etc) are freely available libraries for AIs to exploit, but they can grow into full-strength enterprise platform use once the business solution has been proven.

[JB] Another way to look at this is to ask a simple question: what are the foundational building blocks for the next generation of intelligent automation? For me, processes, cases, workflows or whatever you name it (and the APIs that expose and interact with them) sit right at the center. They provide the structure AI agents need to operate effectively and safely inside an enterprise.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

[JB] Building on what I just said, declarative thinking will only become more important. At the same time, the fundamental skills that have always defined BPM practitioners remain crucial, arguably more so than ever. Making sure solutions meet data security standards, governance policies, and regulatory requirements is non-negotiable today. And with new players entering the field, that challenge is only getting tougher.

[PHH] I really think we should change the mindset, so that BPM means Business Problem Management, to avoid the easy oversimplification that everything is a sequential, procedural process. A business process is about getting an outcome from an initial situation. What happens in between is a blend of machine and human intelligence with repeatable best practice. BPMN, DMN and CMMN all have a role to play in this.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

[PHH] Get your hands dirty and try things out, because the technology is moving too fast for books or courses – even an online resource will be out of date at depth. Download the open source or trial versions of BPM platforms and use AI-generated BPM standard models to see how agentic solutions can work today. To learn CMMN through a book, Bruce Silver’s “CMMN Method and Style” is your best option.

[JB] Absolutely. We’re very much in an experimentation phase. Best practices are evolving so rapidly that what we write today can become outdated tomorrow. As you say, the most effective way to stay ahead is by actively experimenting with the capabilities and understanding what works in practice. On that note, I couldn’t agree more about CMMN: the evaluation-cycle approach in “case” management fits perfectly with agentic ways of working. It’s a natural match: structured flexibility that balances control with flexibility.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

[JB] One side-effect of generative AI is that people are reading less, relying on AI to summarize and extract key information quickly. When I started in BPM a long time ago, a big part of my work was process discovery: interviewing stakeholders, summarizing their intents, finding gaps to automate and sketching back-of-the-napkin diagrams. The essence of that work won’t disappear, but with today’s tools, how that information is gathered and processed is changing very fast.

Similarly, some technical skills are becoming less central. Early in my career, we crafted XML by hand; later, visual modeling made syntax less of a worry. Today, we can interact with models directly, applying changes or querying them via AI, without knowing every detail. The focus is shifting from mastering mechanics to orchestrating strategically and understanding how models drive real outcomes.

[PHH] Just don’t expect AI-generated BPM models to be production ready! I could be controversial and say not to spend time on RPA if you aren’t already committed to it: AI-generated code will do the same.

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Caspar Jans

Caspar is a seasoned BPM professional with 25 years of experience in various industries. From managing a center of excellence on BPM for a global manufacturing company, hosting a podcast on BPM and consulting large enterprises on the benefits of a process centric approach to being a Principal BPM Expert for Celonis, Caspar has been on both sides of the table on process management (and more). On top of that, Caspar is listed in the PEX Network Global Top 25 though leaders on Operational Excellence.

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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

With the introduction of AI also came the realization that your business processes actually provide the necessary alignment and guard rails for AI to be successful within. Without this, AI tends to spin out of control. The developments on the AI front are going so fast that the usual governance concepts can’t keep up and in order to offset that, a proper process landscape (connected to roles, applications, input/outputs and more) is vital. So, there seems to be a revived interest in how to efficiently and effectively document processes, not just for the sake of documenting them, but for the sake of being able to also orchestrate and automate them (either via automation platforms or AI).

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

The BPM practitioner has to become much more allround compared to the last decade. Just being knowledgeable on how to model and govern processes will simply not be sufficient anymore. BPM practitioners will need at least basic understanding on topics like orchestration, automation, AI and maybe even the most important one: human psychology, because after all, if you want to implement successful change within an organization, you will have influence people rather than software or hardware. Being an avid communicator will help the BPM practitioner to more eloquently explain why having a governed and up to date process landscape is vital for all of the AI use cases.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

For the more general background on BPM I would suggest the youtube channel of Roger Tregear (the Australian BPM guru) or season 1 of the BPM360 podcast (explaining the 4 key success criteria for BPM implementations in great detail). Also the book on “influence” by Robert Cialdini is a recommendable book (for the human behavioral part).

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Given the emergence of AI assistants in BPM, the modeling skill has become less relevant (in terms of: you don’t need that many modelers anymore and their work emphasis changes a bit from creating to validating process documentation). The model to execute skill (so the ability to model a process and then ingest it straight into an execution engine) is emerging but not yet critical to master for now.

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Dr. Mathias Kirchmer

Dr. Kirchmer is an experienced practitioner and thought leader in the field of Business Process Management (BPM) and Digital Transformation. He is Managing Director of Scheer Americas, previously BPM-D US. He co-founded BPM-D, a consulting company focusing on performance improvements and appropriate digitalization by establishing and applying the discipline of BPM. Before he was Managing Director and Global Lead of BPM at Accenture, and CEO of the Americas and Japan of IDS Scheer, known for its process modelling software and process consulting.

Dr. Kirchmer has led numerous transformation and process improvement initiatives in various industries at clients around the world. He has published 11 books and over 150 articles. At the University of Pennsylvania and at Widener University he has served as affiliated faculty for over 20 years. He received a research and teaching fellowship from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.

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Twitter: @mtki2006

How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

Business Process Management (BPM) has become the management discipline that moves strategy into people and technology-based execution, fast and reliably. It creates the transparency necessary to take fast well-informed decisions and implement the related actions effectively. This transparency is the foundation of success in the digital age. The discipline of BPM helps to align business and technology aspects towards the goals of an organization to create the expected value.

Most process improvement initiatives must leverage digital technologies to achieve the desired agility, flexibility, innovation and efficiency. Realizing the business potential of those digital technologies has become a key role of BPM, delivering process-led digital transformation. This includes the identification of the improvement opportunities through AI. The visibility BPM provides helps to identify systematically where AI helps to enhance the end-to-end performance of business processes.

With Agentic AI, the role of BPM continues to evolve. Intelligent agents create process instances more and more independently, with little to no human intervention. Therefore, BPM shifts its focus from the design of operational processes to defining their deliverables and performance levels. Related data requirements are crucial and need to be addressed through the BPM-Discipline. Governance and management process become increasingly more significant.

BPM provides the “process of process management” integrating and aligning process, data and AI governance to provide the necessary control and rapid adjustment of the highly automated business processes. BPM moves from addressing mainly the design and implementation of operational processes to delivering appropriate management and governance processes.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

BPM Practitioners need to focus increasingly on delivering process-led digital transformation through appropriate standardization, optimization and innovation of processes. They organize the required management and governance processes, integrating process, data and AI requirements through the definition of a company specific “process of process management”, realizing value and driving the ongoing transformation journey. Therefore, BPM Practitioners need to understand both the business aspects of processes and the effects of digital technologies that support these processes. BPM Practitioners need to know how to create and apply related assets, such as software-based process reference models.

Process standardization remains an important topic since it simplifies digital transformation and makes it more efficient. BPM Practitioners need to develop related skills, such as the definition of the right degree of abstraction and detail for a specific standardization initiative or the appropriate leverage of process reference models.

Not all processes are equal. BPM Practitioners need to identify the 10-15% high impact processes for sophisticated innovation and optimization initiatives. Commodity processes are improved by applying industry common practices to reach an average performance level. Sophisticated optimization doesn’t pay off here. BPM Practitioners need to be able to apply process impact and maturity assessments to achieve the required process segmentation.

The role in digital transformation requires the handling of related data aspects. Developing logical data models and simplifying those to enable nimble processes as well as supporting applications becomes an important skill. The design of appropriate data management processes becomes another important task.

The high degree of automation allows the collection of related data. This enables the use of “digital twins” to manage processes more effectively. BPM Practitioners help to develop and apply those digital twins.

The BPM-Discipline goes through a digital transformation itself. The integrated use of BPM tools, such as modelling, mining and automation tools, leveraging AI, becomes an important success factor. BPM Practitioners need to drive this transformation of BPM.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Specialized consulting and education organizations offer training and eLearning addressing those skills, such as Scheer with its academy and publications (www.scheer-americas.com). Industry organizations, like APQC (www.apqc.org), ABPMP (www.abpmp.org) or the BPM Institute (www.bpminstitute.org), provide related resources. Forward thinking universities and research organizations address related topics, for example the August-Wilhelm Scheer Institute for Digital Processes and Products (www.aws-institut.de), the Scheer School for Digital Sciences (Scheer School of Digital Sciences – Saarbrücken – Scheer School of Digital Sciences at Saarland University), Widener University with its master program for Digital Transformation (www.widener.edu) or the University of Pennsylvania (www.upenn.edu).

Here are some related readings that may help:
• Scheer, A.-W.: Digitale Industrie: Daten – Prozesse – Metaverse. New York, Berlin, e.a. 2025 (English version to follow in 2026).
• Scheer, A.-W.: The Composable Enterprise: Agile, Flexible and Innovative – A Gamechanger for Organizations, Digitalization and Business Software. 4th ed., New York, Berlin, e.a. 2023.
• Kirchmer, M., Havaligi, S.: Realizing the full Potential of AI Applications through Business Process Management. In: Shishkov B. (ed): Business Modeling and Software Design. BMSD 2025. Lecture Notes in Business Information Processing, vol 559 (ISBN: 978-3-031-98032-9). Springer, 2025.
• Kirchmer, M.: Process-led Digital Transformation – Mastering the Journey towards the Composable Enterprise. In: Shishkov B. (ed): Business Modeling and Software Design. BMSD 2024. Lecture Notes in Business Information Processing, vol 523 (ISBN: 978-3-031-64072-8). Springer, 2024.
• Wilson, H.J, Daugherty, P.R.: Generative AI – The Secret to Successful AI-driven Process Redesign. In: Harvard Business Review, January-February 2025.
• Kirchmer, M.: High Performance through Business Process Management – Strategy Execution in a Digital World. 3rd ed., New York, Berlin, e.a. 2017.
• Franz, P., Kirchmer, M.: Value-driven Business Process Management – The Value-Switch for Lasting Competitive Advantage. New York, 2012.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Traditional improvement approaches that do not address the alignment of business and information technology or do not leverage digital technologies as appropriate to enhance processes will no longer be successful. Every transformation is related to some degree of digital transformation.

General principles of process improvement as applied in approaches like Lean, Six Sigma or Kaizen remain true and useful. But to stay relevant they must be upgraded, leveraging modern digital process management capabilities, such as mining or modelling tools.

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Mirko Kloppenburg

Hi, I’m Mirko. I’m living in Hamburg, Germany, with my wife and our two daughters. For more than 20 years, I’ve been working in Business Process Management – starting in large, complex organizations and today helping companies build truly process-driven organizations.

I’m creator of the New Process approach and founder of NewProcessLab.com, where I combine BPM, New Work, and experience design into a human-centric approach to process management. My focus is on BPM as a leadership and management capability: creating clarity, enabling people, and turning strategy into action through processes.

I host the New Process Podcast, where I share real-world BPM experiences, frameworks, and conversations with practitioners from around the world.

WWW: NewProcessLab.com
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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

AI is fundamentally changing how work is executed – but not why work exists.

In many organizations, AI is currently introduced as a technology initiative. New models, agents, and tools promise efficiency and autonomy. At the same time, we see many AI initiatives struggling or failing because underlying processes are unclear, fragmented, or not owned by anyone.

This is where BPM becomes more important than ever.

In an increasingly unpredictable environment – with volatile supply chains, geopolitical shifts, and rapid technological change – organizations need orientation, clarity, and adaptability. BPM provides exactly that by making value creation explicit end-to-end, clarifying responsibilities, and creating a shared understanding of how work actually gets done.

AI will automate decisions, generate content, and execute tasks. But BPM must ensure that:
– processes are meaningful and aligned with strategy,
– humans remain accountable for outcomes,
– and AI is embedded intentionally into workflows, not layered on top of confusion.

I see BPM evolving from a discipline focused on optimization to a management capability that enables learning, resilience, and informed decision-making in an AI-enabled world.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

To stay relevant in 2026, BPM practitioners must shift from being process experts to becoming process enablers and sense-makers.

From my perspective, four capability areas matter most:

1. Strategic positioning of BPM: BPM practitioners must be able to connect purpose, strategy, and processes. This includes articulating why BPM matters, what impact it creates, and how it contributes to business strategy in times of uncertainty.

2. Implementing pragmatic BPM frameworks: Instead of heavyweight governance, organizations need lightweight, usable BPM frameworks that provide orientation without bureaucracy. This includes clear process architectures, meaningful communication, and well-defined roles such as Process Owners as real leadership roles.

3. Enabling people, not controlling them: The ability to inspire people for processes, facilitate dialogue, and build a process culture is becoming a core skill. BPM only creates value if people understand, accept, and actively shape their processes.

4. Applying AI with intention: BPM practitioners don’t need to become AI engineers. But they must understand where deterministic automation, GenAI, AI agents, or human decision-making are appropriate – and where they are not. The key skill is judgment, not tool mastery.

Underlying all of this is a mindset shift: from “designing processes” to continuously enabling organizations to learn and adapt through processes.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I believe BPM skills are best developed where practice, reflection, and exchange come together.

Peer communities and practitioner exchange are extremely valuable, because they surface real-world challenges and patterns beyond theory. For example, New Process Pro is a free community where BPM practitioners share experiences, discuss frameworks, and reflect on what it really takes to build process-driven organizations.

Structured learning formats can help to create orientation, especially for practitioners who want to position BPM more strategically. A good starting point is a concise BPM roadmap that connects strategy, processes, and people – before diving into methods or tools.

Curated content such as podcasts, blogs, and BPM platforms helps to stay connected to the broader BPM discourse and emerging perspectives.

Most importantly, learning happens through application: facilitating workshops, coaching Process Owners, experimenting with BPM frameworks, and reflecting on what actually creates impact in a specific organizational context.

Examples mentioned above:
New Process Pro Community: https://www.newprocesslab.com/pro
BPM Roadmap Mini Course: https://www.newprocesslab.com/roadmap

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

No BPM skill is irrelevant per se – relevance always depends on purpose and context.

That said, I currently see a strong overemphasis on tools and technology compared to foundational capabilities.

Highly detailed process modeling, tool-driven BPM initiatives, or AI-first approaches often create activity without impact when organizations lack clarity about:
– their end-to-end processes,
– process responsibilities,
– and purpose.

Similarly, fully autonomous, self-optimizing process visions are still largely aspirational for most organizations. Without a strong process culture and clear accountability, they remain more hype than reality.

What is often underestimated – and still underdeveloped – are skills related to leadership, facilitation, sense-making, and cultural change. In 2026, these will differentiate BPM practitioners far more than technical specialization.

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Harald Kühn

Dr. Harald Kühn is a member of the management board of the BOC AG. He is responsible for the product management and the related strategic aspects of BOC’s ADONIS and ADOIT product portfolio. Dr. Harald Kühn works in the areas of BPM, EA, their integration and the usage of innovative technologies in these domains.
He is an author of over 20 publications about various aspects of BPM.

WWW: boc-group.com
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Twitter: @BOC_Group

How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

If you provide this question to the ChatBots of the big players (see question 3), you already get very good answers with various perspectives on the related impact. No need to repeat the answers here.

Independent of that, I personally see three concrete impacts:

• In the near future, human work processes will be primarily influenced by AI-based technology for “knowledge-related tasks” (white-collar tasks) such as writing, analyzing, summarizing, researching, planning, programming, testing, conceptualizing, managing etc. For the next 3-5 years I do not see a major impact on “manual tasks” (blue-collar tasks) of human work processes such as repairing of physical things, construction, outdoor services, maintenance activities, nursing services etc. The latter might change with the upcoming wave of AI-based robotics.
• In the domain of “knowledge-related tasks” I see intensive usage of AI-based technology within all kind of tasks. This leads to a distinctive productivity boost for “knowledge-related tasks”, but not a complete replacement of such tasks by AI. As a result, the nature of human work will continuously change from “do-ing” to “govern-ing”.
• In the domain of “machine-based processes” or “automated processes” I see a clear trend to extend the automation domain from pre-defined or rule-based execution to agentic execution. The domain of agentic AI is still in an early maturity level, but the evolution speed rapidly accelerates (https://aaif.io/).

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

To be honest, actually I do not see big differences between 2025 and 2026 on this topic. But it might be even more important to focus on speed to deliver value and results quickly as just having an eye on costs and short-term profitability.

1. Continuous Learning: As the work environment, used technologies, practices, methodologies etc. are continuously changing, the learning process must do so as well. Continuous learning involves the persistent broadening of knowledge and abilities. Within the realm of workplace professional development, it focuses on acquiring new competencies and insights, as well as reinforcing previously acquired skills and knowledge.
2. Practical Engagement with AI-based Tools: To successfully integrate AI with its different flavors such as Machine Learning, GenAI, Agentic AI etc. into BPM, practitioners in 2026 must prioritize continuous learning. This includes formal training, up-to-date online courses, and participation in global industry events tailored to AI advancements. Hands-on experience remains vital – through pilot projects, close collaboration with technology teams, and practical applications such as designing contextualized prompts or applying domain-specific models. Particular emphasis should be placed on addressing modern challenges like information security, data privacy, and the ethical use of company data in conjunction with public GenAI and/or Agentic AI services. Furthermore, staying actively connected with the BPM and AI communities is critical. Engaging in professional forums, participating in discussions on cutting-edge case studies, and networking with experts will ensure practitioners remain informed about the latest trends, tools, and best practices shaping the field in 2026.
3. Use of Conceptual Modelling: The intensified use of multi-perspective conceptual modeling continues, incorporating sustainability, customer journeys, digital ecosystems, and value streams into cohesive BPM methodologies. This is accompanied by using a mix of different design, analysis and data-science techniques.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

A very valuable resource is of course Zbigniew’s recent co-authored book :
Practical Business Process Modeling and Analysis: Design and optimize business processes incrementally for AI transformation using BPMN

In general, I heavily recommend to use ChatBots as “interactive learning companions”. Especially if you use various of them in a combined way. They already reached a reasonable mature state including the possibility to guide you to trustful information sources during your “learning dialog” or to use their agentic features for powerful research. Very good examples are Le Chat by Mistral (https://chat.mistral.ai/chat), Gemini by Google (https://gemini.google.com/app), ChatGPT by OpenAI (https://chatgpt.com/), Copilot by Microsoft (https://copilot.microsoft.com/), Claude by Anthropic (https://www.anthropic.com/claude) or Perplexity AI (https://www.perplexity.ai/).

Books on Conceptual Modelling:
Domain-Specific Conceptual Modeling (Part 1): Concepts, Methods and Tools,

Domain-Specific Conceptual Modeling (Part 2): Concepts, Methods and ADOxx Tools,

Domain-Specific Conceptual Modeling (Part 3): The OMiLAB Community of Practice,

Metamodeling: Applications and Trajectories to the Future.

Free Conceptual Modelling Tools:
Library of more than 80 OMiLAB Modelling Tools,

ADONIS Community Edition,

ADOIT Community Edition,

ADONIS Academy Programme,

ADOIT Academy Programme

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Any knowledge and experiences gathered in the past will influence decisions for the future. Therefore, even if specific skills, techniques or technologies are not really relevant any more, they are important to evaluate, decide on and apply new upcoming approaches.

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Prof. dr. Amy Van Looy

Prof. dr. Amy Van Looy holds a Ph.D. in applied economics. Before entering academia, she worked as an IT consultant. Being an associate professor at Ghent University, she coordinates the research cluster of “Process orientation” at the Department of Business Informatics and Operations Management. She teaches, among others, courses on research methods, process management, technology innovation and social media. Amy Van Looy is the recipient of the “Highest Award for Achievement” at the Dale Carnegie Consulting Program in 2007, the “Award for Best Contribution” at the OnTheMove Academy in 2010, the faculty’s “PhD Tutor Award” in 2022, as well as paper nominations (e.g., BPM2018, HICSS2025) and paper rewards (e.g., BPM2019). She was nominated in the top-10 for “Young ICT Lady of the year 2014” by the Belgian magazine DataNews, and was recognized as a tech role model by the non-profit “InspiringFifty Belgium” in 2020 (i.e., for being one of Belgium’s 50 most inspiring women in technology).

WWW: https://www.amyvanlooy.eu/
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X: AmyVanLooy

How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

The biggest 2026 trend affecting how organizations are looking at their business processes is definitely related to generative artificial intelligence (genAI), including all its variants, tools, and (potential) realizations. It is true that AI in general has already been frequently mentioned in the past years as a dominant technology to support and rethink business processes (e.g., by software robots such as robotic process automation and chatbots as well by physical manufacturing robots and service robots). And this AI wave will continue to evolve, but now being specifically expanded with genAI.

Especially the rapid pace and new possibilities offered by genAI increasingly raise questions on how to properly take advantage of the wide range of more novel, widespread and accessible genAI opportunities. Of course, this also come with the need for a more critical attitude toward genAI use, which I still consider as a major challenge for organizations and society at large. For instance, genAI can be positively supporting routine tasks and beyond, while also security and ethical concerns need to be more carefully addressed. For instance, examples are related to underlying copyright issues and hallucination problems with fake information. Nevertheless, I am sure that 2026 will bring new avenues to further explore how genAI can be used for facilitating all kinds of BPM activities in a more trusted and fair manner, among others during process modelling, process execution and process optimization.

Additionally, instead of seeing genAI as taking over human tasks or human roles, a more strategic approach is required to use genAI for the better. By this, I mean using genAI for dealing with internal and external pressures that come, among others, from pressures surrounding burnouts, work overload problems, social and green sustainability, customer centricity, and agility needs. Besides strategic alignment for genAI, also business-IT alignment issues remain critical.

Hence, the AI trends in general and genAI in particular demonstrate once more that the BPM discipline is not just a technical discipline but also a true managerial discipline that needs a holistic lens by extending the traditional BPM lifecycle with managerial, cultural and structural features to obtain long-term process performance outcomes.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

Thinking in terms of end-to-end value streams (instead of ad-hoc projects or siloed functional views per department) will remain highly important in 2026. By this, I mean putting the end customers first, and then exploring what business opportunities appear based on using digital technologies. While customer thinking is not necessarily new to 2026 (also in earlier years), much stronger employee-related skills will be needed to explore such business process opportunities because this contrasts from incremental process changes. Instead, upgrading skills related to out-of-the-box thinking, co-creation, ecosystem thinking, and experimentation with trial-and-error will increase much more in importance for creating business value to organizations.

Also, this value thinking needs to be further extended beyond purely financial or economic value (e.g., not just in terms of process costs, time, quality, flexibility). Instead, value thinking also need reconsidering the ecological footprints of specific business processes and the related social implications for obtaining a more responsible way of applying BPM. In this regard, AI algorithms are not necessarily fair and could be biased towards certain majority views. Also in decision-making, AI decision support mechanisms are not necessarily transparent and genAI features still have a high risk of hallucinations and so providing fake information. Consequently, a critical eye on using BPM for the good, will only increase in importance in 2026. This applies to everyone involved in BPM, namely BPM users, analysts, developers and employees in general will substantially benefit from a more open though critical view on how to explore those technology-based process opportunities.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Since genAI and other digital technologies are evolving, it remains important for organizations to stay up-to-date about recent developments in the digital landscape and which BPM implications are related. For instance, managers and employees can attend seminars, conferences and even look for collaborations with universities (e.g., for participating in case study research or action-based research). Managers can also inform themselves about BPM updates by talking to consultants, especially since their own company’s core competence might not necessarily be in BPM and digital technologies. This way of working also aligns with the idea of ecosystem thinking, namely partnering with other companies and universities to find synergies and co-creation options.

Furthermore, managers and employees might follow Master university classes (e.g., as a kind of credit contract system) on the advanced and/or emerging topics of BPM, process mining and process innovation. Just one example is a practitioner-oriented Springer handbook that explains how organizations can improve their business processes based on agile projects by taking advantage of digital technologies, and which is also used as university teaching materials with a lot of practical cases (https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-59770-1).

Additionally, the annual International Business Process Management Conference will be organized in Toronto this year, and which I highly recommend for your October planning. This conference offers a broad range of workshops, fora, panels, presentations, etc. Such a conference is also a nice way for networking and getting in touch with BPM scholars and industry professionals.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

The BPM skills of, let us say 20 or 30 years ago, are still relevant nowadays to exploit daily business. It is rather a matter of extending them with more explorative skills for also thinking in terms of innovating business processes in an agile manner. The underlying idea of process modelling, monitoring and optimization is still needed, and will remain valid. This means that the BPM lifecycle remains more or less the same, though requiring faster iterations in particular. While process execution used to be with software-specific BPM systems (or alternatively, ERP or SAP systems), those dedicated tools are now being extended towards more AI and genAI features by tool vendors. Hence, I consider those renewed skills and features not as opposing to or contradicting with conventional BPM skills, but rather as an organic evolution towards more ambidexterity for which the traditional exploitation of business processes remains valid while also keeping an eye on exploring new business opportunities and benefiting from digital technologies.

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Madison Lundquist

As Principal Research Lead, Madison Lundquist develops and executes APQC’s research agenda for process and performance management and serves as subject matter expert. She interviews leading organizations on their practices, identifies key findings from the research projects, and shares the approaches and best practices organizations use to manage processes, improve organizational agility, and continuously improve.

WWW: apqc.org/expertise/process-performance-management
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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

While the digital landscape is evolving rapidly, I don’t believe the fundamentals of BPM are changing all that much. If anything, having a strong foundation is becoming even more critical. The core essentials of process management remain consistent. Each year, when we ask process professionals about their priorities and challenges, the same themes continue to surface: process management, continuous improvement, and data and measurement. New technologies like AI, automation, and process mining can be powerful enablers, but they don’t replace the basics. In the end, people still run processes, and people don’t naturally love change—strong change management is what helps organizations move forward.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

Each year, APQC surveys process professionals to understand their priorities and challenges for the year ahead. This year’s data highlights three areas where change is most needed within the process discipline: technology and tools, a more collaborative culture, and stronger integration with IT. In my view, these areas are deeply interconnected, especially as the digital landscape continues to evolve. Process professionals increasingly recognize the need to work more closely with IT to successfully implement new tools and technologies, and that level of integration isn’t possible without a collaborative culture.

When we look more closely at the skills BPM practitioners need to develop, survey participants consistently point to design thinking, change management, and analytics as the most critical. Together, these skills help practitioners not only design better processes but also drive adoption and demonstrate value through data.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

APQC has a robust Resource Library that includes content critical to process management professionals, along with our training courses and webinars that help process professionals learn the necessary skills to be successful in an ever-changing business environment.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Looking at our survey data over the past several years, problem solving and data management/data visualization have declined in perceived importance. We’re also seeing facilitation and project management ranking lower for 2026, which I find surprising. Facilitation, in particular, remains a critical skill for process professionals—especially when the goal is to truly understand how work happens across the organization. Strong facilitation and project management skills are what enable teams to thoughtfully assess the current state, propose meaningful improvements, and successfully execute change.

I also believe data management and visualization are undervalued in this year’s results. As digital tools and technologies evolve rapidly, clean, well-managed data becomes even more essential. Underestimating the importance of data foundations could ultimately create challenges for organizations that don’t invest the time and attention these skills require.

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Prof. Dr. Jan Mendling

Prof. Dr. Jan Mendling is the Einstein-Professor for Process Science with the Department of Computer Science at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, adjunct professor at Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien, and Principal Investigator at the Weizenbaum Institute, Berlin. His research interests include various topics in the area of business process management and information systems. He is co-author of the textbooks Fundamentals of Business Process Management and Wirtschaftsinformatik. He has published more than 500 research papers and articles, among others in IEEE Transaction journals and MIS Quarterly. He is inaugural Co-Editor-in-Chief of Process Science and Co-Founder of Noreja, a tool vendor focusing on generative process intelligence.

WWW: LI profile

WWW: Personal website

WWW: Noreja website

How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

Best the organizational management of processes should dictate where which AI technology is used to make a substantial impact on the processes. But yes, AI functionality also improves and speeds up the way how we manage our processes. In noreja, we have integrated analytical support based on GenAI. Agentic functionality will be next. Autonomous agents will take care of tasks in the background and trigger actions where necessary.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

Companies need resilience more than ever. This requires building capabilities and having processes under control. The next crisis is just around the corner. Denial is the wrong response to it.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The Fundaments of Business Process Management capture all the core methods that have not changed. It is great to see that now translations are available in German, French, Greek, Indonesian, Mongolian, Persian, Polish, Spanish, Ukrainian and soon also Brazilian Portuguese and Italian. These translations make fundamental BPM concepts even more accessible. I am very grateful for those who took part in the translation teams.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

The Case Management Model and Notation is no more relevant. Among others, Camunda has marked their CMMN support as deprecated for a while. In contrast, agentic automation is on the rise in exactly this spot. Where CMMN was meant to address the underspecification of processes that humans should somehow fill, it is exactly here that agentic process automation can fill the gap.

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Nathaniel Palmer

Nathaniel Palmer is the CEO of Infocap AI Corp and the author of “Gigatrends” (2024) which recently reached #1 on Amazon’s “Hot New Releases” list for books on AI and Machine Learning. Rated as the “#1 Most Influential Thought Leader in Business Process Management (BPM)” by independent research, Nathaniel has also co-author over a dozen books on BPM and Process Improvement, as well as being the first individual named as a “Laureate in Workflow.” Over his career has he has the led the design and execution for some of the industry’s largest and most complex projects involving investments exceeding $200 Million and has overseen more than $2.5 billion in R&D around automation and AI.

WWW: www.infocap.ai
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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

Finally (!!) we are witnessing the inescapable yet fundamental shift from process as a static artifact to living, adaptive system.

For decades BPM was defined by documenting workflows, standardizing execution, and incrementally improving efficiency. The notion of adaptable, dynamic defined processed emerged as a first-class citizen within the BPM discipline in the late-2000s with Adaptable and Dynamic Case Management. Yet until now it was cast within the false dichotomy of Adaptability versus Automation – rather than embracing and enabling Adaptable Automation.

Today AI (notably Agentic AI) turns that notion on its head. Unlike Generative AI tools that provide answers or generate content, the newest wave of AI can act by executing tasks, collaborating with humans, and dynamically adapting to new challenges. “Agentic” or “Agent AI” moves beyond providing information to taking action, enabling processes which are no longer simply executed, but interpreted, optimized, and acted upon dynamically by digital workers operating, either with agency (autonomously) or working in concert with humans co-workers.

This present three significant changes in perspective on how changing how organizations manage and run processes.

First, work is moving from information → action. Generative AI was interesting when it produced answers. It becomes transformational when it executes multi-step workflows autonomously. That turns processes into decision-driven systems, not flowcharts.

Second, organizations are shifting from task automation to end-to-end orchestration. Intelligent automation now spans documents, decisions, integrations, compliance, and human collaboration—collapsing silos that BPM unintentionally reinforced for decades.

Third, trust becomes the limiting factor. Black-box AI fails in regulated, mission-critical environments. The future belongs to glass-box automation: observable, explainable, auditable systems grounded in operational excellence disciplines, not statistical mysticism.

In short, AI doesn’t replace or obviate process management, but rather hastens its need for successful business transformations, especially where AI adoption is deemed a key success factor.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

Most of all (and building on the points above) the BPM practitioner of 2026 is no longer a process modeler but rather the designer of human-machine collaboration. This true not just for human facing processes, but in understanding and leading the holistic orchestration of processes (or more apropos, attempting to holistically understand the process and moments of automation within your enterprise).

The new mission of BPM practitioners is make palpable and comprehendible to business stakeholders the re-envisioning the structure of the task to be not a single, discrete unit of work, but business outcomes, and to remove the distinction between what supports a task and the task itself – as well as who performs the work.

This is framed by making the work done by humans more consistent, predictable, and less reliant upon subjective interpretation of policies and rules, while simultaneously expanding the aperture for what is automatable, where digital workers and human workers use the same systems, follow the same rules, as well as are equally observable and accountable. Success requires a new set of critical skills and techniques than previously defined BPM as a discipline. These include:

• Decision Intelligence & Rule Design: the ability to externalize decisions from code and models into explicit, governed logic is foundational. If you can’t explain why a system acted, you don’t control it.
• Agent Orchestration & Digital Workforce Design: practitioners must design how AI agents, humans, and systems collaborate—who decides, who executes, who escalates.
• Operational Data Literacy: not data science, but knowing which data matters operationally, how it flows, and how it creates accountability.
• Process Observability & Metrics: AI without measurement is theater, not transformation.
• BPMN as an AI Orchestration Language: there are very individuals sufficiently knowledgeable of BPMN, DMN, and CMMN to use create useful models of agentic workflows which stand on their own, yet BPMN remains the closest thing to a true lingua franca for AI Orchestration.

Behaviors and attitudes that create value

• Skeptical optimism: excited about AI, intolerant of hype.
• Human-centric mindset: automation exists to amplify human capability, not obscure responsibility.
• Systems thinking: understanding second- and third-order impacts of automation across people, compliance, and culture.
• Governance-first thinking: designing control, transparency, and auditability from day one.

The practitioners who thrive will be those who can translate ambition into execution, rather than evangelizing a particular methodology or technology. Be a change agent and transformer, not an ideologue.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Books

• Gigatrends (Koulopoulos/Palmer, 2024): a foundational primer for understanding where work, identity, AI and automation are heading over the next decade and beyond.
• Decision Management Systems (Taylor/Raden) still one of the clearest foundations for understanding decision intelligence
• Business Process Management: A Rigorous Approach (Martyn A. Ould): still the single best source for understanding BPM as a discipline and as a learning foundation to build upon with contemporary concepts such as agentic AI.

Technical Learning Paths

• Python (if not already conversant, start your own learning path and explore frameworks such as Django, Flask, FastAPI, et al.)
• Decision intelligence and rules-based automation platforms
• Low-code / no-code workflow orchestration tools
• AI governance and compliance training (especially for regulated sectors)

The driving the learn path behind the modern BPM Practitioner should be learning how to operationalize AI, not how to demo it.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Some hard truths about skills that are no longer relevant or mostly hype:

• Pure process modeling without execution context: BPMN diagrams that never touch production systems are mostly irrelevant, and this is most of them (i.e., out of the sum total of process modeling artifacts only a small percent make it execution). Process modeling is not dwindling in value as much as it is becoming a lost art, but what will sustain it is the ability to create models as living artifacts, able to be linked to execution context.
• “Prompt engineering” as a standalone skill: useful tactically, but not a profession. Prompts don’t scale, but the key to success for a BPM Practitioner has always come down to the ability to ask the right questions. In the GenAI era this will often mean framing the right questions as prompts, but prompts are only as effective the questions they represent (however they are expressed).
• Black-box machine learning for core operations: if you can’t explain or audit it, you can’t deploy it responsibly at scale. All decisions and actions made through automation must be transparent, observable, and appealable.
• AI “ethics” without operational accountability: Ethical AI discussions disconnected from real workflows, controls, and metrics are well-intentioned but insufficient. Focusing on automated outcomes is more important than chasing model training bias.
• AI-powered Automation Without Modeling: The biggest hype of all is the belief that AI strategy can exist without operational excellence. It cannot. That gap is where most failures occur. Automating poorly designed processes is faster than process improvement, and can also be more effective when transparent and aligned to outcomes. The critical difference is not upfront re-engineering but continuous measurement and optimization.

AI doesn’t diminish the role of BPM. Raises it raises the bar and hastens the need for skill BPM professionals able to apply traditional methods to contemporary system design. The future belongs to practitioners who can design clarity in a world of increasing autonomy.

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Brian Reale

Brian Reale is a serial entrepreneur. Brian founded a telecommunications company in 2000 called Unete Telecomunicaciones which provided, voice, data, and satellite services in Latin America. Brian sold Unete to a publicly traded US telecom company in 2000. Brian was also the co-founder of Spotless LLC, an entertainment technology company that developed projection mapping technology for major live entertainment industries.

Brian has been involved in the workflow and BPM industry since he co-founded ProcessMaker in 2000. ProcessMaker is a leading open source BPM suite. The ProcessMaker BPMS has been recognized with numerous awards and pushes the bounds of BPM with a fundamental belief that process management can be simple, elegant, and easy to use.

Brian graduated magna cum laude from Duke University in 1993 and was awarded a Fulbright scholarship in linguistics in Ecuador in 1994.

WWW: https://www.processmaker.com
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Twitter: @breale
Twitter: @processmaker

How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

The fundamental shift for 2026 is the realization that Agentic AI is the natural evolution of Case Management. For decades, Case Management was the “exception” to the rule—the way we handled unstructured work that required human judgment. Now, the AI Agent has become the ultimate knowledge worker.

• From Deterministic to Intent-Driven: We are moving away from “Hard-coded Workflows.” Instead of a rigid path, we give an Agent a goal (the “Case”) and the boundaries (the “Governance”). The Agent then orchestrates the steps to reach that goal.
• The Orchestration Stack: We are seeing a “Layered Intelligence” approach. Organizations no longer rely on a single LLM. They use BPMN as the control plane to prevent “agent-to-agent” chaos (the digital equivalent of Chinese phone tag), DMN for cost-effective deterministic logic, and Agents to handle the “messy” middle of the work.
• The Death of the Static Interface: We are seeing the “disappearing UI.” Instead of users clicking through 10 screens in a portal, they are interacting with processes via natural language or voice. The process is becoming invisible, running in the background and only “surfacing” to a human when a judgment call is required.
• Process Intelligence as the Foundation: You cannot have effective AI without Process Intelligence (PI). Organizations are realizing that feeding an LLM their data isn’t enough; they need to feed it their operational context. PI acts as the digital twin that tells the AI exactly how work currently happens so the AI can actually improve it rather than just automate a broken step.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

The BPM practitioner of 2026 is less of a “Map Maker” and more of a “System Architect of Intent.”

• Skill: Governing Autonomy: You must learn how to design “BPMN Guardrails.” The skill is no longer just drawing a line from A to B; it’s defining the sandbox in which an AI Agent can safely operate without creating a feedback loop or a compliance nightmare.
• Technique: Hybrid Modeling (BPMN + DMN + LLM): Value is created by knowing which tool to use for which task. You use DMN for regulated, binary decisions to keep costs low and outcomes certain; you use BPMN to maintain the state machine; and you use Agents for everything that requires “understanding.”
• Attitude: Pragmatic Optimism: You must embrace the power of Agents to solve the “un-automatable,” but maintain a healthy skepticism regarding the “black box.” The best practitioners will be those who refuse to let agents manage agents without a structured BPMN “supervisor.”
• Skill: Prompt Engineering & AI Literacy: You don’t need to be a data scientist, but you must understand how to “instruct” an AI agent. Understanding RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) and how to give an agent the right “knowledge base” is more important than knowing how to drag-and-drop a gateway.
• Technique: Value-Based Orchestration: Stop measuring “time to complete a task.” Start measuring “value created per process cycle.” In 2026, practitioners must focus on orchestrating diverse “workers”—humans, bots, and AI agents—into a unified stream.
• Attitude: Radical Agility: The business environment is too volatile for “annual process reviews.” Practitioners must adopt a mindset of continuous, real-time optimization.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

• The “Trifecta” Frameworks: Study the intersection of BPMN 2.0, DMN 1.x, and AI Agentic Frameworks (like LangChain or AutoGPT). Understanding how these three standards talk to each other is the “Gold Standard” of 2026.
• Case Management Theory: Revisit the core principles of CMMN (Case Management Model and Notation). Even if the notation itself is less common, the philosophy—that work is a collection of events and data rather than a straight line—is exactly how Agentic AI operates.
• Cost-Benefit Modeling for AI: Learn to calculate the “Token Cost vs. DMN Cost.” As models get larger, the ability to offload logic to deterministic DMN tables becomes a major competitive advantage in operational efficiency.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

• Irrelevant: Perfectionist Process Mapping. If you are spending months on a “Current State” map, you are documenting the past. In 2026, Process Intelligence (PI) tells us the current state in real-time; the practitioner’s job is to design the “Governed Future State.”
• Hype: The “Agent-Only” Enterprise. There is a lot of hype around letting Agents run the whole show. This is a recipe for disaster. Without a BPMN State Machine, you lose auditability and control. We don’t want “Chinese Phone Tag” where one agent misunderstands another until the process drifts into a hallucination.
• Hype: Purely Generative Decisioning. Using an LLM to decide on a credit limit or a medical diagnosis is still a “hype” risk. For those outcomes, we still require the DMN layer for total transparency and 100% repeatability.
• Irrelevant: Manual Coding for Connectors. Building “hand-coded” integrations and scripts is a dying art. AI can now generate these connectors or use “action-based” APIs on the fly. If you are spending weeks writing integration code, you are falling behind.
• Irrelevant: Rigid BPMN Perfectionism. Spending three months perfecting a 50-page BPMN manual is now a liability. By the time you finish the map, the business environment has changed.
• Hype: Fully “Autonomous” Enterprises. While we talk a lot about agents, the idea that a company can run entirely without human oversight in 2026 is still hype. The “Human-in-the-loop” is not an elective; it is a requirement for governance, ethics, and complex decision-making.

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Adrian Reed

Adrian Reed is a true advocate of the analysis profession. In his day job, he acts as Principal Consultant at Blackmetric Business Solutions where he provides business analysis consultancy and training solutions to a range of clients in varying industries. He is editor-in-chief of the quarterly open-access magazine BA Digest, and he speaks internationally on topics relating to business analysis and business change.  Adrian wrote the 2016 book ‘Be a Great Problem Solver… Now’ and the 2018 book ‘Business Analyst’

You can read Adrian’s blog at http://www.adrianreed.co.uk and connect with him on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/adrianreed/

WWW: http://www.adrianreed.co.uk
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How do AI and other trends impact the BA?

This is a really interesting question, Zbigniew, and one that lots of people are asking. I suppose at this point it’s worth highlighting that my background is business analysis, rather than business process management. Of course, there’s overlap, but I’m likely to have a slightly different lens on these questions compared with your other interviewees…

In my mind, this question has three core angles:

Angle 1: How can BAs utilize AI to become even more efficient and effective
Angle 2: How can BAs work with their stakeholders to ensure organizations deploy AI in an effective, ethical, safe and secure way.
Angle 3: How might customers, suppliers or “service users” start using AI, and how might that impact our processes, services or “systems” (in the broadest sense).

I think a lot of the debate is currently around Angle 1, and that’s understandable. Yet, for me, Angle 2 is even more crucial. And there’s so much value that a BA can add here. One of the key ways I believe I’ve added value in my career is encouraging people to pause, stop and understand the real set of problems they are trying to solve, or outcomes they are trying to achieve. Too often, people reach for the most seductive, shiniest, newest thing. That’s human nature, we all do it. But with something like AI, where the consequences of getting it wrong could be huge, ensuring adequate thought is crucial.

Angle 3 is a big topic on its own, so that’s a blog for another time. But imagine a world where a customer sends an AI agent to interact with your company’s live chat. Do you allow that? Do you care? Can you even detect it…? But that’s just scratching the surface…

So, in my view, BAs absolutely need to be thinking about AI, experimenting, and learning.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help Business Analysts create value for their organizations in 2026?

For me it’s always about ensuring that the desired outcomes are stated and agreed. I’ve been on too many projects where there’s surface level agreement on what’s being delivered… but when you pick away at the edges you realize that people have no shared agreement on “why”.

This sounds trivial, but it isn’t. This can happen at a micro or macro level. People might say “we want a new CRM system” or even something like “we just want a new field”. Well fine, a new field sounds small doesn’t it?

But when you probe, you find that they want a “source of business” field so the marketing team can test which marketing campaigns work. Their actual aim is to “optimise marketing spend”. Once you know that, you can work with them to figure out a way of doing that… and spoiler alert: a new field (on its own) almost certainly won’t achieve that.

Add AI into the mix, and the potential impacts on process, policy and ethics and there needs to be someone asking the tricky questions. For example “what groups might be negatively impacted if we do this? And are we OK with that, ethically? Can we mitigate it?”, and sometimes, frankly “should we actually be doing this at all?”.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Well, obviously everyone should read bpmtips.com! And I’d also plug a quarterly magazine that I edit, BA Digest. It’s completely free and available at BAdigest.link.

I’d also say find people on LinkedIn who are knowledgeable practitioners and follow them. There are too many people here that I really respect for me to name anyone (as I fear I’d leave someone out!).

Also, with AI, I genuinely think things are moving so quickly the best way to learn it is to do it. Start, experiment. If your company doesn’t currently have an AI policy, do it at home. There are so many resources out there, many are free.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I always struggle with this question! I find myself taking meeting notes much less frequently now, as I find usually (for non-confidential meetings) people are happy for them to be recorded and transcribed. However, I’m always very diligent about checking the meeting summaries (again, this is an area where bias can inadvertently happen. E.g. if someone is speaking English with an accent, their points may not be transcribed accurately, which means their views are not accurately represented. It’s so important to be aware of stuff like that).

But, on the whole, I think it’s “the same but different”. Business analysis has always been, in my view, a primarily human endeavour. Perhaps it’s even more so now, as AI tools can help with some of the more routine aspects, we can spend more time with people. And that has to be a good thing.

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Björn Richerzhagen

The trained businessman, business economist and business IT specialist is one of the most sought-after BPM experts. The BPM rationalist has been at the interface between departments and technology for two decades now and sees himself as a translator between the worlds. As a BPM consultant and trainer, he is OCEB and CBPP certified and accompanies process initiatives at company level as well as process automation projects as a workflow analyst.

In his private life, the family man is involved in numerous community / charity projects, enjoys traveling (Europe and Africa), listens to a lot of music (everything that has bass) and is an enthusiastic ocean sailor.

WWW: https://www.mi-nautics.com/
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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

We observe that our customers are highly interested in AI with a strong focus on AI being a resource in a process, not so much being the resource orchestrating the process. Often they fail to identify use cases that ofter a true business benefit. Hence, it is often a discovery and get accustomed to the AI tech stacks. Anyway, we assume use cases creating a real business value are on the rise and will gain traction in 2026.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

Besides from foundational process management skills (they never get old), we foresee that proper training on AI and skills on creating effective guardrails will become most relevant things to work on. To accept AI agents will become team members will speed up process execution generally as they can be engaged in tedious work whereas human colleagues may focus on what the can do best: human oriented work, system design, creative work, exception handling etc.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Numerous sources for AI and process management can be found not only in books but also on the internet. The first one is still rapidly developing. Hence, the time it takes to publicize cannot keep up with current developments. Numerous blogs, video and pod casts (mainly from scientists, vendors and consultants) offer valuable insights but have to be critically judged if it is just buzz or if it contains generally applicable principles. The latter, process management, is more profound and magazines and books can be helpful for first steps in process management. Anyway, recent developments in BPM can also be found in numerous online sources.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Process Mining and RPA seem to be beyond its peak. Customers invested heavily but either did not get the expected return or are now facing the consequences they have not been able to foresee. Whilst edge cases exist where a positive business value is existent, the advertised approach by tool vendors to be generally applicable on a bread range in processes turned out to be technically true but often of little value when a ROI is calculated.

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Pedro Robledo

Pedro Robledo is President and Co-founder of the Spanish chapter of ABPMP International and a leading authority in Business Process Management (BPM), digital transformation, and artificial intelligence. He is the author of the Business Process Maturity Model (BPMM, 2014), a framework adopted globally to assess and elevate process maturity across seven pillars: Strategy, Processes, Technology, People, Governance, Methodologies, and Culture, helping organizations define and execute successful BPM roadmaps.

With over 25 years of experience, Pedro’s mission is to help professionals and organizations rethink, redesign, and future-proof their processes, connecting operational excellence with strategic innovation. He has led initiatives in multinational organizations and served as a jury member for the WfMC Awards for Excellence in BPM & Workflow, reinforcing his position as a recognized thought leader in the field.

Currently, Pedro focuses on:
Acting as a thought leader and architect in BPM, AI, and Autonomous Agents
Designing strategic roadmaps for BPM, AI-driven automation, and enterprise architecture
Researching Agentic AI and its impact on organizational process maturity
Teaching and delivering advanced, strategic BPM education, bridging innovation, governance, and operational excellence

He shares insights and thought leadership through his newsletters and publications:
Diario de un COO – High-level operational management insights: https://lnkd.in/dnYn4ybU
BPM & AI-Driven Innovation – The process revolution in the age of AI: https://lnkd.in/dE8eH3VR
Voces BPM – Inspirational cases and people: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/voces-bpm-casos-testimonios-7346543494393466881/

Pedro is committed to empowering professionals and organizations to think critically about processes, moving beyond tools and certifications through consulting, advisory, frameworks, training, and applied intellectual leadership.
Philosophy: He believes that processes are not just tasks to manage—they are the foundation for innovation, resilience, and value creation in the age of AI.

Pedro’s specialties include BPM, BPMM, PEMM, AI applied to processes, Agentic AI, process innovation, enterprise architecture, process benchmarking, strategic roadmaps, BPMN, and DMN.
He currently counts 32,722 LinkedIn followers, reflecting his growing influence as a BPM and AI thought leader, with over 1,700 new followers gained in the past year.

WWW: pedrorobledobpm.blogspot.com.es
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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

By 2026, processes are no longer simply managed. They are co-managed with AI, but this does not mean chaos, nor does it mean abandoning structured processes.

AI has pushed BPM beyond documentation and isolated optimization toward continuous, autonomous orchestration. However, one of the biggest challenges organizations face today is not the lack of automation, but the lack of coherence. Many companies have accumulated hundreds of task-level automations, copilots, bots, and agents that optimize locally but damage performance end to end.

This is where BPM becomes more important than ever.

Processes are evolving from static representations into living operational systems. BPMN models are no longer frozen diagrams; they are increasingly connected to execution engines, process mining, and decision services, forming operational digital twins that reflect reality in near real time. These twins allow organizations to understand how work truly flows from start to finish, not just how individual tasks are automated.

At the same time, decision automation becomes a structural element. DMN is essential to ensure that AI-driven decisions remain consistent, explainable, auditable, and aligned with strategy and regulation. Without DMN, AI quickly becomes a black box operating at task level, increasing risk rather than reducing it.

This brings us to CMMN and case management, which play a crucial, but often misunderstood role. The rise of AI agents and knowledge-intensive work has revived interest in CMMN, as many business scenarios are event-driven, non-linear, and unpredictable. Case management is extremely powerful for handling variability, exceptions, and human judgment.

However, a dangerous misconception is emerging: the idea that everything should become case management.

Structured, repeatable, high-volume processes do not disappear in 2026. They still require BPMN, clear flows, performance control, and optimization. Treating all work as cases creates fragmentation, weak governance, and loss of end-to-end visibility. Autonomous agents should not live only inside CMMN worlds; they must operate across BPMN, DMN, and CMMN, depending on the nature of the work.

The real shift is not BPMN versus CMMN, but intentional orchestration. BPM provides the backbone that connects structured flows, unstructured cases, and AI-driven decisions into a coherent operating model.

Human roles, therefore, move upward. People stop managing task execution and start governing behavior, intent, and outcomes. AI handles coordination, optimization, and execution, but BPM ensures that all of this happens end to end, not in isolated pockets.

In short, BPM in 2026 becomes the discipline that prevents intelligent automation from becoming intelligent chaos. In 2026, BPM is not about choosing between BPMN, CMMN, or AI agents. It is about orchestrating them coherently. Without BPM, intelligent automation becomes fragmented, risky, and opaque. With BPM, organizations gain control, clarity, and scalability, even in an autonomous world. The real challenge is not automating more. It is automating with intent, structure, and governance. And that is exactly where BPM proves its relevance again.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

The BPM professional of 2026 is not a simple process analyst, nor a task automator. They are a business process architect and business orchestration designer.

A critical skill is the ability to design end-to-end processes that combine BPMN, DMN, and CMMN intentionally. Practitioners must know when to use structured flows, when to enable case-driven behavior, and how decisions and AI agents operate consistently across both. This architectural thinking is what separates scalable automation from fragile experimentation.

AI-first process design is no longer optional, but it must be process-first, not task-first. BPM professionals must be able to challenge initiatives that automate individual tasks without understanding upstream and downstream impact. Value in 2026 comes from optimizing the whole system, not local efficiency.

Decision-centric BPM remains essential. DMN provides the guardrails that allow autonomous agents to act responsibly across both structured processes and cases. Without decision models, agents become unpredictable and governance collapses.

Process mining skills also evolve. Practitioners must use mining not just to discover flows, but to expose fragmentation caused by disconnected automations, identifying where task-level optimization has broken end-to-end performance.

From a behavioral standpoint, BPM professionals must be comfortable saying no. No to automation without process context. No to agent deployments without governance. No to replacing structured processes with cases simply because “AI is flexible.”

Ethics and accountability remain central. As automation becomes more autonomous, BPM practitioners increasingly act as custodians of fairness, transparency, traceability, and compliance, across flows, cases, and decisions.

Above all, BPM in 2026 requires a relentless focus on business outcomes. Automating tasks is easy. Designing resilient, compliant, and scalable operating models is hard, and that is where BPM creates value.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

To operate at this level in 2026, learning must go far beyond tools.

The BPM classics remain essential because they teach systems thinking. Hammer, Rummler & Brache, and Weske provide the intellectual discipline needed to reason end to end, something desperately needed in an era of fragmented automation.

At the same time, practitioners must deepen their knowledge of BPMN, DMN, and CMMN as a coherent triad, not as isolated standards. Understanding how these standards complement each other is fundamental to governing AI-driven operations.

Formal education in Strategic Process Management becomes increasingly relevant, particularly when it incorporates process architecture, decision governance, AI, and maturity assessment. In complex organizations, knowing what to automate is less important than knowing what the organization is ready to automate.

This is why BPM maturity models regain strategic importance. My BPMM evolved for 2026, explicitly addressing AI, decision automation, agentic behavior, governance, and the balance between structured processes and cases, is essential to avoid both under-automation and reckless over-automation.

Beyond formal learning, practitioners must stay close to real implementations. Process mining academies, decision automation communities, and practitioner forums that discuss BPM + AI honestly (not just vendor marketing) are critical.
And, as always, experimentation matters. Working hands-on with AI agents inside structured processes and cases is the only way to truly understand where each approach adds value.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Some trends need to be challenged openly.

Task-level automation without end-to-end process thinking is rapidly becoming a liability. Organizations full of disconnected bots and copilots often perform worse than those with fewer but well-orchestrated automations.

Over-reliance on case management for everything is another emerging risk. CMMN is powerful, but it is not a universal replacement for BPMN. Treating all work as cases leads to loss of predictability, weak KPIs, and governance gaps.

Manual documentation and static modeling are also declining. AI now generates documentation automatically from execution data. The valuable skill is not writing documents, but validating, governing, and improving AI-generated process knowledge.

On the hype side, the idea of a fully self-managing organization remains fiction. Autonomous agents still need human-defined intent, constraints, and accountability. AGI- or ASI-driven BPM is not a practical reality in 2026, and pretending otherwise creates unrealistic expectations and poor decisions.

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Prof. Michael Rosemann

Dr Michael Rosemann is the Director of the Centre for Future Enterprise and a Professor for Information Systems at the Business School, Queensland University of Technology (QUT), Brisbane, Australia.
Dr Rosemann’s main areas of research are corporate innovation, revenue resilience, process management and trust management. His work is focused on creating compelling future worlds with today’s possibilities that make current practices obsolete. As a researcher and advisor to board rooms and senior executives he is committed to advancing research-informed knowledge and confidence in order to appreciate the emerging design space and to create an increased ‘sense of ambition’ and innovation appetite.
Dr Rosemann is the author/editor of ten books, more than 350 refereed papers in outlets such as MIS Quarterly, European Journal of Information Systems, Journal of Strategic Information Systems, Information Systems and Journal of the Association of Information Systems, Editorial Board member of ten international journals (incl. MISQ Executive) and co-inventor of US and European patents. His ‘Handbook of Business Process Management’ (with Prof. Jan vom Brocke, second edition) is a comprehensive consolidation of global BPM thought leaders. His publications have been translated into German, Russian, Portuguese and Mandarin. His latest book, ‘The New Learning Economy’ (with Martin Betts), has been published by Routledge in December 2022.
Michael provides advice related to performance, innovation, trust and process management to organisations and their executives from diverse industries including telco, banking, insurance, utility, retail, public sector, higher education, logistics and the film industry. He is also the Honorary Consul of the Federal Republic of Germany in Southern Queensland.

WWW: https://www.qut.edu.au/research/michael-rosemann
WWW: http://www.michaelrosemann.com/
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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

AI in all its forms – machine learning, generative AI, agentic AI – has three main impacts within business processes.

First, its deep machine learning capacity provides the opportunity to delegate a new range of typical human activities to technology. This is what I call autonomization as it reflects the ability of AI to autonomously make decisions. Instead of specifying what needs to be done (automation), and as common in business process modelling, autonomization requires a definition of the why of an activity or a process. Thus, organisations need to become more explicit in terms of process objectives and related constraints and guardrails. Also, responsibility will have to complement feasibility, viability and desirability as a key criterion in assessing process improvement proposals. This is why we developed a Process Canvas  consisting of these four dimensions as a way to support comprehensive process contextualisation ‘on a page’.

Second, this increased potential for delegation will make substantial capabilities exclusive to humans available for future business processes. This impact is called humanization, and a BPM community traditionally focused on streamlining processes seems poorly prepared to benefit from this capability. This is a tremendous opportunity for process designers, but it will not be adequately harvested with common reductionist, technology-centric approaches. Instead, organisations are encouraged to follow a resource-based, human-centric view and explore the extent to which personal 1-1 advice, diagnostics, therapy, care or new services can add value to its business processes. In a world of ubiquitous AI utilization, humanization might become the distinct factor in tomorrow’s business processes.

Third, augmentation describes the AI-enabled creation of entirely new forms of value resulting from the interplay of humans and machines. For example, a retailer might enhance its online shopping process by providing a conversational as opposed to a transactional experience. A bank might use proactive banking and not only anticipate but flip the process and actually run transactions on behalf of its customers. And a university might consider precision education, i.e. personalised educational processes. This emergence of new value is in sharp contrast to the common elimination of non-value.

Beyond considering the impact of AI within processes, we need to be aware of the growing role of AI on business processes. This includes the use of AI along all stages of the business process lifecycle and includes AI-supported identification of high priority processes, detection of process issues, and conversational navigation across large process data derived via process mining. In addition, we also see an increased use and maturity of AI in the context of explorative BPM, i.e. supporting BPM professionals in identifying entirely new process design options.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

With the growing AI footprint in business processes, it is needless to state that data and algorithmic literacy, but also ethical literacy will be essential.

As we witness increasingly digitised, friction-free processes, we are moving from a focus on pain points to a concentration on opportunity points within business processes. Rather than only looking to the inside and analysing existing problems, BPM practitioners also need to explore a growing process design space and assess new value opportunities. This will mean experimentation might become more important than expertise, and the social licence to experiment with corporate but also with public business processes will be required. For example, we might see (autonomous) A/B testing more often embedded in processes that otherwise were aimed for predictability and stability. The required new skills, techniques and attitude include curiosity, environmental scanning, hypothesis testing and comfort with minimum viable business processes among others.

We also encourage organizations to develop futures literacy, i.e. assess different types of process futures – preferred, plausible, possible, probable futures – and develop robust response strategies so that process designs remain decisive and agile.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The global uptake of the book ‘Fundamentals of Business Process Management’ by my dear colleagues Marlon Dumas, Marcello La Rosa, Jan Mendling and Hajo Reijers demonstrates that it remains the point of reference for every BPM professional. The very recent book Enterprise AI (edited by Shazia Sadiq, published by Springer 2026) provides a contemporary overview about the impact of scalable AI capability on organisational assets including its business processes. In this book, we also elaborate on the notion of process autonomization.

There are many high-quality BPM learning resources available, often with strong regional roots. One example is the largest Brazilian BPM YouTube channel, hosted by Andréa Magalhães from dheka, who visited us here at QUT in Brisbane last year. The channel covers a broad range of BPM topics (from fundamentals to innovation, research, and emerging topics) and has an impressive 30,000+ followers. A good podcast with a strong AI lens on all matters BPM is Lukas Egger’s Process Transformers.

The International BPM Conference will take place in Toronto, Canada, end of September. This remains the event that brings the global BPM community together like no other, including various forums and workshops to specific BPM topics, and it is always a wonderful week to experience and discuss the emerging state-of-the-art.

Finally, it is great to see the uptake of the new journal Process Science, the new flagship journal on BPM and process mining.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

As processes start to reach the state of being streamlined and digitised, techniques dedicated to the search of waste (Lean Management) and non-value might become less relevant. This will be amplified by the fact that in a world of cloud-based business processes, types of waste like bottlenecks will be a dying species.

There might be two nuanced versions of BPM becoming relevant soon. Individual Process Management (IPM) will be dedicated to the optimisation of our very own personal processes (e.g., shopping, banking, healthcare) as AI assistants might take over more of the transactional duties in our lives. As a consequence we might become orchestrators of such individual processes. How we approach and best support Individual Process Management is still in its infancy.

Public Process Management (PPM) is about entire national business processes. Digital infrastructure including government processes are becoming a new distinct competitive feature of global investment and trade attraction. The design and management of such processes is still poorly understood, exposed to a wide range of contextual factors (e.g., national risk aversion, digital literacy). The diversity of global process practices is a rich source of insight for academics and PPM professionals.

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Serge Schiltz

Serge Schiltz is CEO and founder of processCentric GmbH, a European consulting and training firm focused on business process management. With his extensive practical experience as a senior consultant working with clients on their BPM challenges in different industries, he has been able to build a solid reputation over the past decades. Author, trainer, university lecturer and conference speaker in English, German and French. Member of OMG’s DMN Task Force and contributor to the OMG Certified Expert in BPM (OCEB) examination.

WWW: https://www.processcentric.ch/en
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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

The way that we approach process discovery could potentially take an entirely new perspective if we use generative AI tools for documenting business processes. To date, the way business representatives describe their processes is influenced by the process analyst, who typically takes a BPM expert approach and gives direction to the interviews. If we manage to build AI tools that can transform process descriptions as made by SMEs in the form of written text, audio, or video (Why not describe your processes using Lego or Playmobil for Business?), there will be less of the expert bias in process modeling and models will be truly owned by the business.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

It remains key for BPM practitioners to understand the value proposition and strategy of the organizations that they work with. To me, OMG’s Business Motivation Model (BMM) is one of the most important tool to understand and apply for being able deliver value to an organization through BPM.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The BPM certifications of OMG (OCEB certification program) cover the Business Motivation Model and it is no surprise that many candidates have difficulty answering the BMM questions. OMG’s BPM certification task force is currently finalizing the questions for the new edition of the Fundamental level exam, of which 10% will about the BMM, 70% BPMN, 15% DMN, and 5% CMMN. There is little use modeling business processes, rules, or cases, as long as you don’t understand the business context and purpose. If you are looking to understand BMM, you can read my books for the Fundamental or Intermediate exam certification preparation, or the Fundamental prep book of Tim Weilkiens. My colleague Joshua Ara and I are currently putting the final touches to a new book that will prepare you for the next edition OCEB Fundamental exam … expect this to be published late February or early March.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I see a lot of potential in case modeling using CMMN. Yes, this approach has not been successful (yet) and some vendors even completely scrapped if from their offering, while enhancing the capabilities of BPMN adhoc subprocesses. I expect that this proprietary approach will disappear in the near future and that BPM practioners will at last understand the value that the standard CMMN brings. Read Bruce Silver’s “CMMN Method & Style” if you are not familiar with it yet, or my new book that I mentioned above. There are excellent tools on the market that offer CMMN support. Watch out for Trisotech and Flowable!

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Jim Sinur

Jim Sinur is an independent thought leader in applying smart Digital Business Platforms (DBP), Customer Experience/Journeys (CJM), Business Process Management (BPM), AI, Automation (RPA), Low-code and Decision Management at the edge for enhanced business outcomes. His research and areas of personal experience focus on intelligent business processes, business modeling, real time data feedback with heterogeneous data types, business process management technologies, smart process collaboration for knowledge workers, process intelligence/optimization, AI applied to business policy/rule management, IoT and leveraging business applications in processes. Jim was a contributor to Forbes in AI. Jim is also one of the authors of BPM: The Next Wave. His latest book is Digital Transformation. Innovate or Die Slowly. Jim also co-authored recently a new book entitled “Practical Business Process Modeling and Analysis”. Jim’s personal blog is approaching two million hits to date. Jim is also a well known digital and traditional artist. His recent adventures include songwriting. He is revisualizing his art and marketing his music with generative AI.

WWW: https://www.forbes.com/sites/cognitiveworld/people/jimsinur/
WWW: http://www.james-sinur.com/
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

There are a number of skills that BPM folks could pick up as there are many in the middle of digital evolution assisted by AI, but my top seven would be the following:

1. Journey Mapping for Customers, Employees and Partners including touchpoint analysis and persona creation that crosses internal functional stovepipes. Outside-in Thinking.
2. Embedded Advanced Analytic and Visualization Capabilities. Process plus big, fast and dark process/data mining is growing to be more important. Decision Models and Intelligent Management Cockpits will become more important as they integrate with process models. Strategic and situational analysis can be helpful in guiding agents and processes.
3. Agentic AI, Adaptive, Smart and Goal Driven Processes (often in Case Management and also Explicit Rule enabled) guided by guardrails and by process/data mining with real time feedback. Concentrating on Agents inside and outside a process or process snippets. Snippets and RPA bots are often candidates for converting into agents. Get ready for specialty agents such as broker agents.
4. AI Productivity Focused looking for opportunities to add automation or more smarts like Generative AI. Machine learning, Deep Learning and 17 other AI technology tributaries. See the 20 AI tributaries by clicking here: https://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2023/11/ai-tributaries-types-for-2024.htm
5. Cognitive Collaboration for Knowledge Workers Intense Processes or Cases. AI Assistance for process resources is on the move right now. Leveraging learning AI software and Agents for knowledge building and simulating potential outcomes. Having Skills to interact and guide AI in an interactive fashion will be key.
6. Signal and Pattern Detection at the edge (often needed for agility, IoT and business strategy). IoT integration is a new emerging theme. This can be taken to the level of digital twins and by merging control on the edge with central control.
7. Business Professional Process creation, adaptation, and optimization by leveraging lite BPM/workflow, Process/Data Mining utilizing Low code and generative AI.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

While there are no skills that one should drop, there are several that are considered common and receding. My top three would be the following:

1. Central Control Only approaches with siloed skill sets. More lateral thinking is and collaborative control is needed today.
2. Water Fall Only project methods are taking a second seat to incremental development leveraging Generative AI, RPA and rapid experimentation. We are living in an emergent world with emergent responses required.
3. Large blocks of dumb frozen code are giving way to smart and instrumented components, micro services and late binding rules guided by constraints. Turn dumb code into adaptive agents where possible.

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Roger Tregear

Roger Tregear spends his working life talking, consulting, thinking, presenting, recording, and writing about the analysis, innovation, improvement, and management of business processes. He helps organizations improve performance.
As Principal Advisor at TregearBPM Roger provides business process management consulting, training, and coaching services. 36 years’ experience as a business, management, and IT consultant means that he has well-developed insights into business improvement and problem resolution.
Roger’s practice and client base are global with assignments completed in Australia, Bahrain, Belgium, Jordan, Namibia, Nigeria, Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Switzerland, New Zealand, United Arab Emirates, UK, and USA.
Roger writes, presents, and records on many topics related to process-based management. That material can be accessed via https://bit.ly/TregearBPM_Resources.

WWW: https://www.tregearbpm.com
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Twitter: @rogertregear

What advice would you give organization leaders who want to start managing processes intentionally in 2026?

Do This:

• Identify the organization’s processes in a hierarchical format (process architecture). This is not hard to do and has two important effects. Provides a coherent context for understanding the organization’s processes. Promotes understanding of the key principles of process-based management.
• Select a small number of high-impact processes and use these to establish and demonstrate active process management. For many organizations there will be 20-30 high-impact processes. You might start by selecting just three demonstration processes.
• Design and implement effective process governance. Assign Process Owners (PO) to the demonstration processes. Establish support arrangements for these new POs. Clearly communicate the need for, and practice of, process governance.
• For the demonstration processes identify process KPIs (PKPIs) and related targets. Make sure there are viable data collection mechanisms.
• Establish the data collection, analysis, and reporting cycle. Look for actual or emerging problems. Search for other opportunities for performance improvement. Repeat endlessly.
• Create and execute a whole-of-organization communications plan to share the theory and practice of active process management. Communicate the plans, successes, and failures. Deal with fears, uncertainties, and doubts throughout the organization.
• Deliver proven, valued, business benefits. Encourage engagement.
• Prepare to survive success, i.e. dealing with (many) more business units asking for active process management support and guidance.
• Regularly review the process of process management and improvement. Make it the organization’s most effective process. Imagine the impact of that!
• Plan to appear in BPM Tips next year as an exceptional example of active process management!

Don’t Do This:

• Don’t just focus on the processes that self-select by being broken or difficult. They may be important but are they the processes that can provide the highest return?
• Don’t try to manage “all your processes”. You can’t do it — there are thousands of them — and the good news is you don’t need to.
• If starting the process-based management journey, avoid the temptation to start with lots of processes to actively manage. Better to demonstrate success with 3 than failure with 30.
• Process documentation is important but challenge the business/operational purpose before any documentation effort is started. What’s the problem the documentation will fix? Avoid the insanity of “we will model all our processes”. Document just in time, not just in case.
• Don’t underestimate the degree of change involved in moving to process-based management. Cross-functional management is vital and can be challenging for some people and organizations.
• Don’t take the ‘easy’ path and ‘assign’ existing functional KPIs to processes. Put the functional KPIs aside and design effective process KPIs (PKPIs) and targets (and measurement methods).
• Don’t allow the organization to fall in love with the process artifacts it creates and waste time admiring them at the expense of using them to deliver proven, valued, business benefits. Realize innovative and productive opportunities. Fix — better yet, anticipate and avoid — real problems.
• Don’t give up.

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Roland Woldt

Roland Woldt is a well-rounded executive with 25+ years of Business Transformation consulting and software development/system implementation experience, in addition to leadership positions within the German Armed Forces (11 years).

He has worked as a Team Lead, Engagement/Program Manager, and Enterprise/Solution Architect on many projects. Within these projects, he was responsible for the full project life-cycle, from shaping a solution and selling it, to setting up a methodological approach through design, implementation, and testing, up to the roll-out of solutions.

In addition to this, Roland has managed consulting offerings throughout their life-cycle, from definition, delivery to update, and had revenue responsibility for them. This also included the stand-up and development of consulting teams, and their day-to-day management. Roland worked as a Vice President at iGrafx, Director in KPMG’s Advisory, as a Practice Director at Software AG/IDS Scheer, and as a project manager at Accenture.

WWW: “What’s Your Baseline?” podcast
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How do AI and other trends impact the way organizations manage and run their processes?

The topic of AI is cooling down a bit these days, it seems (good, because it is overhyped to the degree that I roll my eyes when I see the next “AI expert” telling me that everything is changing on LinkedIn. I just hope that the bubble will not explode (to a degree that makes the dot.com or housing bubble look tiny comparatively), but rather that there will be a controlled release of hot air.

Let’s call things what they are – AI is a form of process automation. Nothing more, nothing less.

Yes, it has some advanced capabilities, like learning from previous process executions, or having more autonomy in orchestrating things in a workflow, but it is still “just automation” and not your “new coworker” or any other anthropomorphic nonsense (“If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, …”).

So, with that out of the way, I see a few things that are relevant for BPM practitioners in regards to AI:

• There will be more AI features in every software and vendors will stress this until it becomes “normal” and is not a distinguishing feature anymore. This will be true for process management software as well (I am including the subdiscipline of mining here) , but the quality for the foreseeable future will be the one of “little helpers.”
  If you expect to see a full blown analysis or simulation on the press of a button (or prompt), then you will be disappointed.
• AI will have a bigger impact when it comes to automation. Here I see the biggest potential in orchestration and executing the “dummy tasks” that cost a lot of time today. Do I think that you can “fire and forget” processes and replace what you do today (and the humans involved included)? No, and I am not sorry to disappoint you.
• But this also means that you need to get the basics of process management right – understand and optimize processes before automation, creating simulations for business cases, describe your intended changes in solution designs, and monitor the process execution, while keeping the risk & compliance topics always in mind.
  I would love to see process groups mature into these higher-levels of maturity, but it seems that we are still discussing how to describe what we do, instead of aiming for CMMI 4 or 5 levels of maturity (note to everyone in the former camp: BPMN won, don’t try to reinvent the wheel, go and improve things higher in the stack).

So, things change and stay the same as they’ve always been

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2026?

I hope that 2026 will be the year when data-driven analysis will finally take off. Gartner rated Process Mining as “early mainstream” in their Enterprise Automation hype cycle earlier this year, which means that it is in the 20-50% addressable audience for this approach … and this means these are people who have never heard about mining at all, so don’t confuse them with “object-centric mining” or any other terms that are “hot” in our bubble these days. Stick to the basics.

I find it astonishing how many organizations still “fly blind” when running their organizations and don’t measure or even just monitor what they are doing. Process Mining is becoming an affordable commodity where you don’t have to pay an arm and a leg to get process-oriented visibility into what is really going on in your organization – and not only what your SMEs know or want to tell you.

If I could dream even more, I would love to see more collaboration (not only of SMEs in mining projects, which you will need for sure), but also in the full process lifecycle that then will include things like a central repository, strategic analysis of capabilities and finding improvement areas systematically, or process simulation.
And, of course, I would love to see more collaboration between the practitioners in real life. It seems that there are some great initiatives of Meetups in Germany for example, but I have not found anything similar in my neck of the woods, unfortunately.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I am biased because I published two books -Successful Architecture Implementation and Successful Process Mining Projects- last year. And I run the “What’s Your Baseline”?” podcast together with j-m@whatsyourbaseline.com and the occasional co-hosts (thanks caspartcjans@gmail.com and matus.mala@gmail.com so far) for 4.5 years by now. And there is more to come in 2026 (IYKYK

If you want to learn more, please head over to whatsyourbaseline.com.

But in general I think it is important to learn data analysis skills as a BA. And the one tool that I really like is KNIME (knime.com) – it allows you to create workflows for data analysis or preparation of process mining logs without the need for coding in a “self documenting” way. And the folks in that community are super helpful (in the forums) and also have free-of-charge training for different roles on the website.
And did I mention that it is open-source? The perfect tool IMHO.

Lastly, there are also some basics to be learned, and if you are brand new here and want to know what that whole process thing is all about and how you can describe them, I recommend Zbigniew’s BPMN course on Udemy of course

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I mentioned it above, but I think that data analysis in the context of mining and simulation will become more relevant, and there will be some improvements on the technology front as well. My hunch is that by the end of the year the majority of tool vendors will have enabled object-centric data sets in their tools, so you will have to change how you do step 3 of my approach to Process Mining. This will come with some challenges and complexities (not at least based on the fact that your data structure and governance in your organization might be a mess) that you will have to overcome.

But otherwise I think the fundamentals of describing your processes, analyzing them, automating processes, predicting future performance, and monitoring the realization of everything does not change. Why should it?

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Part 1 of the post about BPM skills in 2025 was full of insightful answers about role of process management today. Part 2 provides additional great comments.

Read below for inspiring answers from 10+ BPM experts.

As always, you can either read everything or use the navigation below. Enjoy!
Lloyd Dugan
Marlon Dumas
Mahendrawathi ER
Michael Fox
Renata Gabryelczyk
Paul Holmes-Higgin
Thomas Hildebrandt
Martin Holling
Caspar Jans
Sandeep Johal
Emiel Kelly
Hanneke Loefs-Mos
Amy Van Looy
Morten Marquard
Derek Miers
Nathaniel Palmer
Björn Richerzhagen
Stefanie Rinderle-Ma
Kevin Tan
Steve Towers
Roland Woldt

Which BPM skills will be hot in 2025?

Now, let’s dive into the answers.

Lloyd Dugan

Lloyd Dugan is a widely recognized thought leader in the development and use of leading modeling languages, methodologies, and tools, covering from the level of EA and BA down through BPM, Case Management, and SOA. He specializes in the use of standard languages for describing business processes, systems, and services, particularly BPMN, CMMN, and DMN from the OMG. He has developed and delivered BPMN 2.0 training to the U.S. Department of Defense and large consultancies. He has nearly 40 years of experience with public and private sector clients, and has an MBA from the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University. He is a past member of the Workflow Management Coalition and its BPSim Working Group that produced the process simulation standard, and also a past member of the OMG’s BPMN Model Interchange Working Group (MIWG). He is a Contributing Member (author) and Collaboration Team Member for the BA Meta Modeling and BPM-BA Alignment Groups of the Business Architecture Guild. He represents the Guild on the OMG Task Force for the BA Core Metamodel (BACM) standard. He is a frequent speaker at national and international conferences on BPM, BPMN, Case Management, Decision Management, SOA, and BA. He is a published author or co-author on BPM, BPMN, and BA. He led the effort to develop a new OMG certification for integrating BPMN, DMN, and CMMN, known as BPM+. He serves as the Chief Architect for Serco, NA, on its CMS Eligibility Support Program, which provides back-office processing of applications to access the Federal Health Care Exchange created under the Affordable Care Act, and where he has led award-winning efforts to build intelligent document processing, dynamic work assignment queuing, RPA for case management, use of AI/ML, process mining, and migration of all Program elements to the AWS Cloud. He still delivers BPM-related training, and when asked also provides client advisory services on BPM-related matters/technologies.

WWW: Serco, NA – CMS Program
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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

Climate change will likely (and certainly should) force a reexamination of our increasing and widespread reliance on computationally-intensive technologies like AI/ML and the cloud that consume increasing amounts of electrical power (still) produced from mostly fossil fuels, (hopefully) making them more power-efficient and not just more effective. The aging of populations in the West will likely lead to the expansion of process automation efforts and use of AI/ML to address the attendant social and economic needs in less typically user-interactive ways and in more user-anticipating ways. Digital technologies are already pervasive in our lives, and can only become more so, which will have to happen in ways that help societies while not reinforcing economic divides. AI/ML will continue to augment BPM technologies, but the use cases for such will become more refined, better understood, and clearer in the value added beyond the marketing-driven branding of simply using AI/ML (especially the generative kind).

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

Modeling is still a key skill for BPM practitioners, even though the AI/ML-fueled capability of modeling tools to generate models is advancing steadily. This is because BPM modeling languages can still model complex behaviors better than the tooling can (at least for now), which requires a minimal understanding of the key semantics of the modeling languages to be able to read models and an even deeper understanding to create models or to refine generated ones. (As is often heard about AI/ML, it will not replace one’s job so much as the ability to use it well will become a prerequisite for one’s job.) Incorporation of more and more AI/ML means that BPM, typically built on using discrete data and deterministic logic, will be more and more built on using probabilistic data and fuzzy logic, which raises more challenging design issues and the importance of math in all of this (e.g., AI/ML measurements like Precision, Recall, and F1).

The advent of Agentic AI brings new design patterns into play that answer these challenges. In addition, AI/ML is making more and more unstructured data/document types accessible, but requires understanding these things as vector datasets and using knowledge graph-based approaches to not just extracting information but giving it the appropriate contextual meaning. The use of LLMs (or smaller varieties) becomes more critical as generic public models will give generic (and perhaps hallucinatory or biased) results, but these can be narrowed and tailored for further resolution through the joint use of domain-specific models as a new design pattern.

Next, as has been happening for some time now, the importance of data analytics and the application of data sciences will continue to grow, especially as AI/ML makes even more data accessible and subject to analyses. The importance of using or at least understanding technologies like Excel, SQL, and Python continue to be key. A strong BPM practitioner should house a budding data scientist in this age of data’s ascendancy relative to that of process.

Finally, the advent of cloud technologies and micro-services make very fine-grained designs possible and easier to do (e.g., REST services running as Lambda jobs in AWS Cloud), which present challenges for building stateful applications out of stateless services.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The resources listed elsewhere in this set of posts are better than anything I could assemble. I would simply add that BPM has always been, and still is, a discipline more than just a set of enabling technologies, and as such, requires a steady dedication to the craft and a commitment to being curious and to always be learning. My one suggestion is that Agentic AI, which combines agent-like behaviors and AI/ML use cases into new design patterns, becomes a key point of learning as it will become more prevalent in BPM applications. Here is an example of a conference on using AI/ML in BPM that I attended and spoke at: https://agenticage.ai/.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

BPM technologies have become highly efficient, so skills at finding efficiencies are waning in importance, replaced by skills at finding effectiveness, which is why AI/ML’s ascendancy is so timely as it is very powerful in this regard. With processing already being so fast and efficient, it is becoming more relevant to ask are the outcomes it produces as good as such can be. RPA is an example of this, as it has already paid off in extending the utility of legacy systems and midwifing successor technologies, so initial RPA skills are giving way to AI/ML usage skills.

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Prof. Marlon Dumas

Marlon Dumas is Professor of Information Systems at University of Tartu and Chief Product Officer at Apromore – a company dedicated to developing process mining and AI-driven process optimization software. While continuing to grow the Apromore product, he conducts a research backed by the European Research Council with the mission of developing AI-based techniques for automated discovery of business process improvement opportunities. He is a widely published researcher, having co-authored over 350 scientific articles, 10 patents, and a textbook (Fundamentals of Business Process Management) used in more than 400 universities worldwide.

WWW: Company website
WWW: LI profile

What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

There are currently two major forces clashing in the field of BPM.

On the one hand, there is a strong demand for ROI. Business leaders expect BPM initiatives to consistently deliver measured business value in rather short timeframes (not measurable value, but measured value).

On the other hand, the rapid evolution in AI technology is creating new and enhanced possibilities for driving process change and improvement. In particular, GenAI and agentic AI are opening a very wide spectrum of new automation affordances.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

At any given point in time, there might be hundreds of points in an end-to-end process where deployment of GenAI or agentic AI can add business value. And that is just in one process! When you look at an entire organization, the number of process improvement investments that potentially can add value is in the order of thousands.

From this vast space of improvement opportunities, BPM teams need to pick the ones that will predictably deliver the high ROI that business leaders demand.

So what do we need? We need the ability to evaluate the impact of improvement opportunities rapidly and reliably. We need tools and methods to locate the largest improvement opportunities in our processes and to quantify the improvement magnitude we can get from each of those opportunities. In other words, we need digital process twins that allow us to reliably simulate the impact of changes across one or more processes.

This is why I have no doubt that data-driven analysis (e.g. process mining) combined with simulation, are the key capabilities that BPM teams need to acquire now, if they have not done so yet.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I recently gave a talk summarizing the state of the art in digital process twins and data-driven simulation in a webinar of the Auto-Twin consortium. It introduces the basic concepts and techniques in the field with pointers to tools.
https://youtu.be/LRVP0uAe55M?si=RxuvivSfMlVfzKgP

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Manual process mapping is losing relevance. We are seeing new approaches to process mapping and process understanding that combine automated process discovery (process mining) and LLMs to create semantically-rich models.

Agentic AI is in hype mode. Beware of big promises in this space. Stick to pragmatic approaches where agents are used to semi-automate specific tasks or small workflows within broader processes, under human supervision.

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Prof. Mahendrawathi ER

Mahendrawathi ER is a full Professor and the Head of the Enterprise Systems Laboratory in the Information Systems Department, Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember, Surabaya, Indonesia. She specializes in Business Process Management, Enterprise Resource Planning, and Supply Chain Management and has written books in all three domains. Her research interests include entrepreneurial process management, inclusive business process management and digital transformation. Her research has been published in various academic journals. She is passionate about applying process-oriented approaches to empower individuals and organizations to drive positive societal impact and contribute toward achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.

Since November 2024, Mahendra has served as an Advisor on Business Process Management for Naima Sustainability. She has been actively promoting BPM adoption in Indonesia through speaking engagements and consultancy services for both government agencies and private companies.

Additionally, she is one of the founders of the Indonesia Business Process Management Association (IBPMA) – https://sites.google.com/view/ibpma/id

WWW: LI profile
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@mahendrawathierawan

What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

The global megatrends demand that the BPM community adapt to different challenges and be prepared to answer it with a different approach, skills and mindset.

My answer comes from my experience as an academic from a country where BPM is not (yet!) as popular as in other parts of the world and my research on Inclusive BPM. The megatrends potentially amplify existing inequalities and create new challenges for marginalized communities. Climate change may disproportionately impact vulnerable populations. Demographic shifts require us to design processes that are inclusive and accessible to all. Digital technologies and AI can amplify the digital divide and exacerbate biases if not implemented thoughtfully.

Therefore, process management must evolve to be more context-aware, equitable, and ethical. Organizations must:
• Tailor BPM Approaches: Develop context-specific BPM solutions that are tailored to the unique needs and challenges of the communities they serve, particularly those at the bottom of the pyramid, marginalized groups, and those facing gender inequality.
• Address Systemic Inequalities: Use BPM as a tool to challenge and address systemic inequalities by designing processes that create opportunities for those who are often excluded.
• Prioritize Ethical Considerations: Ensure that BPM implementations prioritize the rights and well-being of vulnerable populations, actively working to avoid unintended harm and promote positive outcomes.

To adapt to this new reality, organizations must embrace a new approach to BPM that is rooted in inclusivity, social responsibility, and ethical conduct. Process management must become a strategic enabler of organizational resilience, agility, and long-term value creation in a rapidly changing world for all people, irrespective of origin and/or condition.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

Building on the need for inclusive and responsible BPM, I think these are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes for different BPM roles in 2025:

I. BPM Leader (Manager, Director, VP of BPM/Process Excellence)
Skills:
• Strategic Vision: Ability to align BPM initiatives with broader organizational goals and social responsibility.
• Communication and Influence: Ability to communicate the importance of inclusive BPM and to influence decision-makers.
• Ethical Governance: Knowledge of ethical frameworks and best practices for AI and data management.

Techniques:
• Stakeholder Engagement: Facilitating discussions and gathering input from diverse stakeholders, especially those often marginalized.
• Impact Measurement: Implementing metrics to track the social and environmental impact of BPM initiatives.

Behaviors/Attitudes:
• Commitment to Equity: A genuine belief in the importance of creating a more just and equitable world.
• Openness and Humility: Willingness to listen to feedback, learn from others, and adapt approaches as needed.

II. Business Process Architect/Owner
Skills:
• Contextual Design: Ability to tailor processes to specific community needs and cultural nuances.
• Bias Detection: Ability to identify potential biases in process design and to develop mitigation strategies.
• SDG Integration: Understanding of the Sustainable Development Goals and ability to incorporate them into process design.

Techniques:
• Participatory Design: Co-creating processes with community members and end-users.
• Value Stream Mapping with a Social Lens: Analyzing value streams to identify opportunities to create social and environmental value.

Behaviors/Attitudes:
• Empathy and Cultural Sensitivity: Deeply understanding the experiences and perspectives of diverse communities.
• Commitment to Social Responsibility: A sense of responsibility for creating processes that benefit both the organization and society.

III. Process Analyst and Methodologist
Skills:
• Data Analysis for Equity: Ability to use data to identify and address biases in existing processes.
• Responsible AI Implementation: Knowledge of ethical AI principles and practices.
• Impact Assessment: Ability to quantify the social, environmental, and economic impacts of process changes.

Human-centered skills:
• Empathy and Active Listening: Ability to deeply understand the experiences and perspectives of individuals involved in the process.
• Qualitative Data Gathering: Expertise in conducting interviews, observations, and focus groups to gather insights into human needs and pain points.
• Process Mapping with a Human Lens: Ability to visualize processes from the perspective of the people involved, identifying areas of friction, confusion, or frustration.
• Accessibility Standards: Knowledge of accessibility standards to ensure that processes are inclusive and usable by everyone.

Techniques:
• Empathy Mapping: Creating visual representations of user needs, feelings, and motivations to inform process design.
• Customer Journey Mapping: Mapping out the end-to-end customer experience, identifying touchpoints and opportunities for improvement.
• Participatory Process Design: Involving stakeholders directly in the process design to ensure that their needs are met.
• Human-Centric BPM: Focuses on improving the human aspects of the process while designing the workflow. This includes user-friendly interfaces and considering the human element.

Behaviors/Attitudes:
• Advocacy for Fairness: Proactively seeking ways to make processes more equitable and inclusive.
• Curiosity and Open-Mindedness: A genuine desire to understand the human side of processes.
• Advocacy for User Needs: A commitment to advocating for the needs of process users and ensuring that their voices are heard.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

To learn the fundamentals of BPM, I recommend two books:
• Marlon Dumas, Marcello La Rosa, Jan Mendling and Hajo Reijers, 2018, Fundamentals of Business Process Management. Also, the videos from the four professors widely available via YouTube.
• Mathias Weske, 2024, Business Process Management Concepts, Languages, Architectures.

Follow the BPM thought leaders on LinkedIn, such as Michael Rosemann, Jan vom Brocke, Caspar Jans, and many others.

I would also encourage you to read more on universal design and ability by design concepts to apply it to process design.

If you want to be part of learning, discussing and formulating Responsible BPM, I would like to invite you to join us in Seville for Responsible BPM Forum https://www.bpm2025seville.org/calls/responsible-forum/

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I believe some of the basic skills about process will remain, but certainly some must be enhanced or extended with the latest technology.

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Michael Fox

Michael Fox is a Managing Director at Action Advisory. He also runs a Process Nerd Podcast on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@miketheprocessnerd

WWW: LI profile

What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

I believe AI has become pertinent in the delivery of process improvement. It’s allowing analysts to go further and starting to decrease the requirement for very technical implementations. It’s also allowing it to happen at speed and scale. I’m currently implementing an ERP for a customer in Rapid Platform. ChatGPT has helped me construct the database structures and align the processes in a way that makes sense for business use, and then implement them. I’ve been able to do 95% of this as a non-technical analyst, basically eliminating the need for deep technical expertise from a developer.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

How various processes come together and affect one another is more critical than ever. Getting the basics right before getting technical. For example, it’s plausible for a procurement process to impact that of production. Work orders should be created when a procured set of items is received. This is the overlap of business functions that process cuts through.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The APQC and SCOR frameworks help show the process angles of various business functions, as well as understanding business and the people in them (The E-Myth and 5 Dysfunctions of a Team have been recent good reads).

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I think the way we traditionally think about process improvement delivery is going to take a drastic shift. The skills required to implement a process are consolidating.

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Prof. Renata Gabryelczyk

PhD, DSc, an Associate Professor at the University of Warsaw. She is Head of the Department of Management and Information Technology at the Faculty of Economic Sciences, University of Warsaw. Her academic experience includes involvement in research projects, research fellowships at several universities in Germany and Austria, and numerous publications in national and international publishers. Her research interests include business process management, performance management, facility management, and IT applications. She is a member of the program board of the Polish Certificate of BPMN at the Polish Academy of Sciences, a member of Polish Scientific Society of Economic Informatics, a member of the Technical Committee for Facility Management of the Polish Committee for Standardization, and a member of Polish Chapter of AIS (PLAIS). She serves as Managing Editor in the Central European Economic Journal and as Senior Editor in the Information Systems Management journal.

WWW: LI profile

What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

Global megatrends reinforce existing BPM applications while simultaneously creating new challenges for BPM. Sometimes, these challenges are somewhat imposed—such as in the areas of climate change and sustainability, where regulatory pressure, like ESG requirements, forces greener processes and the monitoring of environmental performance.

In the context of demographic shifts, it is crucial to highlight workforce transformation and population aging, which may lead to shortages of skilled labor, particularly those capable of distinguishing reliable AI-generated content from noise. BPM can play a key role here in managing knowledge within business processes. I believe that in the future, the most sought-after professionals will be those who can assess the credibility and reliability of information.

To navigate these megatrends, organizations must adopt a more adaptive BPM approach—one that is both flexible and secure, built upon well-established architectures of processes. Organizations must understand the timeless truth that technology alone does not drive economic outcomes—process changes do.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

The greatest real business value comes from combining strategic, analytical, and technological competencies. Technology should not be implemented just because it is trendy or because others are using it, but because it supports the execution of the strategy and its impact can be measured. Additionally, a deep understanding of the industry and the specific nature of the organization, along with systems thinking and interdisciplinarity, play a crucial role. Since interdisciplinarity requires people from different areas to communicate effectively, soft skills are becoming increasingly valuable.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

As an academic teacher, while also highlighting how the university curriculum should evolve, I believe that we should continue providing students with a strong foundation supported by high-quality textbooks, case studies, highly cited research articles featuring the latest findings, and reputable online courses. However, to foster holistic thinking, connect strategy with technology, and solve real organizational problems, collaboration between academia and business—along with access to real data—is more crucial than ever.

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Paul Holmes-Higgin

Dr Paul Holmes-Higgin, Fellow and co-founder of Flowable. Previously, as co-founder and CPO of Alfresco Paul brought Activiti to the fore of the company’s innovation. A long-time Open Source advocate, he believes it has an important role to play in making today’s innovation more widely available. His PhD and background in AI gives him a deep understanding of the opportunities and realities of Machine Learning. Paul sees innovation around the standard models of BPM as the best way to bring together his passions for human-centred software and intelligent automation in today’s highly dynamic business and social environment.

WWW: https://flowable.com
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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

Many of us hope that businesses will consider their impact on the climate, but recent political changes have [heavily edited rant] shown that Big Tech billionaires and others are more motivated by wealth accumulation. AI will continue to consume significant energy and water resources, even with smarter training approaches – and this translates to high financial cost of use at scale. In turn, this means that business can optimize their bottomline by not throwing everything at AI services (thereby indirectly reducing their climate impact). Instead, they can use BPM and Case Management (e.g. CMMN) tools to manage appropriate and allowable use of AI services in specific contexts. Modern open source process and case engines can scale massively with low compute resources, ensuring their impact, both on finance and climate, are not a primary concern.

AI, along with demographic and other technology shifts, is ushering in a period of unpredictability and volatility for businesses and employees. This is also where BPM and CM tools can be a benefit by digitizing business processes, all the while allowing well-designed implementations to be agnostic about the AI service they can use in the future, as well as providing auditable guard-rails and human oversight for the emerging AI offerings. This can be even to the extent of A/B testing of AI offerings and parallel outcome validation. Of BPM technologies, CMMN is the ideal open standard container for AI-based automation of business applications.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

Something that BPM practitioners should already be doing as best practice – building for change and the ever more rapid iteration of business applications. Hands-on experimentation with AI services is critical to implement their use in ways that are robust, reliable and regulatory sound; evolving new patterns for blending traditional services, AI and human interaction.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Books on the current, rapidly changing field of AI are out of date before they’re published, however, getting an understanding of the basics provides a valuable point of reference. The fundamentals were being defined decades ago, so even a 25 year-old free book such as http://www.macs.hw.ac.uk/~yjc32/project/ref-NN/Gurney_et_al.pdf allows you to get deep enough into some of the math(s) and concepts without the complex architectural aspects of current GenAI melting your brain.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Personally, I think much of RPA, Process Mining and Analytics gets squeezed by the use of AI. Though, there’s still a place for some of that technology as an efficient runtime for well-understood use cases, for cost and predictability reasons. Otherwise, it’s too early to say what other significant areas AI is going to help optimize the definition and execution of business activities!

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Prof. Thomas Hildebrandt

Thomas Hildebrandt has since 2018 been full professor at the Department of Computer Science, Copenhagen University and founder of the research section for Software, Data, People and Society. Thomas has been working as PI and co-PI on inter-disciplinary research and development projects jointly with industry partners in the area of technology and methods for business and workflow management systems for more than 20 years and has and has been a senior PC member of the BPM Conference for several years. Thomas initiated the research on DCR Graphs in 2008 and has since then led the research in collaboration with his research groups and Morten Marquard, the CEO at DCR Solutions. Thomas is also an active speaker on AI and digitalization for industry and public sector organisations and is member of the Danish Standards group for AI, who is part of the European (CEN/CENELEC) and Global (ISO) standardization bodies.

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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

The megatrends are at the same time making BPM even more relevant than before, but also challenge how we think of and implement BPM. Climate change and the demographic shifts obviously increase the need for more efficient business processes, not only with respect to speed but also with respect to energy efficiency.

Digital technologies and AI enable automation in BPM, but organizations must careful to select sustainable solutions. Using the new energy hungry technologies based on large artificial neural networks will neither be a sustainable nor a reliable solution to process automation. However, there is still a huge potential in implementing no-code solutions that will allow organizations to take ownership on their digital processes in a trustworthy and maintainable way.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

A crucial skill will be to be able to know which techniques to use for which problems, in particular the different types of AI, but also the different kinds of approaches to digitalization and automation of business processes and decisions. We have for 50 years been too focused on business process management based on process flow graphs that gets too rigid and difficult to maintain. There is now a new generation of rule and event-based no-code business process management technologies that enable domain experts to.take ownership of their and paves the way for flexible hyper automation that can be adapted when business processes needs to be changed.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The old approach to business process management and automation is still dominant in the literature and online courses. I am recommending the excellent book Enabling Flexibility in Process-Aware Information Systems Challenges, Methods, Technologies written by Manfred Reichert , Barbara Weber https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-642-30409-5 to all my students and also use it for teaching and thesis supervision. The book lays a great foundation both for the classical imperative approach but also the challenges in making flexible business process prepared for change and the declarative approach to BPM. However, the book is now more than 12 years old, so it does not cover the latest developments where we now have mature design and execution tools for declarative process management, such as the tools from DCRSolutions.net that are embedded in full scale enterprise information management systems such as KMD WorkZone (https://www.kmd.net/press/press-releases/nec-collaboration-brings-kmd-workzone-to-the-united-kingdom) from NEC. The approach behind the tools are described in a large number of research papers that can be found mainly in the BPM conference series https://bpm-conference.org/ but also at DCRSolutions.net.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

A crucial skill that never stop being relevant is the skill to describe the activities, goals and rules of your business in a clear and unambiguous way. This also includes describing scenarios and simple ideal ways to perform a process. However, with mature declarative process design and execution tools it is less relevant to learn how to model very complex BPMN processes, since they can more easily be described in a maintainable and adaptable way using a declarative approach. A hyped skill is that of “prompt engineering”, which does not really deserve the term engineering, since it is not based on any kind of exact or reliable methods.

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Martin Holling

Industrial Engineer with 25+ years of experience in Business Process Management from operational implementation and improvement over QM, strategic development, process design and consultancy mainly in global corporations from small to more than 400.000 employees, focusing on Culture, people and continual improvement. Making use of broad experience in QHSE auditing, process documentation and project management implementation.

For further information about me and my ideas on BPM, you can have a look at both my LinkedIn profile and my website: https://living-processes.de/home-en/

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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

All these global megatrends do have one impact on people and business in common: They force people, culture and business to get more and more flexible and adapt to change. This is happening faster and faster, more and more profound so people feel more and more uneasy with their future and how work will be going forward.

BPM/process management can support people during these fast changing times by providing clear frames, boundaries and guidelines on how to develop culture and business going forward to embrace the change and implement it in the daily work / develop clear strategies on moving on.

Nevertheless BPM in itself needs to provide enough flexibility to adapt to changes on a pretty fast pace. Stiff structures and “carved in stone” SOPs will not help but communication, collaboration and a common understanding of the need to have both flexibility and clear guidance will propel BPM into a bright future.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

Openness to change needs, clear communication and flexible collaboration skills are the number one skill. For sure also techniques like process documentation, process mining process automation and also the integration of AI into these areas will help, but they are all nothing if the BPM practitioner cannot transport these techniques into the mind of the users or even sell them to the management. The biggest skill need for BPM practitioners is project- and change management. Hard skill techniques can more easily be trained to people but soft skills and culture change is the hardest to achieve and takes the longest. But without it, BPM, automation and digitalization will fail over time.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Soft skills are best learned by collaborating, doing it and learning from communities. Take books and articles or maybe courses to learn the technological skills but implementing them, learning how to embrace change, how to collaborate and how to best transport ideas into the minds of the people is a longer task and involves a lot of communication, collaboration and trial and error with good best practice learnings. Use the communities to get to know how others did it and put your ideas and implementation task to the test.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Once AI has reached a point where transforming any spoken or written process description into a process model in any desired notation, documentation, digital workflow, RPA or process simulation, the skills of documenting and modelling processes will no longer be needed.

Although I can see some development into that direction at some BPM tool providers, we are not yet there, but I think this will be one of the useful implementations of AI in BPM.

Being a technical specialist will become more and more unimportant compared to the communication, collaboration and project-/change- management skills.

From my point of view the BPM practitioner really needs to develop more and more into a culture-, communication-, and management- role and move away from the technical expert to not being replaced by AI.

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Caspar Jans

Caspar is a seasoned BPM professional with 25 years of experience in various industries. From managing a center of excellence on BPM for a global manufacturing company, hosting a podcast on BPM and consulting large enterprises on the benefits of a process centric approach to being a Principal BPM Expert for Celonis, Caspar has been on both sides of the table on process management (and more). On top of that, Caspar is listed in the PEX Network Global Top 25 though leaders on Operational Excellence.

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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

The reality is becoming more complex by the year, partly because we start to understand better how the various parts that make the world go round fit and interact together. This also means that organisations need to deal with much more regulation than ever before and BPM is one of the best ways of dealing with this tsunami of legislation and regulation. AI and all of its related technological benefits enable an even better understanding of the interconnectedness of the various parts of an organisation and that’s why, at least in my view, we need a better fundament underneath our organisation (=BPM). No AI without PI (process intelligence).

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

Business analytics is still a required skill, but with the addition that the level of detail that a business analyst will have go down to has become much higher (and thus more complex). Process mining has made tremendous progress over the last decade and has established itself as a default transparency and analytics platform (basically pushing out traditional BI). The reason for this is that process mining can deliver the necessary level of details in order to quantify the benefits of process optimisation. Furthermore, change management and communication skills remain to be underrated in importance and ignored too much. Finally, skills around continuous improvement still remain incredibly useful as they help people to frame and execute proper process optimisations.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The book Process Intelligence in Action (by Lars Reinkemeyer) is a good place to start, as well as the BPM courses by Roger Tregear. The first twelve episodes of the BPM360 podcast will help you to understand the BPM adoption framework. The last thing to mention is the work that Mirko Kloppenburg is doing to make BPM more human-centric.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Although the art of creating a readable and concise process model is still required, the generic creation of process models is a skill that will be taken over by AI in the next year or two. Traditional business analyst skills (using Excel and BI) will also become obsolete in the near future due to a shift to process intelligence via mining, supported by AI.

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Sandeep Johal

Sandeep is a Managing Director & Principal Consultant at Nano Business Technology with over 15 years of Business Process Management and Digital Transformation experience, specifically in enterprise wide system implementation process design, process improvement, strategic sourcing, capability uplift, strategy alignment, thought leadership in energy, utilities & resources; finance; and government bodies across Australia, New Zealand, Middle East, and North America

Sandeep’s consulting takes him to both national and international destinations including the Americas, Middle East, New Zealand and the UK. He is often invited to speak at national and international conferences and is regarded as a contributor to the Business Process Management body of knowledge. He holds a Masters in Information Technology (BPM), an honours in Business Management and a diploma in Mechanical Engineering.

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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

We are living in a transformative era defined by two powerful forces: climate change and disruptive technologies. From unprecedented natural disasters to the rapid integration of AI-assisted productivity tools, these global megatrends are reshaping industries and societies alike. As a result, process management is evolving beyond traditional goals such as making operations faster, better, and cheaper. Today, the focus is increasingly on responsible and sustainable process management.

A Shift Towards Responsibility
In my years of advocating best practices in process management, I have always emphasised five critical success factors: Time, Cost, Quality, Risk, and Compliance. However, I now believe a sixth factor is essential: Responsibility.

This new dimension reflects an organisation’s strategic commitment to not only improve financial performance but also to advance environmental, social, and governance (ESG) goals. Responsible process management calls for decision-making that balances operational efficiency with a broader duty to stakeholders and the planet.

AI and Process Management
AI is undeniably the buzzword of the moment. While some fear its disruptive potential, others are harnessing its transformative power. One thing is certain—AI is reshaping organisational processes in profound ways.

Agentic AI, which refers to AI systems that can learn and act autonomously, is a prime example. At its core, however, Agentic AI is still a process—one that must be measured, configured, implemented, and improved, just like any other. The key difference? AI agents have the capability to learn and self-optimise, creating unprecedented opportunities for process management innovation.

Future-Proofing Organisations
Process management is not static; it evolves alongside global trends and technological advancements. As practitioners, we must stay agile, informed, and proactive in delivering value to organisations. By integrating responsibility and embracing AI-driven technologies, process management will remain a critical driver for organisational resilience and future growth.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

At the core of process management lies a balance of technical expertise and interpersonal skills. Practitioners must navigate complex information, collaborate with diverse stakeholders, and remain attuned to emerging trends. Success in this field demands four essential traits: analytical, curious, sensitive, and aware.

Analytical
Effective process management relies on the ability to interpret information from multiple sources, identify patterns, and use data to solve problems collaboratively. Analytical skills enable practitioners to uncover insights that lead to meaningful improvements in organisational processes.

Curious
Data alone often doesn’t tell the whole story. Curiosity drives practitioners to dig deeper, seeking a genuine understanding of the challenges organisations face. This desire to explore beyond the surface ensures that both tangible and intangible outcomes are addressed in process initiatives.

Sensitive
Beyond the technical aspects of process management lies the human element. Practitioners must recognise that behind every process are people with their own experiences and stories. Sensitivity to these dynamics fosters trust and collaboration, helping teams navigate the process management journey together.

Aware
Staying informed about global trends, industry shifts, and emerging technologies is crucial for maintaining credibility and delivering contemporary solutions. Awareness enables practitioners to approach problems with fresh perspectives and innovative strategies.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

BPM tool vendors such as Signavio, Celonis, and Apromore offer exceptional resources on their websites, making it easier for curious individuals to stay ahead in the evolving process management landscape. Many of these vendors provide free academy courses and educational materials that help practitioners and newcomers alike deepen their understanding of industry trends and best practices.

In addition to BPM vendors, RPA and automation solution providers, such as Microsoft, are also significant contributors to this space. Like their BPM counterparts, they offer a wealth of learning resources and training materials designed to help organisations leverage automation technologies effectively.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

The core skills of a Process Management Practitioner remain unchanged: they must be analytical, curious, sensitive, and aware. That fundamental expectation has not changed, nor is it likely to anytime soon.

However, what has evolved is the expectation around outputs and documentation.

Organisations today are increasingly impatient with traditional process-based documentation. The emphasis has shifted to a forward-looking focus on achieving the desired target state. Spending significant time and resources on detailed documentation for its own sake is no longer seen as valuable.

Fortunately, advancements in process mining technology are changing the game. These tools now automatically generate detailed process documentation, freeing practitioners to concentrate on more strategic activities. The emphasis is shifting to deeper analysis, problem-solving, and continuous improvement — the skills that truly deliver value.

As process management evolves, practitioners must adapt by staying laser-focused on outcomes, leveraging advanced technologies, and maintaining their analytical curiosity. The ability to interpret insights, design efficient processes, and continually improve will remain valuable.

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Emiel Kelly

I have been working “in BPM” for more than 25 years. Most of his time as a consultant and trainer at a BPM software and consulting organization. I helped all kind of companies in their BPM journey. From companies with 5 employees till companies with thousands of employees. From city councils, till investment companies and manufacturers of satellites.
Eight years ago I decided I want to make more impact on one company and joined an Insurance company (5 minutes cycling from my home). Of course I am still ‘doing BPM’ but with a much higher impact because I am part of the team now and fully responsible for the results of my implementations of ‘process things’. I can’t get away with leaving a slide deck behind, anymore
As a hobby, I started my blog ‘Procesje.nl’ in 2011. The goal of this blog is to address the “nonsense” I run into in BPM world. Mainly brought with some irony, but always with the goal to help organizations make their processes perform better and stay away from the non value adding things.

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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

Before I’ll try to tell what I think will be the impact of all these aspects on BPM, I think I first should tell what is BPM in my perspective.

To me BPM is, for each process in your organization, a few combined cycles in which you design, implement, monitor, adjust, measure, analyze and redesign a process. I wrote more about this in one of my blogs: https://procesje.blogspot.com/2016/05/customers-dont-care-about-bpm-cycles.html

 

 

 

 

 

BPM; what it is, didn’t change since the Sumerians, but how you can do it changed a lot, of course. Not the less by technology.

So let’s start with some AI. Even my 6 year old daughter can tell this will have a big impact on different aspects of BPM.

In my BPM cycles, “Execution” is on top for a reason. Simply because that’s the most important part of a process. Without executing a process, you don’t have to worry about anything else.

I think AI can have a very big impact on executing a process. Especially in combination with the inner cycle of “monitoring” and “adjusting”. Combined with the digitalization of data, I think in some industries this will lead to big changes. And it already did. For example in production processes. Sensors are measuring the progress of cases and when some cases in the process are “out of goal” AI will sense it and adjust some robots. The good old Andon chord can be brought to the museum, I am afraid.

The self-driving car is a great example of AI combined with my cycles. It executes a trip where the goal might be “Arrive in Amsterdam at least at 17:15”. The goal would be the same for a human driver, but now AI is responsible (in combination with some metal and plastic). During the trip, AI continuously monitors. Of course the road and traffic but also if the desired goals will be reached (will we be in Amsterdam at 17:15?). If not, it analyzes all kind of options to still reach the goal and might adjust the execution. Like a different route or changing the speed. Just like a human driver would do. After the trip all data can be analyzed to learn to improve for the next ride; the outer cycle. This might lead to changes on the car, the way routes are planned, etc.

So yes, AI and digitalization have a large impact on the HOW of BPM. Not on the why.

Talking about the outer ‘’process improvement” cycle; we’ve seen lots of implementations of AI already to support that. For example good old process mining. And that only gets better in analyzing a process and come up with improvement proposals. Hopefully that will help us to get rid of the useless process models is see often: https://procesje.blogspot.com/2016/05/process-models-really-helpful-for.html

The aspect of “digital technologies” is a big driver for all this of course. Without sensors and digital data, the self-driving car will go nowhere.

But “simple” ways of digitalization has had its impact on BPM for decades. From OCR (do you still remember how amazed we were?), to QR codes, to fancy dashboards, to chatbots; all kinds of “digitalizing the analog” that has a big impact on how processes can be executed, managed and improved nowadays.

Another one big impact of AI on BPM, but more on organizations and their customers is the use of AI by criminals. It’s so easy to create content to fool you and get you into (financial) trouble. Thinking about that, maybe that’s the biggest impact we might see. You always have to be aware if things are real or getting fooled. I think this will costs organizations a lot of effort and money. First of all for protection and security but also to fix things when their customers were fooled and thought they were interacting with your organization. I see it at my the company I work for; we spend a lot on be prepared for security breaches. Time and money we cannot spend on developing better products, services and processes for our customers.

BPM and climate change? BPM and demographic shifts? I think I’ll talk about that in the context of the next question.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

First of all; don’t forget that processes are just a means; a means to deliver a product or a service.

Also don’t forget that (what most of us call) BPM is also a means; a means to make those processes perform.

Without customers and their need for the result of those processes, those processes aren’t needed at all. Let alone managing them.

So I think a very important skill when you are into BPM (but most wouldn’t call it a BPM skill) is understanding what problems your (future) customers have. Always start at the end; what problems should our (future) processes solve?

Brings me back to AI. Especially GenAI. I think GenAI really could help to develop new processes, starting from the problem of (future) customers.

GenAI can help you find out if it is a problem many have, come up with scenario’s to solve it and maybe even select the best scenario. Next, based on that scenario what a proper process result could be to solve the problem. And from there what the process to deliver that result could look like. Some kind of “result based process design by GenAI”.

You could save millions on Big4 powerpoint slides in hours!

This means also understanding the aspects from the previous questions; climate change and demographic shifts. This will definitely impact problems of customers. The might give opportunities or even make your processes obsolete. So continuously monitoring if you are doing valuable things; a skill that shouldn’t be ignored.

Talking about saving; one important skill for me in BPM is ‘finance’; understanding the benefits and cost of processes and all actions and tools to manage and improve them.

In the end companies are not hobbies, so understanding the financial impact of “process things” is important for a BPM practitioner, in my opinion. I’ve seen many time that all kind of process inititiatives were started without understanding the value. So “finance”; don’t underestimate that skill.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

To be honest; I think I turned a little rusty to answer this question, because I am not hardcore into BPM anymore (do you remember the fun days of all the debates on the BPM.com forum?).

Of course the insurance company I work for now has processes, we try to manage and improve them, but I wouldn’t call my self a “BPM guy” anymore.

But I love the step I took. Because when I was in BPM consulting and training, it was never for my own processes. Of course my advices where the best, but still I missed the feeling with the real processes of the companies I worked for.

So I think domain knowledge is something very valuable when it comes to helping organizations with BPM (maybe I should have noted this at the skills question)

So resources; for me it’s mainly some groups and people on Linkedin. From there some blogs and books.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Everything in me shouts old school process modeling! But that wouldn’t be completely fair.

Actually I mean making models that cost a lot of effort to produce, but don’t really solve a problem because:
– They are too general, so everyone agrees (and that’s not what you want)
– They don’t help you understand why a process doesn’t perform (see blog mentioned above)
– Modelers where taught not to use more than 5 activities so the model doesn’t tell anything
– The method (e.g. BPMN) was more important than understanding and improving the process,
– It was done by external consultants without much participation of the working class heroes.
– …

But who am I? If you think modeling your processes could help, just do It.

GenAI; hold my beer.

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Hanneke Loefs-Mos

Hanneke’s motto is “Embrace the Chaos”, creating structure during transitions. She focuses on processes, finance, and systems with a human touch by implementing Business Process Management (BPM) as the crucial link between strategy and operations.

Her diverse background spans Startups (CFO Laevo exoskeletons) and global Corporates (Schiphol Airport/ ETG commodities) across various industries, ensuring a pragmatic and holistic approach. She holds an Executive Master in Finance and Control (EMFC) and is a Black Belt Six Sigma, currently operating as an independent professional.

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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

Climate change will disrupt supply chains. To mitigate risks, organizations will need to build in flexibility (slack) since efficiency alone (e.g. Just-in-time production) won’t be enough to ensure reliable output. It’s also essential to integrate sustainability into processes to reduce environmental impact and comply with regulations such as the CSRD.

Demographic Shifts: Aging populations and skill shortages will drive the need for further optimization and automation. To ensure knowledge transfer from retiring employees, clear documentation will be key.

Introduction of GenAI will increase the need for mature process management. Businesses will need a solid foundation in process understanding and data management for GenAI to be effective. A new model notation might emerge to facilitate clear instructions and well-defined restrictions needed for GenAI processes.

A Modular Process Architecture is essential for continuous change without disrupting operations. This modular approach enhances agility and flexibility, allowing businesses to quickly adapt to new technologies and changing market conditions.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

Develop a multidisciplinary skillset that breaks through traditional silos and encourages cross-functional collaboration. This includes knowledge in areas like AI, Data, Mining and Risk Management. Aligning with various disciplines ensures a holistic approach.

Aim for pragmatic and achievable results rather than striving for perfection. BPM Professionals often have a “nerdy” specialist image, which can lead to them being surpassed by the organization and missing opportunities to add value.

Foster a culture of innovation and creativity within the company. Encourage employees to experiment with new ideas and approaches to drive continuous improvement. Embrace the concept that learning about AI involves actively engaging and experimenting with AI technologies.

Enhance your communication and empathetic skills to understand the intrinsic motivations of people within the organization. Facilitate their needs to unlock their full potential.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

A startup internship can be incredibly beneficial for employees from larger corporations, as Industry 5.0 emphasized agility and flexibility. The exposure to disruptions with minimal resources fosters a culture of innovation and adaptability. When done right, the employees become antifragile, positively influencing the development of plans and frameworks that are suited for a complex and ever-changing context.

“Successful Architecture Implementation” by Roland by Roland Woldt. As a Beta Reader I can confidently say this book is a must-read for all Business Process Management professionals as a practical guidance for Architecture implementation.

“Digital Transformation Success” by Michael Schank emphasizes the importance of the Process Inventory Framework in achieving alignment and delivering results by bridging organizational silos and enhancing operational efficiency.

“Ethiek rondom gebruik van Data en Algoritmes in de Organisatie” online course by Dr. Stefan Buijsman (Dutch only). It explores the ethical challenges and considerations of using data and algorithms in organizations, emphasizing transparency, accountability, and responsible AI practices.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Lean and Six Sigma, which focusses on eliminating waste, reducing variation, and improving process efficiency. They are highly structured and data-driven methodologies that have been incredibly effective in the past.

Though both methods will always have their place with regards to process optimization, the emerging demands of Industry 5.0 call for a broader and more flexible skillset which emphasizes more on complexity, integration and agility.

Next to that I am curious to learn if Process Mining will become more accessible to SMEs as predicted.

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Prof. dr. Amy Van Looy

Prof. dr. Amy Van Looy holds a Ph.D. in applied economics. Before entering academia, she worked as an IT consultant. Being an associate professor at Ghent University, she coordinates the research cluster of “Process orientation” at the Department of Business Informatics and Operations Management. She teaches, among others, courses on research methods, process management, technology innovation and social media. Amy Van Looy is the recipient of the “Highest Award for Achievement” at the Dale Carnegie Consulting Program in 2007, the “Award for Best Contribution” at the OnTheMove Academy in 2010, the faculty’s “PhD Tutor Award” in 2022, as well as paper nominations (e.g., BPM2018, HICSS2025) and paper rewards (e.g., BPM2019). She was nominated in the top-10 for “Young ICT Lady of the year 2014” by the Belgian magazine DataNews, and was recognized as a tech role model by the non-profit “InspiringFifty Belgium” in 2020 (i.e., for being one of Belgium’s 50 most inspiring women in technology).

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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

The discipline of business process management (BPM) can benefit from global megatrends in two ways: externally and internally. On the one hand, global megatrends represent external pressures (e.g., also showcasing implications for more customer centricity, sustainability, agility, etc.), requiring organizations to apply BPM in order to properly act in evolving business environments. For instance, in response, organizations can critically rethink their way of working by following the typical BPM lifecycle (of process modelling, deployment, monitoring and optimization). On the other hand, global megatrends offer new opportunities to improve the actual use of BPM itself by advancing the underlying methods and techniques in each phase of the BPM lifecycle.

Overall, while artificial intelligence (AI) and other digital technologies are entering the workspace and affect how employees operate and perform tasks, the BPM discipline provides a more structured and methodological approach to reconsider the related process changes and innovations. For instance, BPM strongly encourages organizations to look at entire end-to-end value streams, including strategic alignment and business-IT alignment lenses. BPM also helps organizations avoid ad-hoc projects that merely follow IT hypes rather than truly creating long-term sustainable business value.

Regarding the latter, BPM is turning more towards the idea of broadly interpreting the notion of sustainability. Not only economic sustainability counts. Voices are raised to reconsider the performance of specific business processes in a more responsible manner by looking at the entire triple bottom line, thus also including a process’ environmental and social outcomes. This is because organizations experience varied pressures to perform, for which they not only need efficient and effective business processes but also environment-friendly processes and processes where employees feel surrounded and truly appreciated. Nevertheless, until present, such wider interpretations of sustainability have often been limited to window dressing for the sake of corporate social responsibility or due to pure reporting reasons (e.g., for regulatory compliance only). In contrast, BPM can be applied to more profoundly reconsider business processes that turn out efficient from a profitable viewpoint, but also become greener and more socially aware. More specifically, our Western World suffers from a skill shortage (especially in terms of advanced digital skills) while employees are increasingly coping with burn-outs. In this regard, BPM can help organizations optimize their overall workload for reasons of inclusion and to obtain a better work distribution among all employees based on data-driven insights. Just one solution is to let employees focus more on specialized tasks rather than no-brainer tasks, which is where automation solutions (such a robotic process automation) play a role. Another solution is to reconsider global value chains by turning to a blockchain approach for obtaining more transparent, trusted and fair value chains, better recognizing the efforts of local farmers or enterprises who are often underpaid or underappreciated (also in the Global South). Nevertheless, this example directly hints at important trade-offs to be made in terms of this triple bottom line thinking since blockchain’s transparency also requires a lot of energy consumption, though.

In sum, I believe that the impact of global megatrends on an organization’s business value can be best assessed by carefully looking at all potential strategic and operational implications, such as the related adjustments in employee’s tasks and underlying value chains. In response, many BPM scholars have already started to investigate how BPM methods and techniques can better include large language models (e.g., for designing, measuring or optimizing processes). Other scholars are focusing more on reconsidering process performance to obtain greener processes that also bring along more employees’ and customers’ wellbeing. It is thanks to such a holistic approach that BPM can truly let organizations adapt themselves to new business realities.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

Digital literacy will become even more important in 2025. Global megatrends (to which the previous question is hinting) partly fit into the advancement of a digital economy, for which employees increasingly require digital skills. Although this is an overall need (and not necessarily limited to BPM practitioners), it entails a relevant inclusion risk for vulnerable people on the other side of the digital divide. Digital literacy implies general digital skills (such as critically assessing online information to decrease the risks of fake news and cyberattacks), but also advanced data-driven skills (such as analytics for deriving meaningful business insights and making informed decisions).

Regarding the BPM field in particular, BPM practitioners have always been the bridge between business people and IT staff, demonstrating skills related to change management and problem solving. Such boundary spanning role will become even more important given the following growing needs for BPM’s human talent. First, BPM practitioners need to be prepared for acting in more volatile business environments. We have already experienced the need for resilience in times of the unexpected COVID-19 lockdowns. Similarly, unforeseen changes to value chains will remain, among others due to increasing political instability and other environmental issues. Secondly, more strategic skills are useful to not only look at operational processes but also to critically reflect on the related business models (such as servitization, manufacturing-as-a-service). By looking at both operational and strategic levels, BPM practitioners can more accurately think about disruptive process changes, among other those triggered by digital technologies. Likewise, having innovation skills and interdisciplinary collaboration skills will become indispensable. Finally, given that 2025 will most likely enlighten us more regarding generative AI’s potential, I strongly encourage BPM practitioners to stay ahead of those AI skills for the sake of improving process modelling, improvement and performance management. Just one example is to learn how large language models can help in gathering and interpreting business requirements and process changes based on textual documentation (such as corporate documents, employee interviews, and online customer reviews). More broadly, generative AI can assist in taking meetings notes or decreasing administrative tasks for the sake of human specialization. In this light, AI skills will facilitate creating novel insight out of process data, possibly elevating process mining skills and techniques, and potentially also decreasing workloads.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I have recently published a handbook about the business opportunities related to emerging technologies, while also reflecting on process innovation by means of artificial intelligence, Internet of Things, augmented and virtual reality, digital twins, blockchain, 3D printing and biochips. This book is available at Springer since the summer of 2024 (https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-59770-1). It concerns a practitioner-oriented book covering interviews with scholars and reporting on various real-life case organizations that have rethought their way of working by digital technologies. Based on its layman’s writing style, this book is an interesting resource for getting inspired. Additionally, academic conferences related to business process management allow to get acquainted with the latest developments in the field, such as the International Business Process Management Conference in September, which will be organized in Seville this year.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I would not necessarily claim that certain BPM skills have become irrelevant or outdated. Instead, BPM activities will especially entail less manual labor and become more digitalized instead. For instance, conventional process methods or techniques (such as Lean and Six Sigma) can still be exploited to run daily business, but will cover much more data-driven support. Additionally, organizations increasingly need to consider how digital technologies may (or may not) provide them with new business opportunities, in addition to purely relying on conventional methods and techniques. Likewise, BPM practitioners should become more open to innovation and learn about exploration. Just a few examples relate to explorative or innovative methods and techniques to think out of the box, to do some experimentation, and to do storytelling. Additionally, methods and techniques that merely focus on the financial or economic value of business process outcomes should rather be replaced by alternatives that also measure the green and social performance of business processes to allow for a more responsible way of doing business. Such broadening in BPM’s scope would help safeguard our planet and keep an eye on wellbeing issues.

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Morten Marquard

Morten Marquard has dedicated his entire professional journey to addressing the challenges faced by knowledge workers, including lawyers, social workers, and other professionals dealing with complex work processes. The struggle to navigate these processes efficiently while complying with ever-changing laws and regulations has been a persistent issue. Traditionally, compliance has relied on laborious reading and understanding of lengthy paper-based documents—a cumbersome task that often hinders productivity.

Recognizing the need for a transformative solution, Morten embarked on a mission to leverage technology for the benefit of knowledge workers, not only enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of employees but also alleviating the burden of manual compliance checks and reducing stress levels.

Morten realized the limitations of using Business Process Model and Notation, BPMN, to streamline process digitalization as the rigidity of the processes failed to meet the requirements of end-users. It was during this critical juncture, approximately 15 years, that Morten collaborated with professor Thomas Hildebrandt, and together, they propelled the development of dynamic condition response graphs, DCR. This innovative approach has since been embraced by over 40 different customers, primarily in Denmark, with expanding reach into international markets such as Italy and the United Kingdom.

Morten’s journey exemplifies a commitment to pushing the boundaries of technology to empower knowledge workers, offering them a more streamlined and stress-free approach to managing their intricate work processes. The impact of his work extends far beyond national borders, contributing to a global shift in how organizations approach digitalization and compliance in the modern age.

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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

Edwards Deming once said, “If you cannot describe what you are doing as a process, you don’t know what you’re doing!” But still today, many organizations struggle to describe their processes correctly. Often, process models reflect an idealized “happy path” that do not match reality. Process mining has exposed this disconnect, revealing inefficiencies, compliance risks, and the heavy manual work required to bridge the gap.

Looking ahead, global megatrends—including climate change, demographic shifts, digital transformation, and AI—are forcing organizations to rethink how they manage processes. Due to an aging population, Europe faces a big labor shortage, making process efficiency and automation key for economic resilience. At the same time, AI-driven solutions must be energy-efficient. Generative AI, while powerful, is extremely energy-intensive, while symbolic AI provides explainable, transparent automation with much lower energy consumption.

BPM must move from rigid, static workflows to flexible, AI-assisted process models. The shift is already happening. As Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella recently pointed out, SaaS is dead, and business logic is moving into AI-driven agents. The process layer is no longer an afterthought—it’s becoming the glue between AI agents and business operations, making adaptation much easier without being locked into monolithic ERP or CRM systems.

With process mining, organizations can identify how work actually happens and optimize it without disrupting operations. AI can take this a step further—reading laws, regulations, and policies to extract digital rules that can be verified automatically. The goal? Automatic compliance. In financial services alone, AML (anti-money laundering) compliance costs billions every year, but is still not very effective. With the right BPM strategies, this burden can be reduced a lot.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

To create value in 2025, BPM practitioners must learn new skills that go beyond traditional process modeling.

Generative AI can help translate long, document-based processes into declarative process models that work as blueprints for AI-driven execution. It can also analyze regulations and identify which rules must be digitalized so computers can verify them automatically, making compliance much more efficient.

Processes are not static; they change over time. A mortgage approval process running for decades will need to adapt due to new regulations, economic shifts, and technology. BPM formalisms must support real-time adaptability even when processes are already running. With BPMN, this would be almost impossible, as its rigid structure makes modifying live processes complex and risky. Declarative models, on the other hand, allow for flexible adaptation without breaking compliance or execution.

Process mining shows how work actually happens in reality. BPM practitioners must connect these insights with declarative modeling to improve processes dynamically, instead of trying to force-fit work into predefined flows.

Beyond technical skills, BPM professionals need to challenge assumptions, work iteratively, and collaborate across disciplines. AI and automation will not replace BPM experts—but those who fail to adapt to an AI-driven future might struggle to stay relevant.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

For those looking to deepen their declarative BPM expertise, here are some key resources:
• https://documentation.dcr.design – Our portal with documentation, examples, videos, and articles on declarative process modeling and AI-driven BPM.
• Upcoming book by Thomas Hildebrandt & Co. – This book will introduce the DCR methodology for structuring process knowledge, showing how to extract insights beyond just event sequences.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

• BPMN – Overrated & Misleading
o BPMN has long been considered a standard, but process mining has shown that real-world processes don’t fit into rigid, predefined flows.
o People think they understand BPMN, but often get it wrong, leading to models that others cannot understand.
o It shifts focus away from actual work and makes compliance extremely difficult.

• The Myth of the “Perfect Process”
o Lars Reinkemeyer (Siemens, now Celonis) put it best: “There is no such thing as a happy path.” – https://www.celonis.com/customer-success-stories/siemens-digital-transformation-process-mining/
o Too much time is spent searching for the perfect process instead of focusing on solving real-world problems dynamically.

• Full Automation is Overhyped
o The best BPM strategies don’t replace humans but facilitate their work—ensuring tasks, approvals, and decisions happen at the right time. A process can be 100% automated while still relying on human input where needed.
o Ask yourself: How often do you face a broken process? Check your inbox. Every email received or sent is a sign of a process that could be facilitated by a computer.

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Derek Miers

Derek Miers is a well-known Industry Analyst and Technology Strategist, publishing a great many papers and product assessments. Derek worked as an independent BPM Industry Analyst from 1992-2010 when he joined Forrester Research. After 2 years as a leader of the BPM practice, he took on a leadership role to grow the Business Architecture practice – across these two domains he has published more than 60 research reports with in Forrester. He also made significant contributions to Forrester’s Customer Experience (CX) research, developing comprehensive methods, techniques and engagement practices around Target Operating Models and Business Transformation. In 2014 he became a Principal Consultant helping clients apply these methods to challenging change and transformation projects.

Within Gartner, Derek picked up the intelligent Business Process Management Suites (iBPMS) Magic Quadrant and Critical Capabilities (MQ/CC), before establishing the RPA MQ/CC efforts and more recently, the Enterprise Architecture Tools MQ/CC.

Over the years, he has carried out a wide range of consulting roles including establishing and facilitating change initiatives, running hundreds of training courses, undertaking detailed technology selection assessments and project-risk assessment studies. Other engagements have involved the provision of strategic consulting advice – from facilitating board level conversations around BPM and CX initiatives, through to establishing effective Centers of Expertise, and helping clients develop new business models.

Clients have included several Fortune 100 firms, major governmental organizations and NGOs.

His experience within the BPM community ranges back to the mid 80’s when he started developing process oriented approaches.He is co-author of the BPMN Modeling and Reference Guide (along with Dr Stephen White of IBM, the main author of that specification). He read Civil Engineering in New Zealand before entering the IT industry in the 70’s and completed an experimental MBA equivalent at London Business School. He has taught at INSEAD, Cass Business School (London), University of Linz, University of Stockholm and University of Porto.

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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

Climate change and demographic shifts will only exacerbate an already ultra-competitive work environment. However, the next shiny object on the horizon – some fancy new technology such as AI Agents or Process Mining – will not deliver any real sustainable change without your employees stepping up to the plate to make it happen.

That means you have to ENGAGE your people to want to change – to involve them in cocreating and reinventing how the organization delivers value. That usually means fundamentally rethinking from the outside-in what customers and external parties want/need rather than merely automating and existing set of steps.

The good news is that AI Agents (or is it Agentic-AI) and other technologies offer the opportunity to engage in that rethinking … but these technologies still need threading and weaving together with your workforce to create a viable (and sustainable) value proposition. So yes, orchestration is still very much needed and one only has to read the pages of LinkedIn to realize that many of the BPM vendors have a grip on how to organize that part (e.g. Camunda’s recent release). One thing that’s often missed in implementation is some deep thinking about the data that you will use to help train and focus the value delivery mechanisms.

But you still need to engage your people in developing a vision for how you are going to make that step change in customer value. One thing that hasn’t changed – the soft stuff (people engagement) is still the hard stuff – it’s mobilizing employee’s brains and thinking.

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Nathaniel Palmer

Nathaniel Palmer is the CEO of Infocap®, a leading innovator in Intelligent Automation technologies. He is a pioneer in automation and digital transformation, serving as Chief Architect to several of the largest and most complex initiatives across government and private industry, totaling over $3.5 Billion in research and development. He is a best-selling author, speaker, practitioner, and rated as the “#1 Most Influential Thought Leader in Business Process Management (BPM)” by independent research. He has co-authored 15 books on technology and business transformation including “Gigarends” released Feb’24 which reach #1 for AI on Amazon’s Hot New Releases and is the 2019 recipient of the “Marvin L. Manheim Award for Significant Contributions in the Field of Workflow” as well as the first individual awarded “Laureate in Workflow.”

WWW: www.infocap.ai
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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

Across various missions of sustainability, BPM can optimize processes to minimize waste, integrate relevant metrics into workflows, and ensure compliance with environmental standards as well as to prioritize energy-efficient operations or circular economy principles. But arguably the most impactful “gigatrend” is the shift to an aging population globally and regional declines in population growth. Regions seeing growth among younger, tech-savvy workforces while increasing come from areas outside of historically developed economies. This trend among others have already begun to shift workforce dynamics, customer expectations, and talent availability. BPM still offers a unique leverage point to help adapt processes to accommodate flexible work arrangements, automate repetitive tasks to offset labor shortages, and personalize customer-facing processes to meet diverse demographic needs.

Lastly, tech trends have an inescapable impact. Cloud-native capabilities and “Functions as a Service (FaaS)” accelerate process digitization, enabling real-time data and transparency but also demanding faster adaptation. AI transforms process automation, predictive analytics, and customer interactions, reducing manual effort while raising ethical and governance questions. BPM acts as a strategic enabler by aligning processes with these megatrends. It fosters resilience through continuous improvement, scenario planning, and agile process redesign, enhancing data-driven (albeit not necessarily algorithmic) decision-making, as well as integrating disparate systems, to foster agility in a hyper-connected world.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

Process Modeling and Optimization: proficiency in visual modeling—and my personal bias aside I will still argue for the triad of notations (BPMN, DMN, CMMN) —remain a critical skill for any process professional. Even in the face of GenAI or similar “automagical” means for generating process snippets, there remains an imperative to understand how to translate process complexity into well-formed process models. Low Code and “No Code” tools can replace time spent in front of a compiler, but this only hastens the need for modeling proficiency.

Decision modeling: beyond the competency in a particular methodology or notation (DMN, TDM, etc.), far too many BPM practitioners remain stuck in a procedural, “control flow” mindset and struggle to appropriately model business processes and business logic in the declarative, goal/policy-driven manner required for modern automation initiatives (i.e., how we leverage BPM in 2025 vs. 2005). This is both art and science and requires not only a shift in mindset but an understanding of the same methods and techniques for accurately defining deterministic rules and event-driven automation.

Process Mining (et al.): while admittedly tool-driven, process and task mining is de rigueur for any help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025. If you’re not doing it already, get on it!

Lastly are two wildcards, straddling the lines of skills and techniques, are Spatial Computing and Human-Centric Design (HCD). Spatial computing combines AR/VR, 3D mapping, as well as Digital Twin technologies and capabilities ultimately for the objectives of workflow optimization (via automation) and improved human-machine interaction. BPM practitioners should lean into this. Apply BPM lens to leveraging synergies across AR and digital twins to reduce errors, enrich training, and elevate productivity, as well as overlay digital instructions on physical assets and providing real-time performance insights. Future advancements in AI, robotics, and 5G/6G networks promise greater automation, but ethical considerations and workforce disruptions must be managed. This is a key role for the BPM practitioner and will not be satisfied by platforms alone.

Similarly, making the work done by humans more consistent, predictable, and less reliant upon subjective interpretation of policies and rules and by doing so simultaneously expanding the aperture for what is automatable, where digital workers and human workers use the same systems, follow the same rules, as well as are equally observable and accountable. This requires re-envisioning the structure of the task to be not a single, discrete unit of work, but business outcomes, and to remove the distinction between what supports a task and the task itself as well as who performs the work. Applying Human-Centric Design (HCD) reorients work processes around natural human thinking, making them more intuitive, consistent, and predictable. By reducing subjective interpretations of policies, workflows become standardized, ensuring both people and digital workers follow the same clear logic and interfaces. This shared environment increases observability and accountability, as every action is measured uniformly. HCD also shifts the lens from completing discrete tasks to achieving broader business outcomes, embedding support mechanisms within the workflow. This holistic approach removes boundaries between task and task support while enabling humans and digital workers to collaborate, expanding the scope of automation without compromising user experience.

Behaviors BPM Practitioners should follow:

Collaboration: taking the lead to facilitate collaboration across IT, operations, and company/program leadership to align processes with strategy. Be the integrator!

Curiosity and Adaptability: bring your intellectual curiosity to work by proactively exploring new technologies and trends to innovate processes, as well as embracing change and pivoting strategies as megatrends evolve.

Strategic Mindset: make viewing BPM as a business enabler, not just an operational fix, the new vibe in your organization. Understand how to (and do) champion your role as a BPM practitioner to deliver efficiency, agility, and innovation, ensuring organizations can pivot quickly, meet stakeholder expectations, and capitalize on emerging opportunities.

Empathy: Understanding stakeholder needs—employees, customers, and regulators—to design inclusive processes.

Books BPM Practitioners should read:

“Business Process Management: A Rigorous Approach,” by Martyn A. Ould (2005)

“Gigatrends,” by Palmer and Koulopoulos (2024)

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I may be less cynical than some colleagues, yet many of the core tenets of process management we have applied over the last 30 years have not only stood the test of time but continued to form the basis of effective process management. However, the rapid embrace of automation, analytics and digital-first strategies has diminished the demand for some traditional BPM capabilities — or approaches — including:

Generation after generation of manual diagrams, flowcharts, and binders of documentation have become rather obsolete. Today most teams today leverage cloud-based or collaborative BPM tools that offer version control, real time collaboration, and data driven insights.

Heavy frameworks and siloed methodologies based on rigid, linear project cycles (with little iterative feedback) or siloed roles are being blown away in favor of more agile, cross-functional approaches. Today, successful practitioners must instead partner fluidly with development, data analysts, and automation teams.

Expertise in legacy, on-prem BPM suites that do not have modern integration or automation capabilities may fall out of favor. Instead, knowledge of newer, low-code or no-code process-automation platforms have become key new skills.

Manual gathering of process metrics and spreadsheets powered by 60s tech versus real-time dashboards and automation (e.g., IoT, AI, or process mining powered) are becoming the standard for visibility and reporting. Although these old-school skills and techniques are neither useless nor irrelevant, organizations generally prioritize digital, collaborative and automated approaches to BPM, which necessarily are practiced by practitioners who embrace them.

Not Practically Applicable Yet (Hype):

Fully Autonomous AI-Driven BPM: we are on the cusp of Agentic AI delivering on the promise of the comprehensive business operation systems BPM evangelized over the last 20-years, but never truly delivered. AI isn’t delivering it yet either. Although AI+BPM already offers the capabilities needed to enhance processes in many ways previously out of reach, the reality is that fully self-managing systems lack maturity and require human governance. But by this time next year, that conversation will be different.

Quantum Computing in BPM: quantum applications within BPM or process optimization overall are at best experimental and not yet a reality for anything outside of the lab. Although it may be at least a decade before this is a practical consideration, the thought experiments around Quantum BPM by BPM practitioners will benefit both the thinker and chances for future adoption.

Metaverse-Based Process Management: VR/AR for BPM collaboration has a futuristic feel, which seems like it’s been just around the corner for years, yet still lacks widespread adoption in 2025. Although I don’t fully expect this to change this year, it is certainly closer to reach than quantum computing and worth considering of potential use cases.

Web3, Tokenization, and DAOs (Decentralized Autonomous Organizations): less hype than the other three concepts, Web3, tokenization, and Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs) can fundamentally reshape BPM by providing trustless automation, transparency, and innovative incentive structures. On-chain records maintain accountability and auditability, enabling processes to be automatically executed on blockchain networks through smart contracts. Today, multiple organizations can work together using the same source of truth, enabled by decentralized ledgers compliance and cross-entity workflows become as easy as it can get. Tokenization enables novel mechanisms for incentivization. Micro-transactions in tokens, for example, may reward tasks completed, or punish non-compliance. Software, content, outputs from the process can all be tokenized for fractional ownership and revenue sharing.

In addition, DAOs radically change governance: stakeholders vote on changes to processes and how resources are allocated, supporting new models of inclusive and transparent decision-making. From supply chain automation, healthcare data management, IT development bounties to even real estate tokenization, there are virtually endless use cases that can significantly improve from leaner operations, expedited settlements and proof of processes. Some of the near-term challenges include regulatory uncertainty, scalability issues, and technical complexities could be barriers to its widespread adoption. Yet BPM practitioners can take the lead to pilot projects with manageable scope, adopt existing DAO frameworks, and encourage cross-functional cooperation to address these problems. Web3 and DAOs are integrative visions for BPM’s future and can provide new efficiencies and collaboration models, leading to overall improved business results.

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Björn Richerzhagen

The trained businessman, business economist and business IT specialist is one of the most sought-after BPM experts. The BPM rationalist has been at the interface between departments and technology for two decades now and sees himself as a translator between the worlds. As a BPM consultant and trainer, he is OCEB and CBPP certified and accompanies process initiatives at company level as well as process automation projects as a workflow analyst.

In his private life, the family man is involved in numerous community / charity projects, enjoys traveling (Europe and Africa), listens to a lot of music (everything that has bass) and is an enthusiastic ocean sailor.

WWW: https://www.mi-nautics.com/
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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

We do see that most of our customers are aware of those megatrends. Climate change, for example, has created a new discipline of procedural analysis to ensure that process design fulfills environmental requirements and sustains used resources. The demographic shifts mentioned, especially in the western world, are foreseen as the drainage of knowledge from skilled workers. To uphold knowledge and experience in companies, process management, especially process documentation, is utilized to secure process related information at least. This interferes with another megatrend we see. A limited economic growth in most western countries results into cost cuts in many organizations. Hence, management tries to find ways to reduce the amount of effort it takes to discover, document and analyze processes. Often artificial intelligence is regarded as a savior and is applied to increase procedural improvements. Whether or not artificial intelligence can deliver, is to be evaluated in the future. For now, we don’t see an overall AI approach that eliminates process management as a whole. Today, we do see artificial intelligence rather as an endpoint – let’s call it a resource – that can be utilized in some processes. For now, process discovery, process documentation, process analysis, process design, process execution, process controlling can arguably not yet be fully replaced although it might be of help already.

In conclusion, we have seen megatrends passed by over the decades. Process Management remained relevant over the years. If you consider processes as a way to create value in your organization, process management will be there in the future.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

We still see that process management is only done for the sake of regulatory affairs in some companies. To create value, process management needs to be linked to strategic goals for the organization. This asks for a new positioning of process management as a corporate function. Shoulder to shoulder, process management needs to work on reaching corporate goals and strategies. Hence, process managers need to work on their strategy orientation.

Furthermore process management becomes more and more technical. Besides all well- known and battle proven methods of process management, workflow automation, robotic task automation, intelligent document processing, process mining, machine learning, artificial intelligence and such, demand a changed skill set of process managers. That does not make traditional skill sets irrelevant, but the new skills need to be blended in.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Once you start with process management, you will find plenty of information in books dealing with the BPM topic. Once you progress in that field, you will find out that helpful information is located elsewhere. There are a number of international blogs that I follow. They usually offer good hands-on advice. Personally, I make use of fairs conferences all sorts of meetups to exchange ideas with peers. If you are interested, please check out our reading list on our website.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Fundamentally, all acquired skills will help in the future. All phases of the BPM cycle will stay relevant, although some methods may no longer be intensely applied. We believe ‘value’ will be the key criteria.

E.g., does a holistic, company-wide and detailed documentation of processes create value for the organization? Probably not. Hence. that skill will be less prominent in the future as it will be partially replaced by process mining techniques or maybe even AI. Does that mean, you should give up that skill? It sure does not!

In practice, for example, sometime we see a lacking conceptual understanding of an ‘optimal process’ lead to bad decisions. Evaluating a process is an old skill, but nevertheless useful when it comes to investment decisions or prioritizing initiatives.

Skills only add up. They help understand the current and to future situation. Hence, skills never become irrelevant. I highly encourage everybody who is interested in the BPM field to learn as much as possible about it.

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Prof. Dr. Stefanie Rinderle-Ma

Stefanie Rinderle-Ma is a full professor for Information Systems and Business Process Management at the Department of Informatics, Technical University of Munich, Germany. Before Stefanie worked as full professor at the University of Vienna, Austria, where she led the Research Group Workflow Systems and Technology. Stefanie‘s research interests include flexible and distributed process technology, production intelligence, process mining, and digitalized compliance management.

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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

As BPM connects people, systems, and the physical world, all trends affect BPM and vice versa. For sustainability, for example, BPM offers the means to quantify the effectiveness of measures, e.g., on CO2 emissions, but also new metrics have to be developed. AI offers great prospects for BPM, e.g., by empowering domain experts in modeling and analyzing processes, but also BPM has the potential to shape AI, e.g., through AI-agentic workflows.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

Our experience from several industry projects shows the ongoing importance of modeling skills for domain experts, possibly supported by chatbots, enabling them to express how the process should be, as well as of analysis skills, again potentially AI-supported, to analyze real-world process data. This is key for process understanding and continuous optimization. Moreover, at least basic skills in implementing process-oriented solutions for integrating systems, services, and physical devices (machines, sensors) are crucial.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

There are excellent books and I also strongly believe in hands-on exercises.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Maybe there are smaller trends with decreasing importance. The main skill set of modeling, analyzing, and implementing processes is and will be crucial to unlock the full potential of BPM in practice.

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Kevin Tan

Kevin Tan is a BPMN thought leader, author of BPMN Made Easy with Process-bility, and a business process expert specializing in simplifying complex workflows into digestible visual story models. With over two decades of experience, he has coached organizations like NAB Australia and QBE Australia in BPMN best practices. Kevin is passionate about making process modeling intuitive, actionable, and impactful for digital transformation. His Process-bility framework emphasizes simplicity, visual balance, and storytelling to break down silos and drive real business value. He frequently shares insights on LinkedIn and was a guest speaker at the University of Melbourne and the IIBA Festival of Business Analysis.

WWW: www.process-bility.com
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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

BPM has always been about adaptation—understanding the current state, identifying inefficiencies, and enabling organizations to respond effectively to change. These global megatrends fundamentally shift the way businesses operate, and BPM is at the core of ensuring organizations can navigate these shifts with agility.

Climate change forces organizations to rethink sustainability within their processes—optimizing energy consumption, reducing waste, and ensuring compliance with evolving regulations. BPM helps by embedding sustainability KPIs directly into process models.

Demographic shifts, such as aging populations and workforce diversity, impact labor availability and customer expectations. BPM enables organizations to redesign processes for inclusivity, automation, and workforce upskilling.

Digital technologies and AI are not just disruptors; they are enablers of BPM itself. AI-powered process discovery, intelligent automation, and decision analytics transform BPM from a reactive discipline to a proactive, data-driven strategy.

Organizations that embrace Process-bility—making BPM simple, visual, and actionable—will thrive in this new era. Instead of drowning in complex models, BPM practitioners must focus on clarity, enabling businesses to see where they are and where they need to go.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

Critical Thinking & Problem Identification: Many rush to solutions, but the value of BPM is in correctly identifying the problem first. “Anyone can provide a solution, few can understand the problem.”

Process Storytelling: If stakeholders don’t understand your BPM model, it’s useless. The ability to translate complex processes into digestible visual story models is key.

AI-Augmented Process Analysis: BPM practitioners must embrace AI-driven insights, but not blindly trust them. AI can accelerate discovery, but human expertise ensures relevance.

Data-Driven BPM: Process without data is like watching a silent movie. BPM practitioners must incorporate data into their models to drive actionable insights.

Collaboration & Change Management: The best BPM models won’t work without stakeholder buy-in. The ability to communicate, influence, and drive change is more valuable than technical skills alone.

Simplicity & Visual Balance: Complexity kills adoption. “Say NO to complexity, say YES to simplicity.” Models must be intuitive, structured, and easy to consume.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Books:
BPMN Method and Styles by Bruce Silver
BPMN Made Easy with Process-bility by Kevin Tan
Bruce Silver did an excellent job structuring BPMN through Method and Style. But BPMN is still too complex for many organizations. That’s why I created Process-bility—it takes BPMN beyond just structure, making it intuitive, engaging, and practical for real-world business transformation. It’s all about Storytelling, Visual Balance, and Simplicity—the three principles that make BPMN not just correct, but easy to use.”

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Overcomplicated BPM Notations: Knowing every BPMN symbol doesn’t make you a good modeler. In reality, 80% of process models only need a small subset of BPMN elements.

Process Automation without Business Understanding: Some assume RPA and AI can replace BPM. They can’t—automation without a solid process foundation just speeds up inefficiencies.

Rigid ‘Waterfall’ BPM Approaches: In 2025, agility matters more than strict adherence to old BPM governance frameworks. Processes must be continuously improved, not just documented and forgotten.

At the end of the day, BPM is not about modelling for the sake of modelling. It’s about making processes clear, actionable, and continuously improving to help businesses thrive in a rapidly changing world. Process-bility is the future of BPM—if it’s not easy to understand, it’s not serving its purpose.

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Steve Towers

Steve is passionate about helping people and businesses transform to better ways, with happier lives. Whether that is individuals, teams or companies I apply proven and tested ways from the very best individual and corporate achievers to help you codify your own success, happiness and future.

Named one of the 30 most influential Global Customer Experience Experts in 2022. An experienced business transformation leader with over 40 years of success in driving and achieving organizational goals in both the private and public sectors in a variety of key ‘C’ leadership and top-level consulting positions. Recognized across industries including Business Process Management, Enterprise Architecture, Customer Experience and Lean Six Sigma

WWW: https://www.bpgroup.org
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Impact of Global Megatrends on BPM

Global megatrends like climate change, demographic changes, digital technology, and AI are radically altering BPM. These forces push organisations to be more mobile, efficient and sustainable. For instance:

Climate Change
Companies have started to care more about sustainability and carbon emissions. BPM can help by making processes and customer experiences more energy-efficient and environmentally sound.

Demographic shifts
As the world’s population ages and changes, BPM will help modernize processes for the global workforce while imparting knowledge.

Digital Technologies and AI
With AI and digital technologies added to BPM, data analysis, predictive analysis, and automated routine work are possible with the help of real-time data, resulting in efficient, productive processes. Future-orientated Analytics engines, along with AI, can also make predictions about future processes and integrate experiences.

Learns, Practices, Behaviors, and Mindsets for BPM Experts in 2025

As value-creators for their companies, BPM experts need a combination of technical and soft skills including:

Technical Expertise
Know Process Modeling, Data Analysis, Customer Experience Management, AI and Automation tools.

Soft Skills
Critical thinking, problem-solving, communication.

Habits and Mentalities
Proactivity, versatility, customer-first mindset.

The Top Courses To Become A BPM Professional

BPM skills: here are some good places to get started:
Books (the good ones)
The Power of Business Process Improvement
10 Easy Steps to Be More Effective, More efficient, and More adaptable
by Susan Page (former Disney University mastermind)

Digital Transformation – A Short Primer for the Game Changers
by Peter Fingar, and Jim Sinur (BPM business gurus)

Outside-in The Secret of the World Leading companies
by Steve Towers

Articles
You can find tons of articles and white papers at BPGroup.org on all kinds of BPM topics.

Training
Distance Learning Courses from Coursera, edX and the in-the-room Certified Process Professional® (https://experienceprofessional.com/dubai_cppm) from the BPGroup.org.

Competencies Out of Date

Certain competencies might be obsolete because of technology:
Manual Process Mapping
Manual process mapping is no longer necessary due to the AI/automation trend.

Standard Data Entry
Automation tools already handle mundane data entry work, so this expertise is redundant.

Enterprise Architecture
Improved software can now produce rich pictures and guidance in double quick time. Architects can direct systems to produce rapid deep dives negating the need for long expensive projects.

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Roland Woldt

Roland Woldt is a well-rounded executive with 25+ years of Business Transformation consulting and software development/system implementation experience, in addition to leadership positions within the German Armed Forces (11 years).

He has worked as a Team Lead, Engagement/Program Manager, and Enterprise/Solution Architect on many projects. Within these projects, he was responsible for the full project life-cycle, from shaping a solution and selling it, to setting up a methodological approach through design, implementation, and testing, up to the roll-out of solutions.

In addition to this, Roland has managed consulting offerings throughout their life-cycle, from definition, delivery to update, and had revenue responsibility for them. This also included the stand-up and development of consulting teams, and their day-to-day management. Roland worked as a Vice President at iGrafx, Director in KPMG’s Advisory, as a Practice Director at Software AG/IDS Scheer, and as a project manager at Accenture.

WWW: “What’s Your Baseline?” podcast
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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

I have seen more implementation of AI in the tools, but it is still on the level of “little helper tools” that will support import of content (i.e., create a model based on a document), or creation of code for process mining data modeling. However, it misses the boat when it comes to the “bigger picture”. I see some attempts to relate data that could be an insight for an analysis (but is no full analysis), it also does not pull in benchmark data or similar.

Additional use cases that I see are the use of AI for governance purposes (e.g., data quality: is all information needed already captured and up-to-date), or for simulation (create all simulation models and run the simulation for these when pressing the “save” button and then weed out the nonsensical results before giving a user a recommendation similar to “if you make this change, the capacity of your process will increase by x%”).

I am a bit reluctant to jump on the “AI will solve every problem” bandwagon and would love to see more use cases being defined and then implemented.

In addition to this, I have also seen more interest in the Sustainability topic (e.g., from ARIS or Mega), but they all fall short IMHO because they don’t talk about and capture the actual emissions data, and they don’t have a reporting engine that is needed to comply with (mostly) the EU regulators. And what I also don’t see is the urgency in picking up this topic — especially here in the US on the federal level — even though companies need to have a significant reduction done by 2030. I just read a study by Accenture from 2022 in which they predict that nearly all (93%) companies will fail that goal.

BPM and the wider Enterprise Architecture can and should be a part of the whole conversation (it is a redesign of their operating model and making decisions about the changes in the end) but I don’t see how a single BPM/EA group can be successful here. It takes the collaboration of a vendor with someone like Salesforce Net Zero Cloud (who do the emission capturing, calculation, and reporting) to have the proper first step of a technical solution.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

Data-driven analysis techniques will continue to become more popular, but I see some stagnation in innovation for the tools. It appears that Process and Task Mining have reached the status of “good enough” when I look at the tool features, and need to spread wider into more organizations … it is still a “young” topic. Overall, I see “data” still as a topic, though.

From an attitude aspect, I wish that we, as practitioners, don’t jump on the latest fad and then just think about that, but keep the focus on the basics and build the capabilities needed in our organizations that will help professionalize the discipline. Don’t fall into the trap of -artificially- building borders, as we see between “Business Architects” (driven by the BA Guild who do a good marketing game) and “Business Process” people — we are talking about the same thing here!

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I am biased because I just wrote a book about “Successful Architecture Implementation” that will be released in March 2025, and run the What’s Your Baseline? Podcast for 3.5 years for which we received good feedback for. So, I obviously recommend these resources (whatsyourbaseline.com).

Oh, and I am also writing on a second book “Successful Process Mining Projects” right now and expect this to come out in Q3/2025

What I wish for 2025 would be to have more podcasts to listen to, more opportunities to meet in real life and simply connect better with other practitioners. There are some things that I love to see, like the “BPM Stammtisch Hamburg” in Germany, but I don’t see anything in the area where I live (Washington, DC).

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

BPM is an “evergreen” capability, and I doubt that the skills will go away. And some of them will come back at some point in time — like Lean, for example. When I look at the changes that are triggered by the new administration here in the US, the government agencies will be forced to do less with more and become more efficient — I can see that these analysis methods will see a renaissance … combined with data-driven methods like Process Mining.

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This time I asked not only questions about BPM, but also the question about the impact of global megatrends on BPM to give you some broader context.

Check out the thought-provoking answers from 10+ BPM experts.

As always, you can either read everything or use the navigation below. Enjoy!
Wil van der Aalst
Tony Benedict
Scott Francis
Ian Gotts
Mathias Kirchmer
Mirko Kloppenburg
Harald Kühn
Madison Lundquist
Jan Mendling
Brian Reale
Pedro Robledo
Michael Rosemann
Michal Rosik
Serge Schiltz
Jim Sinur

Which BPM skills will be hot in 2025

Now, let’s dive into the answers.

Prof. Wil van der Aalst

Prof.dr.ir. Wil van der Aalst is a full professor at RWTH Aachen University, leading the Process and Data Science (PADS) group. He is also the Chief Scientist at Celonis, part-time affiliated with the Fraunhofer FIT, and a member of the Board of Governors of Tilburg University. He also has unpaid professorship positions at Queensland University of Technology (since 2003) and the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven (TU/e). Currently, he is also a distinguished fellow of Fondazione Bruno Kessler (FBK) in Trento, deputy CEO of the Internet of Production (IoP) Cluster of Excellence, co-director of the RWTH Center for Artificial Intelligence. His research interests include process mining, Petri nets, business process management, workflow automation, simulation, process modeling, and model-based analysis. Many of his papers are highly cited (he is one of the most-cited computer scientists in the world and has an H-index of 161 according to Google Scholar with over 121,000 citations), and his ideas have influenced researchers, software developers, and standardization committees working on process support. He previously served on the advisory boards of several organizations, including Fluxicon, Celonis, ProcessGold/UiPath, and aiConomix. Van der Aalst received honorary degrees from the Moscow Higher School of Economics (Prof. h.c.), Tsinghua University, and Hasselt University (Dr. h.c.). He is also an IFIP Fellow, IEEE Fellow, ACM Fellow, and an elected member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Royal Holland Society of Sciences and Humanities, the Academy of Europe, and the North Rhine-Westphalian Academy of Sciences, Humanities and the Arts. In 2018, he was awarded an Alexander-von-Humboldt Professorship.

WWW: http://www.vdaalst.com
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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

Global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI are profoundly reshaping the landscape of business process management (BPM). Organizations need to rethink how they design, manage, and optimize their processes. Organizations face growing expectations to reduce carbon footprints and adopt sustainable practices. This requires redesigning processes to be energy-efficient and environmentally friendly.

Traditional process mining focuses on event logs linked to a single case (e.g., an order). Object-Centric Process Mining (OCPM), however, tracks multiple object types (e.g., orders, invoices, and shipments) and their interrelations, reflecting the complexity of modern business ecosystems. OCPM provides a more comprehensive view of interconnected processes, revealing hidden inefficiencies and dependencies. OCPM can be used to identify inefficiencies in end-to-end processes (e.g., redundant steps, excessive energy use) and suggests optimizations to cut emissions. Also, the IT infrastructure itself needs to be sustainable. Process mining tools can optimize IT workflows (e.g., data center operations), reducing energy consumption. By identifying high-energy usage processes, organizations can move less critical operations to greener time slots or regions. In one of my LinkedIn posts, I stated that Python consumes 75 times as much energy as C when performing the same tasks and is 71 times slower. The post was viewed 3.4 million times and generated over 1000 comments. My goal was (1) to create awareness that the choice of programming language has a huge impact on energy use and (2) that this is rarely a consideration when teaching a programming language. This hit an open nerve and illustrates that we typically do not think about this.

Next to environmental challenges, we need to address demographic challenges (like low birth rates in developed countries). With fewer younger workers, retaining knowledge becomes critical, and processes need to become more efficient. Process mining identifies time-intensive, repetitive tasks that can be automated using technologies like robotic process automation (RPA). This reduces dependency on a shrinking workforce. Process mining exposes unnecessary steps or approvals in workflows, enabling organizations to simplify overly bureaucratic processes. By automating bureaucratic processes, fewer workers are needed to manage routine administrative tasks, alleviating the strain caused by a smaller workforce.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

To create value in 2025, BPM (Business Process Management) practitioners must evolve to meet the challenges and opportunities of a data-driven, rapidly transforming business environment. Data literacy and integrating data science with domain expertise remain important. Practitioners must be proficient in interpreting data, identifying patterns, and drawing actionable insights. This includes familiarity with statistical concepts, skills in cleaning and preparing data for analysis, and the ability to interpret results from analytics tools. A deep understanding of the organization’s industry (e.g., finance, healthcare, manufacturing) and its unique process requirements is key. For example, a BPM practitioner in healthcare must understand regulatory requirements like HIPAA and understand the challenges related to data management. Storytelling skills are needed to convey insights and recommendations from process analytics to stakeholders in an engaging and understandable way.

BPM practitioners should steer away from superficially using GenAI. The goal is not to produce text or PowerPoints but to improve processes and add value. Professions that are “text heavy” were considered to be above automation. However, generating beautiful sentences has become a commodity. ChatGPT knows nothing about an organization’s processes unless you supply it with data. GenAI works well with unstructured data. However, most business-relevant data are structured, and one needs clever computations instead of generating unfounded answers. This requires an attitude change.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

– W.M.P van der Aalst. Object-Centric Process Mining: Unraveling the Fabric of Real Processes. Mathematics, 11(12):2691, 2023. https://doi.org/10.3390/math11122691
– W.M.P. van der Aalst and J. Carmona, editors. Process Mining Handbook, volume 448 of Lecture Notes in Business Information Processing. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-08848-3
– W. M.P. van der Aalst, O. Hinz, C. Weinhardt: Sustainable Systems Engineering. Bus. Inf. Syst. Eng. 65(1): 1-6 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12599-022-00784-6
– L. Barbieri, E. Madeira, K. Stroeh, W.M.P. van der Aalst: A natural language querying interface for process mining. J. Intell. Inf. Syst. 61(1): 113-142 (2023) https://doi.org/10.1007/s10844-022-00759-9
– LinkedIn post on the energy use of programming languages: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/wvdaalst_sustainability-activity-7223303687266336768-0X0r

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Not much has changed here despite the uptake of GenAI. Traditional BPM, centering around yellow notes and hand-made process schemas, is no longer a good idea. It also does not make any sense to focus on advanced ML techniques when the biggest challenges are data management, unawareness of technologies that actually work (e.g., process mining), and organizational change.

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Tony Benedict

Tony Benedict is a Partner with Omicron Partners, LLC, a strategy advisory firm. He is a senior level operations executive best known for transforming organizations, improving operational excellence and profitability. Most recently, he served as Interim Vice President of Operations for Rising Pharma, managing all phases of complex $200M post-merger integration of 2 acquired companies (36 CMOs, 2 3PLs) within expedited timeframe, while concurrently launching a state-of-the-art pharma distribution center. Consolidated 3 ERP systems into a single SAP instance within 6 months. Benedict previously worked at HonorHealth as Vice President, Procurement and Supply Chain where he was responsible for over $600M in spend management. One of his accomplishments was in the restructuring of the procurement and supply chain organizations post-merger within 12 months and consolidating two ERP systems within 18 months while implementing $60M in cost reduction initiatives. Previously, he was Chief Information Officer, Vice President of Supply Chain for Tenet, and Vice President, Supply Chain, Vanguard Health Systems at Abrazo Community Health Network in Arizona.
He is currently serving as President and Director, Board of Directors for the Association of Business Process Management Professionals International and is a co-author of the Business Process Management Common Body of Knowledge versions 2, 3 and the recently released version 4.
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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

AI will have a place in monitoring and auditing as guard rails for theft and counterfeiting. Sensor technologies will play a role to accomplish this especially in the bio-pharma and agriculture industries. AI will also play a role in compliance to regulations and reporting to government authorities.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

As much as I’d like to say generative AI, I will refrain from saying it because those tools are already here and take away a lot of the core work people used to perform like process modeling. Now you have low and no-code which will only get better. Business Process modeling will still be a foundational skill, however, in order for BPM professionals to move up the food chain, higher level skills sets will emerge as the evolution of the business process architect role takes on more strategic efforts in business transformation. This is an inflection point and tectonic shift requiring people to move into higher level skill sets to stay relevant in the job market. For example, strategic alignment and aligning operations to corporate strategy and goals is key to overcoming the 70% failure rate of digital/business transformations. In the past, too much effort (and money) was spent on aligning technology to operations with no connection to strategy. Some of the key competencies will be: Business Strategy, Operations, Enterprise performance Management, Enterprise Business Modeling and Management of Architecture & Performance. Each competency has a skill set associated with it along with maturity levels for each skill. For example, within Business strategy is systems thinking. Most people know the definition, however, putting it into practice within a department is very different than across an entire enterprise. Experience matters when it comes to proficiency. The skill has to develop over time and be rated according to a scale.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

ABPMP will be releasing an executive level guide to Business Architecture in the second quarter of 2025 which will outline the key competencies and skills within each necessary for business process architects to move up that food chain within corporate cultures. It is an executive skill set and point of view for leading digital/business transformations. Stay tuned.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Agile has moved past the hype and become more commonplace. It’s not a requirement for transformation as much as it is for software development which in itself has become less labor intensive with the introduction of generative AI.

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Scott Francis

Scott Francis is CEO and Co­-Founder of BP3, a BPM specialist firm focused on accelerating process innovation for customers. Scott and his team have grown BP3 into a Leader in Forrester’s Wave for BPM Services Providers, a top 10 Company in Fortune’s Great Places to Work, a top 10 company in Austin’s Fast 50, and to 120 employees worldwide. Scott is a speaker at conferences such as: bpmNEXT, BPMPortugal, and BPMCAMP, and is the primary author of BP3’s blog.

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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

Right now, most organizations are probably looking at an IT future that looks a bit like chaos. More data than ever is traveling into their servers in the cloud, more AI capabilities than ever are at the fingertips of their employees. And there is little discipline or organization to this chaos. While AI can derive meaning from your data, what data should it have access to? Who should have access to the AI tools with these insights? How do we get control over all of this?

If you try to solve these problems with access control lists and data security alone, you’re solving the problem in a really complex, and declarative way that makes it very difficult to see the forest for the trees.

Processes are the key organizing principle that can make order out of chaos here. Processes define who participates, and when. Processes define what actions are expected by these participants – and when. Processes define what information is needed, provided, altered, and created to support the process – and when, and by whom or by which systems. Processes can also be the mechanism for defining when and where AI plugs into your business operations. By having this organizing principle, you don’t have to wonder what rogue AI tools might be addressing your corporate data – the AI tools can be deployed in an organized fashion for specific needs and capabilities.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

Continue to be open minded to new technologies and capabilities – don’t get caught up on what AI “can’t do” – because AI is only another kind of automation – and potentially anything can be automated if we’re clever enough. That doesn’t mean that it is commercially viable to automate everything. I don’t think it is about the specific skills – building LLMs, or transformers, or whatever – it’s about how to use the tools that are being released. The process practitioner has the luxury of *applying* these technologies to our process work, rather than having to do fundamental work inside these techniques/technologies themselves.

Having the creativity, and process-oriented thinking skills, to put these together into solutions is where it is at.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I think training your own LLM is already no longer relevant for the average BPM practitioner – if it ever was!

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Ian Gotts

Ian is CEO and founder of Elements.cloud, tech advisor, investor, speaker and author. He has written 12 books on BPM, change management, and compliance, and can be found on the professional speaking circuit or in a plane!!! 

Elements.cloud helps customers clean-up, document and build their app implementations, focused on Salesforce. But valid for any low code app platform.
WWW: https://iangotts.medium.com
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FINALLY, the BPM dream of “map process and it builds app” is realized with AI agents. And the cool thing is the process maps can be simple e.g. UPN making the multiple shapes supported by BPMN unnecessary.

The implications for app development is profound. As Microsoft CEO said in recent interview “with AI, the business logic is moving to agents”.

Also, in that interview he said he is revisiting LEAN because process reengineering is making a comeback.

@52:00 https://youtu.be/9NtsnzRFJ_o?t=3022

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Dr. Mathias Kirchmer

Dr. Kirchmer is an experienced practitioner and thought leader in the field of Business Process Management (BPM) and Digital Transformation. He is Managing Director of Scheer Americas, previously BPM-D US. He co-founded BPM-D, a consulting company focusing on performance improvements and appropriate digitalization by establishing and applying the discipline of BPM. Before he was Managing Director and Global Lead of BPM at Accenture, and CEO of the Americas and Japan of IDS Scheer, known for its process modelling software and process consulting.

Dr. Kirchmer has led numerous transformation and process improvement initiatives in various industries at clients around the world. He has published 11 books and over 150 articles. At the University of Pennsylvania and at Widener University he has served as affiliated faculty for over 20 years. He received a research and teaching fellowship from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.

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WWW:https://www.scheer-americas.com/
Twitter: @mtki2006

What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

Business Process Management (BPM) equips organizations with the transparency needed to make fast, well-informed decisions and to implement resulting actions effectively. It enables rapid adaption, transforming strategy into people and technology-based execution at a pace with certainty. By leveraging BPM, you identify the impact of megatrends on your operations and how to act on the related opportunities and threats. BPM enables the value-driven use of digital technologies, including the various forms of AI, realizing their full potential.

As these megatrends drive continuously change, BPM has become a management discipline that addresses the ongoing transformation needs of an organization. It is the foundation for the “composable enterprise”—an agile, flexible, innovative and efficient company built on an appropriate organizational structure and software architecture. BPM prioritizes initiatives, drives standardization, optimization and innovation in business processes as well as establishes process governance to sustain the transformation journey.

The role of BPM becomes especially significant in enabling impactful enterprise-wide use of AI. The visibility it provides helps to identify where predictive AI adds best value, such as in maintenance processes, where generative AI is best suited, for example for tasks like generating design alternatives in engineering processes, and where agentic AI can autonomously execute processes, for instance, in simple procurement workflows. By guiding the AI transformation of the organization, BPM ensures that the resulting capabilities are seamlessly integrated in the end-to-end business processes and deliver best value.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

Successful BPM Practitioners focus on business impact and outcomes rather than emphasizing enabling methods and tools. They must understand both the business aspects of processes and the effects of digital technologies that support these processes. Technology-based process reference models can aid in this understanding, enabling BPM practitioners to align business and technology towards the overall goals of the organization.

The broad role of the BPM-Discipline requires solid process prioritization approaches, such as a process impact and maturity assessments, as well as the right combination of standardization, optimization, and innovation. Standardization in particular, is becoming increasingly critical for efficient digitalization and the journey towards the composable enterprise. A practical approach to appropriate standardization is an important skill. Continuous change also requires an agile process governance approach which incorporates appropriate roles and governance processes. BPM Practitioners define the governance model which fits to the specific organizational context.

The BPM-Discipline is established through the “process of process management” (PoPM). BPM Practitioners manage the lifecycle of this key process. Leveraging modern tools, such as modelling and repository tools, mining or enterprise architecture applications, enables an effective PoPM. Additionally, AI is playing an increasingly important role for the PoPM. Generative AI capabilities, for instance, help with the analysis of as-is processes, generation of design alternatives for the future state, or to evaluate process mining data. BPM Practitioners ensure these digital tools are applied in ways that deliver outcomes to the organization.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Specialized consulting and education organizations offer training and eLearning addressing those skills, such as Scheer with its academy and publications (www.scheer-americas.com). Industry organizations, like APQC (www.apqc.org), ABPMP (www.abpmp.org) or the BPM Institute (www.bpminstitute.org), provide related resources. Forward thinking universities and research organizations address related topics, for example the August-Wilhelm Scheer Institute for Digital Processes and Products (www.aws-institut.de), Widener University with its master program for Digital Transformation and Innovation (www.widener.edu) or the University of Pennsylvania (www.upenn.edu).

Here are some related readings that may help:
Scheer, A.-W.: The Composable Enterprise: Agile, Flexible and Innovative – A Gamechanger for Organizations, Digitalization and Business Software. 4th ed., New York, Berlin, e.a. 2023.
Kirchmer, M.: Process-led Digital Transformation – Mastering the Journey towards the Composable Enterprise. In: Shishkov B. (ed): Business Modeling and Software Design. BMSD 2024. Lecture Notes in Business Information Processing, vol 523 (ISBN: 978-3-031-64072-8). Springer, 2024.
Wilson, H.J, Daugherty, P.R.: Generative AI – The Secret to Successful AI-driven Process Redesign. In: Harvard Business Review, January-February 2025.
Kirchmer, M.: High Performance through Business Process Management – Strategy Execution in a Digital World. 3rd ed., New York, Berlin, e.a. 2017.
Franz, P., Kirchmer, M.: Value-driven Business Process Management – The Value-Switch for Lasting Competitive Advantage. New York, 2012.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Basic principles of process management as reflected in concepts like Lean, Six Sigma or Kaizen remain true and useful. But to stay relevant and efficient they must be upgraded, leveraging modern digital process management tools.

Improvement approaches that do not address the alignment of business and information technology or do not leverage digital capabilities to enhance processes will no longer be successful. Nowadays, every transformation is related to some degree of digitalization.

Most BPM software vendors already offer AI capabilities in their tools. Those look promising but are still in an emerging state. This is an area to watch closely.

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Mirko Kloppenburg

Hi, I’m Mirko. I’m 43 years old and I’m living in Hamburg, Germany, with my wife and our two daughters.
For 20+ years, I have been working in different process management positions at Lufthansa Group. But today, I’m transferring all my BPM experiences to other organizations to help them to inspire people for processes.
Therefore, I combine New Work and Process Management to form New Process and I founded NewProcessLab.com as a platform to share experiences and to rethink processes.
I focus on a human-centric transformation approach, experience design, and community building.
I’m also the host of the New Process Podcast where I’m sharing all my learnings from my journey to rethink processes.
For more information, please have a look at my LinkedIn profile.

WWW: NewProcessLab.com
WWW: LI profile
Twitter: @MirkoKBurg

What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

For me, BPM is a structured management approach to turn any strategy into reality. This also works for responding to a changing environment, for example due to megatrends. BPM can help to take megatrends into account in processes and develop processes accordingly.

Of course, some megatrends also have an impact on BPM itself. We are already seeing many BPM tool vendors experimenting with the integration of AI into their tools. From my human-centric BPM perspective, however, not all of these experiments are really helpful. For example, I am not a fan of AI-generated processes at all, as there is a lack of employee acceptance. Nevertheless, AI-generated processes are of course nice for inspiration.

Regarding the megatrends mentioned as examples, I recently noticed in the evaluation of a survey on the topics that the New Process Community has on the agenda for 2025 that the topic of ESG has so far been completely underrepresented. Only 2% of survey participants want to implement ESG topics in processes in 2025. Certainly, a point which I will explore in more detail in the New Process Podcast in 2025.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

I currently see three stages on the path to a process-driven organization that need to be passed through to create an impact for the respective company:

1. Position for impact: BPM practitioners need to define the purpose of why they are applying BPM in the organization on an emotional level and they need to develop a BPM strategy accordingly. Based on this, the impact can be estimated and — even more important — demonstrated. Finally, all these insights should be used to design a BPM framework that contributes to bringing BPM purpose and strategy to life.

2. Implement a BPM framework: The implementation always starts with building up the process architecture and prioritizing processes. As soon as we know which processes to start with, the people have to be inspired for processes and modeling of processes can be done. Finally, BPM role owners such as Process Owners must be appointed.

3. Manage and improve processes: In the third stage, BPM roles must be enabled and guided to manage and improve their processes based on the BPM framework. Here, more advanced methods such as Process Mining, Process Automation and AI can be applied.

Unfortunately, stage 1 is often left out and organizations are solely focusing on the modeling of processes, ignoring the need for a reliable BPM framework. And after processes are modeled, there is no plan to get to the next level. To get beyond modeling. To really manage and improve processes.

I recommend that every BPM practitioner takes a critical look at where they stand today to identify gaps and close them in 2025. In addition, I encourage to also focus on continuously building a process culture by creating transparency, involving the people and creating experiences to get the people excited about processes.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I have three recommendations to learn more about these topics — and beyond:
1. Listen to the following episodes of the New Process Podcast to learn more:
– State of New Process – https://www.newprocesslab.com/episode52

– How to create a good Process Culture with Amelie Langenstein – https://www.newprocesslab.com/episode53

– Lufthansa’s leading approach to BPM – https://www.newprocesslab.com/episode58

2. I invite you to join New Process Pro to learn even more about the topics, find best practices, and explore tools and methods. New Process Pro is my community for BPM enthusiasts like you and me. And it is free: https://www.newprocesslab.com/pro

3. Beyond these topics, to never miss any important BPM content — like this outstanding collection by Zbigniew — again, take a look at BPM.today. BPM.today is an AI-assisted BPM news site that even e-mails you updates on the latest BPM blogs, podcasts, videos and more. Sign up for free at BPM.today

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I think it depends on the purpose you pursue with BPM. Based on this, some skills are more relevant and others become obsolete.

Especially from my human-centric BPM perspective, I consider skills such as process mining, process automation and detailed process modeling with BPMN 2.0 to be rather unimportant and would always prioritize the skills that are necessary to build a process culture. It is essential to know how to rethink processes, focus on people, and get them excited about processes. This is what I’m fighting for. So, let’s join forces!

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Harald Kühn

Dr. Harald Kühn is a member of the management board of the BOC AG. He is responsible for the product management and the related strategic aspects of BOC’s ADONIS and ADOIT product portfolio. Dr. Harald Kühn works in the areas of BPM, EA, their integration and the usage of innovative technologies in these domains.
He is an author of over 20 publications about various aspects of BPM.

WWW: boc-group.com
WWW: LI profile
Twitter: @BOC_Group

What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

I expect the following key impacts:
1. Climate Change:

• Organizations face increasing regulatory, social, and operational pressures to adopt sustainable practices. BPM can assist by embedding sustainability metrics into process designs, optimizing resource usage, and integrating environmental impact assessments into their design and execution.
• Carbon accounting and CO2 estimation tools are being incorporated into BPM systems, helping organizations reduce their carbon footprint.
• On the other side, there are various geopolitical situations, where climate change is ignored or even denied. I see a risk that this produces a counter-trend and would make the described impact less important in the context of BPM.

2. Demographic Shifts:

• Aging populations and diverse workforce dynamics require flexible processes tailored to different workforce needs. BPM can enable adaptive workforce planning, cross-generational training, and inclusive customer journey designs.
• Processes need to address shifting consumer expectations, including personalization and accessibility.
• In industry countries aging populations lead to reduced workforces both in private as well as in public organizations, and therefore the optimization, digitization and automation of processes is a must to keep wealth creation in these countries.

3. Digital Technologies:

• The continued adoption of IoT, AI, and hyper-automation is transforming BPM. Processes are becoming more data-driven and interconnected, enabling real-time monitoring and decision-making.
• The integration of mobile and wearable devices with many types of digital services and business processes creates increasing requirements on security, data consistency and compliance, to be considered both in BPM initiatives as well as in process execution.

4. AI, GenAI and Agentic AI:

• AI and Generative AI amplify the potential of BPM, as seen in 2024. Specific advances in 2025 include refined predictive modeling, enhanced process optimization, and even more accessible AI-driven process automation.
• Process engines for rule-based process control play still an important role. For the next years I expect that they will be complemented with increased usage of Agentic AI for some more autonomous parts of processes.
• Process mining tools now incorporate AI-powered insights to uncover inefficiencies and generate actionable recommendations, fostering adaptability in dynamic environments.

And how can BPM help? BPM supports organizations in adapting to these megatrends by offering tools and techniques for continuous improvement and fostering a culture of process innovation & transformation. Process management and related governance procedures, create reliable information which is approved, validated and sometimes even audited. Especially in the context of using AI services, reliable information as input is one of the most important characteristics to get trustful results.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

1. Continuous Learning: As the work environment, used technologies, practices, methodologies etc. are continuously changing, the learning process must do so as well. Continuous learning involves the persistent broadening of knowledge and abilities. Within the realm of workplace professional development, it focuses on acquiring new competencies and insights, as well as reinforcing previously acquired skills and knowledge.

2. Practical Engagement with GenAI Tools: To successfully integrate GenAI into BPM, practitioners in 2025 must prioritize continuous learning. This includes formal training, up-to-date online courses, and participation in global industry events tailored to AI advancements. Hands-on experience remains vital – through pilot projects, close collaboration with technology teams, and practical applications such as designing contextualized prompts. Particular emphasis should be placed on addressing modern challenges like information security, data privacy, and the ethical use of company data in conjunction with public GenAI and/or Agentic AI services. Furthermore, staying actively connected with the BPM and AI communities is critical. Engaging in professional forums, participating in discussions on cutting-edge case studies, and networking with experts will ensure practitioners remain informed about the latest trends, tools, and best practices shaping the field in 2025.

3. Use of Conceptual Modelling: The intensified use of multi-perspective conceptual modeling continues, incorporating sustainability, customer journeys, digital ecosystems, and value streams into cohesive BPM methodologies. This is accompanied by using a mix of different design, analysis and data-science techniques.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

ChatBots:
I recommend the intensive use of ChatBots such as ChatGPT by OpenAI (https://chatgpt.com/), Gemini by Google (https://gemini.google.com/), Claude by Anthropic (https://www.anthropic.com/claude) or Perplexity AI (https://www.perplexity.ai/) for learning purposes. In many cases they provide an easy way to be used as an “interactice learning companion”.

Books on Conceptual Modelling:
Domain-Specific Conceptual Modeling (Part 1): Concepts, Methods and Tools,
Domain-Specific Conceptual Modeling (Part 2): Concepts, Methods and ADOxx Tools,
Metamodeling: Applications and Trajectories to the Future

Free Conceptual Modelling Tools:
Library of various OMiLAB Modelling Tools, ADONIS Community Edition, ADOIT Community Edition, BOC Academy Programme

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Any knowledge and experiences gathered in the past will influence decisions for the future. Therefore, even if specific skills, techniques or technologies are not really relevant any more, they are important to evaluate, decide on and apply new upcoming approaches.

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Madison Lundquist

As Principal Research Lead, Madison Lundquist develops and executes APQC’s research agenda for process and performance management and serves as subject matter expert. She interviews leading organizations on their practices, identifies key findings from the research projects, and shares the approaches and best practices organizations use to manage processes, improve organizational agility, and continuously improve.

WWW: apqc.org/expertise/process-performance-management
WWW: LI profile

What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

According to our research on priorities and challenges for process professionals, the top drivers of change for process management in 2025 are digital transformation initiatives, the growth of process automation options, and the pace of change in the business, along with the application of machine learning and AI in the business. While new tools, technology and automation can provide great efficiencies for organizations and the management of their processes, there is still a critical component to their success: strong process management.

A strong process management program can enable new technologies, tools, and more through:

1. Strategic alignment –Alignment of your process management activities and organizational strategic plans enables organizations to focus their process efforts on those most critical to achieving the long-term goals of the business.

2. Governance – Strong process governance is critical for effective technology implementation. For example, someone needs to be accountable for securing any sensitive data used by technology while keeping it accessible and ensuring its quality for key stakeholders. Common process management roles like process owner also enable organizations to assign responsibility for continually monitoring and improving processes.

3. Change management – New trends and technologies usually require employees to change in one way or another. It’s critical that organizations have a strong change management plan/program in place that keeps in mind how their employees receive information, the time it takes to process the upcoming change, and how to encourage the employees to make the necessary change through things like rewards and recognition.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

The top skills process management teams need to stay relevant in 2025 are change management, analytics and data visualization, problem solving, design thinking, and storytelling. Storytelling is a skill that historically has been more popular for knowledge management practitioners, however, according to our annual priorities survey in 2024, storytelling has started rising in popularity for the process practitioners. Stories are what we remember. They connect us to the emotion and remind us of our purpose. When organizations are presented with change and new ideas, storytelling can a be a great tool for the “BPM toolbox” to encourage the adoption and successful implementation of new tools and technologies.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

APQC has a robust Resource Library that includes content on core tenets for process management, along with our training courses and webinars that help process professionals learn the necessary skills to be successful in an ever-changing business environment.

• APQC’s Resource Library, which includes articles, case studies, and more:
  • APQC’s Seven Tenets of Process Management
  • APQC’s Drivers of Change Management Infographics on Engagement, Rewards and Recognition, and Communication
• APQC’s Training Courses; including online self-paced courses on topics like process analysis, process frameworks, and process management essentials.
• APQC’s Events Calendar

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Every year, we survey process professionals to understand the skills necessary for the upcoming year. According to our 2025 survey, the bottom three skills were software programming, training, and risk management. Instead, skills like change management, problem solving and data visualization are rising to the top. Process professionals need to have a more diverse set of skills allowing them to work with cross-functional teams, carry out change initiatives, and be able to both analyze data and create stories for their stakeholders on what the data is conveying.

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Prof. Dr. Jan Mendling

Prof. Dr. Jan Mendling is the Einstein-Professor for Process Science with the Department of Computer Science at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, adjunct professor at Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien, and Principal Investigator at the Weizenbaum Institute, Berlin. His research interests include various topics in the area of business process management and information systems. He is co-author of the textbooks Fundamentals of Business Process Management and Wirtschaftsinformatik. He has published more than 500 research papers and articles, among others in IEEE Transaction journals and MIS Quarterly. He is inaugural Co-Editor-in-Chief of Process Science and Co-Founder of Noreja, a tool vendor focusing on causal process mining.

WWW: LI profile

WWW: Personal website

WWW: Noreja website

What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

There are two forces. First, trends such like demographic change and climate change create pressure for organizations to adapt. Second, new technologies such as GenAI provide new tools to implement such a change faster. Bottom line is: The demand for BPM increases while its capabilities increase.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

I offered some BPM trainings this year where I met participants who had not yet played around with ChatGPT. This hit me by surprise. It is of utmost importance for organizations to continuously monitor which tools emerge and who they can help employees for speeding up their daily work.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I am a big fan of what Michael Jordan said: “Get the fundamentals down and the level of everything you do will rise.” Such fundamental knowledge is available in books. When it comes to new AI-tools, you need to follow online resources. Technology magazines and LinkedIn are important to stay up to date.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

GenAI capabilities can pave us the way to self-documenting information systems and self-documenting business processes. BPM approaches that fully focus on manual documentation work are becoming less and less sustainable.

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Brian Reale

Brian Reale is a serial entrepreneur. Brian founded a telecommunications company in 2000 called Unete Telecomunicaciones which provided, voice, data, and satellite services in Latin America. Brian sold Unete to a publicly traded US telecom company in 2000. Brian was also the co-founder of Spotless LLC, an entertainment technology company that developed projection mapping technology for major live entertainment industries.

Brian has been involved in the workflow and BPM industry since he co-founded ProcessMaker in 2000. ProcessMaker is a leading open source BPM suite. The ProcessMaker BPMS has been recognized with numerous awards and pushes the bounds of BPM with a fundamental belief that process management can be simple, elegant, and easy to use.

Brian graduated magna cum laude from Duke University in 1993 and was awarded a Fulbright scholarship in linguistics in Ecuador in 1994.

WWW: https://www.processmaker.com
WWW: LI profile
Twitter: @breale
Twitter: @processmaker

What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

Global megatrends like climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI significantly impact Business Process Management (BPM).

Impact of Megatrends on BPM:

• Climate Change:
  • Supply Chain Disruptions: Extreme weather events disrupt supply chains. We are seeing it everyday. Just look at how the wildfires in LA are going to affect the US economy in 2025 – $250 Billion in losses. Supply chains and processes are going to need to make major changes to adjust to this. Think of all the materials and labor that now need to be sent to California.
  • Regulatory Compliance: Regulation is changing constantly because of climate change and politics. Politics is probably the bigger driver, but it is reacting to climate change (or at least the news of climate change).
• Demographic Shifts:
  • Aging Workforce: Aging populations are changing the way businesses think about their processes. Workers are disappearing from the workforce, and companies see AI agent workforces as a solution to these changes.
  • Skill Shortages: Shifts in demographics can create skill gaps, requiring organizations to adapt processes to leverage available talent and potentially automate tasks.
  • Diverse Workforce: Managing a diverse workforce requires inclusive processes that accommodate different needs, communication styles, and cultural backgrounds.
• Digital Technologies:
  • Automation: Automation technologies like RPA and now Agentic AI are transforming processes. We are less than a few years away from AI being able to dynamically change its own processes on the fly to react to change. The idea of drawing a BPMN diagram will not exist by 2030.
  • Data-Driven Decisions: AI depends on data. Whoever has it wins. Period.
  • Customer Experience: Web 2.0 revolutionized customer experience. Apple capitalized on this. Now, all those beautiful interfaces will disappear. The interface won’t exist by 2030. Everything will be a command line controlled via voice and some text.
• AI:
  • Process Automation: AI will change the face of process automation as it will everything else. As I said above, BPMN diagrams won’t exist by 2030. Or, another way to say it – they will exist on the fly. It is similar for reporting. Reporting suites will cease to exist. Reporting exists to anticipate the needs of decision makers so they can reduce the complexity of the information they are analyzing. AI does not need this intermediate step. It can process the pure data and decide on the next best action in a process, for example.

How BPM Can Help Organizations Adapt

• Agility and Flexibility: BPM enables organizations to design and execute flexible processes that can quickly adapt to change, such as supply chain disruptions or shifts in customer demand.
• Data-Driven Decision Making: BPM+AI can provide data-driven insights into process performance, allowing organizations to identify areas for improvement and make better decisions
• Automation and AI Integration: AI will kill BPM, but for the next few years it will help it work much better. Sound familiar? The same will happen to humanity unfortunately.

Key Skills for BPM Practitioners in 2025

• Foundational: Practitioners should still master process modeling (BPMN, DMN), analysis.
• Advanced: It is becoming more important to gain advanced skills in AI/ML to understand where and how to apply it.
• Essential Behaviors: As always, teams need strong abilities in collaboration, communication, problem-solving, innovation, and results-orientation.

What are the Key Attitudes practitioners need?

• Adaptability: Embrace change and new technologies. Get ready for a roller coaster ride!
• Resilience: Overcome challenges and learn from setbacks. Realize you are going to need to retrain yourself much much faster.
• Sense of Humor – If you can’t laugh – why do it?

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I would recommend users start training on various Agentic AI platforms (Mindstudio, N8N, and many others). This way of thinking will greatly enhance BPM in the next couple of years. Although most of the BPM players (ProcessMaker included) have launched or are launching AI agents, it is useful to try them and build with them on the native AI agent platforms. Similarly, all the RPA platforms are building AI agent layers and even converting their entire business models to agentic AI models. However, I would recommend to start training on some of the native platforms. This technology will rather quickly merge with BPM, and then it will swallow BPM.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet?

Building connectors and scripts by hand is a skill that will die in the next 24 months. I would not waste time learning to do a lot of manual coding. Also, building forms will die off as well. It is important to get good at the big picture business analysis and not get lost in the technical weeds of BPM implementation.

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Pedro Robledo

President and co-founder of the Spanish chapter of ABPMP International, Pedro Robledo stands out as a prominent figure with significant influence in Process Management, specializing in the BPM (Business Process Management) discipline. This influence is underscored by his substantial online following, boasting nearly 31,000 followers on LinkedIn. With over 23 years dedicated to advancing the knowledge of Business Process Management in Spain and Latin America, Pedro is a trailblazer in the field.

Currently serving as the Director of the Master’s Degree in BPM for Digital Transformation and the Director of the Master’s Degree in Strategic Process Management at the International University of La Rioja (UNIR), Pedro also imparts his expertise as a Professor of Innovation Management in UNIR’s MBA program. Focus now on the role of High-Performance AI Project Director in UNIR. Beyond academia, he acts as a BPM consultant, guiding organizations in their BPM initiatives, Digital Transformation endeavors, BPM maturity diagnosis, ROI calculations, supplier selection, and comprehensive training and advice on BPMN process modelling, CMMN and DMN decisions. His strategic guidance extends to offering roadmap advice for the progressive implementation of BPM and Enterprise Architecture.

As the Director of BPMteca, Pedro Robledo further contributes to the BPM landscape. A Computer Engineer from the Polytechnic University of Madrid, Pedro has honed his skills through leadership roles in multinational software companies, including Borland International, Ask Group, Computer Associates, Progress Software, Teamware, and Oracle.

Pedro’s commitment to excellence is evident in his role as a jury member for the international WfMC Awards for Excellence in BPM and Workflow, a position he held from 2013 until the conclusion of WfMC. He shares his wealth of knowledge on BPM and Digital Transformation through his blog, “The White Paper on Process Management” (http://pedrorobledobpm.blogspot.com.es/), and regularly contributes insights to various blogs and magazines. Pedro Robledo’s multifaceted contributions make him a leading authority in BPM, shaping the discourse and practices within the industry.

WWW: pedrorobledobpm.blogspot.com.es
WWW: LI profile

What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

Global megatrends are reshaping business landscapes, presenting both challenges and opportunities for organizations. These trends, which include digital transformation, sustainability, demographic shifts, deglobalization, and the rise of artificial intelligence (AI), are fundamentally altering how businesses operate, compete, and deliver value. Business Process Management (BPM) plays a pivotal role in helping organizations adapt to this rapidly changing reality.

Digitalization and AI’s Disruption

The acceleration of digitalization and the proliferation of AI technologies are driving innovation across industries. From the current state of Narrow AI (ANI) to potential advancements toward Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) in the coming years and eventually Artificial Superintelligence (ASI) in the more distant future, AI is revolutionizing workflows, enabling automation, enhancing decision-making, and uncovering new business opportunities. BPM provides the structure to seamlessly integrate these technologies into core operations, ensuring processes are optimized for efficiency, scalability, and resilience. Through process mining, predictive analytics, and intelligent automation, BPM helps organizations unlock the full potential of AI while aligning it with strategic objectives.

Sustainability and Environmental Responsibility

The growing emphasis on sustainability, fueled by stricter regulations and increased consumer awareness, requires organizations to transition toward greener operations. BPM helps align business processes with environmental goals by reducing waste, optimizing resource use, and embedding principles of the circular economy into workflows. By leveraging BPM to implement sustainable practices, organizations can not only meet regulatory requirements but also strengthen their brand reputation and attract environmentally conscious customers.

Demographic Shifts and Workforce Dynamics

Demographic changes, such as aging populations in developed nations and a growing young workforce in emerging markets, are reshaping labor availability and consumer preferences. BPM enables organizations to adapt to these shifts by fostering agility in workforce management, designing customer-centric processes tailored to diverse market needs, and leveraging AI to address talent shortages through automation. Additionally, BPM supports organizations in building inclusive strategies that reflect the evolving demographics of their workforce and customer base.

Deglobalization and Trade Reconfiguration

Geopolitical tensions and protectionist policies are prompting businesses to rethink global supply chains and prioritize resilience over cost efficiency. BPM helps organizations navigate these complexities by reconfiguring supply chain processes, diversifying sourcing strategies, and strengthening operational agility. By incorporating BPM frameworks, companies can enhance their ability to respond to trade disruptions, minimize dependency on single suppliers, and ensure supply chain continuity.

Cybersecurity and Digital Safety

The growing reliance on digital technologies exposes businesses to increased cybersecurity risks. BPM plays a key role in mitigating these threats by embedding robust security protocols into processes, enabling real-time monitoring, and ensuring compliance with global data protection standards. With BPM, organizations can enhance their cyber-resilience, protecting sensitive data and maintaining stakeholder trust.

BPM’s Role in Adapting to Megatrends

BPM provides a comprehensive framework to help organizations thrive amidst these global megatrends. By fostering agility, resilience, and innovation, BPM empowers businesses to align their processes with emerging challenges and opportunities. Whether integrating AI, achieving sustainability goals, adapting to demographic shifts, or navigating geopolitical complexities, BPM serves as the backbone for strategic transformation. Organizations that leverage BPM effectively will be better equipped to lead in this dynamic and disruptive era.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

In 2025, BPM practitioners will need a blend of advanced skills, innovative techniques, and adaptive behaviors to create value in a rapidly evolving business environment dominated by artificial intelligence (AI) and digital transformation. The rise of AI agents and the incorporation of generative AI into BPM tools will redefine how processes are designed, monitored, and optimized. Practitioners must develop expertise in leveraging AI technologies to enhance efficiency, automate complex workflows, and derive actionable insights. Proficiency in interpreting outputs from AI-driven tools such as process mining platforms and predictive analytics will be essential for identifying opportunities for improvement and mitigating risks.

A strong foundation in data literacy will also be indispensable. BPM practitioners must navigate vast amounts of data to validate AI models, ensure accurate outcomes, and guide AI systems to align with organizational objectives. As enterprise applications become more integrated with AI-powered BPM solutions, practitioners will need to master these platforms, understanding how to optimize and customize them to align with evolving business needs.

Beyond technical skills, the ability to collaborate effectively with AI systems and agents will define successful BPM professionals. Practitioners must adopt an open and innovative mindset, viewing AI not as a replacement but as a powerful partner that amplifies their capabilities. This requires a continuous learning attitude, staying up to date with advancements in AI, automation, and process management methodologies.

Ethical considerations will take center stage as BPM practitioners lead AI-driven transformations. Ensuring transparency, fairness, and accountability in process design will be critical, particularly in areas that impact employees and customers. Practitioners must balance technological capabilities with a deep understanding of human needs, maintaining a customer-centric approach that prioritizes delivering value through personalized, efficient, and seamless processes.

Effective communication and leadership will remain crucial. Practitioners will need to engage cross-functional teams, articulate the benefits of AI-driven BPM initiatives, and address concerns from stakeholders. This will demand strong persuasion skills, empathy, and the ability to build trust across diverse groups within an organization. Moreover, expertise in change management will be vital to navigate resistance and foster adoption during transitions.

In a world characterized by constant disruption and innovation, agility and resilience will be essential attitudes. Practitioners must adapt quickly to shifting market dynamics, technological advancements, and regulatory requirements, ensuring that processes remain relevant and effective. By combining technical mastery with human-centered leadership and a commitment to ethical and innovative practices, BPM practitioners can drive substantial value for their organizations in 2025 and beyond.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

To acquire the skills, techniques, and expertise necessary for effective BPM in 2025, there is an abundance of high-quality resources spanning books, courses, certifications, and practical training. These resources cater to the evolving landscape of BPM, particularly as AI technologies like autonomous agents and generative AI-enabled virtual assistants (VAs) become central to transforming organizational competitiveness.

To acquire foundational knowledge for BPM in 2025, it is essential to follow the works of renowned experts such as Michael Hammer, whose “Reengineering the Corporation” and Process and Enterprise Maturity Model (PEMM) remain central to process improvement. Geary Rummler and Alan Brache’s “Improving Performance” offers frameworks for aligning processes with organizational goals, while H. James Harrington’s “Business Process Improvement” emphasizes continuous improvement. Other key figures include Mathias Weske, author of “Business Process Management”, and John Jeston and Johan Nelis with “Business Process Management: Practical Guidelines”. Additionally, thought other leaders that they provide practical insights into adapting BPM for the digital age. These resources collectively lay the groundwork for BPM professionals to thrive in the evolving landscape of AI and automation. For those aiming to integrate AI into BPM workflows, resources like “Human + Machine: Reimagining Work in the Age of AI” by Paul R. Daugherty and H. James Wilson are invaluable for understanding how AI enhances human and organizational performance.

Online learning platforms such as Coursera, edX, and LinkedIn Learning remain essential for developing specialized skills.

Formal education tailored to BPM and digital transformation is also indispensable. Postgraduate programs, such as the Master’s Degree in Business Process Management for Digital Transformation or the Master’s Degree in Strategic Process Management at UNIR, provide holistic training across the BPM lifecycle, with a special focus on aligning business and technology, using Generativa AI in practice to empower BPM. These programs include coverage of BPMN/DMN standards, process mining, ROI analysis, and the implementation of AI-based tools. Certifications from international organizations like ABPMP International and OMG further enhance a professional’s credibility and adherence to global BPM standards.

As someone actively contributing to BPM education as the President of ABPMP Spain and the director of these UNIR programs, I emphasize the importance of learning-by-doing. My blog serves as a hub of resources for BPM practitioners, offering access to bibliographies, videos, articles, and event calendars to keep professionals updated on industry trends. In 2025 my blog also will address cutting-edge topics, including the transformative role of ANI, AGI, and ASI in BPM. My ongoing research into how autonomous agents, generative AI-enabled VAs, and other AI advancements can be applied to BPM ensures that I remain a trusted source for actionable insights into the future of BPM.

With over 30,800 LinkedIn followers, I am committed to sharing the latest breakthroughs, practical applications, and real-world case studies on how AI-driven BPM solutions enhance organizational competitiveness. By staying connected, practitioners gain exclusive access to curated insights that will shape their understanding of how BPM evolves in this AI-driven era.

Ultimately, combining formal education, international certifications, curated online courses, and insights from industry leaders ensures that BPM professionals are equipped to excel in 2025 and beyond. By leveraging these resources, practitioners can harness the full potential of generative AI and other advanced technologies to drive organizational success and innovation in a highly competitive landscape.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

As we move into 2025, some skills and practices in BPM that were once considered essential are becoming less relevant or are being overtaken by emerging technologies. For example, traditional manual process mapping techniques that do not integrate digital tools are increasingly outdated, as process automation, AI-driven analysis, and advanced process mining offer more efficient, scalable alternatives. Similarly, knowledge of outdated process management tools that lack integration with AI or robotic process automation (RPA) is becoming less practical. While process design and modeling remain critical, the reliance on manual, paper-based documentation is being replaced by digital, cloud-based BPM solutions that facilitate real-time collaboration and adaptive workflows. In addition, old-school change management practices that don’t account for rapid, AI-powered transformations or fail to incorporate agile methodologies are also losing relevance. Another area losing its practicality is the overemphasis on traditional job roles that focus solely on process optimization without considering the integration of AI, IoT, and digital transformation strategies. As AI and autonomous agents begin to take on more process management roles, manual intervention in process decision-making and analysis will continue to decrease. In essence, BPM professionals must pivot towards skills that focus on integrating AI, automation, and data-driven decision-making, while moving away from legacy practices that lack the scalability and adaptability needed in today’s fast-paced, technology-driven business environment.

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Prof. Michael Rosemann

Dr Michael Rosemann is the Director of the Centre for Future Enterprise and a Professor for Information Systems at the Business School, Queensland University of Technology (QUT), Brisbane, Australia.
Dr Rosemann’s main areas of research are corporate innovation, revenue resilience, process management and trust management. His work is focused on creating compelling future worlds with today’s possibilities that make current practices obsolete. As a researcher and advisor to board rooms and senior executives he is committed to advancing research-informed knowledge and confidence in order to appreciate the emerging design space and to create an increased ‘sense of ambition’ and innovation appetite.
Dr Rosemann is the author/editor of ten books, more than 350 refereed papers in outlets such as MIS Quarterly, European Journal of Information Systems, Journal of Strategic Information Systems, Information Systems and Journal of the Association of Information Systems, Editorial Board member of ten international journals (incl. MISQ Executive) and co-inventor of US and European patents. His ‘Handbook of Business Process Management’ (with Prof. Jan vom Brocke, second edition) is a comprehensive consolidation of global BPM thought leaders. His publications have been translated into German, Russian, Portuguese and Mandarin. His latest book, ‘The New Learning Economy’ (with Martin Betts), has been published by Routledge in December 2022.
Michael provides advice related to performance, innovation, trust and process management to organisations and their executives from diverse industries including telco, banking, insurance, utility, retail, public sector, higher education, logistics and the film industry. He is also the Honorary Consul of the Federal Republic of Germany in Southern Queensland.

WWW: https://www.qut.edu.au/research/michael-rosemann
WWW: http://www.michaelrosemann.com/
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Twitter: @ismiro

What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

It is indeed important to think broader than a purely technology-driven (AI) outlook on the immediate future of BPM. The trends mentioned here have two impacts: (1) They create a new set of requirements (demand-side of BPM), and (2) they provide new process design options (supply-side of BPM).

In terms of requirements, we are seeing a tremendous extension of the traditional time-cost-quality ambition that has characterized BPM for the last century. Sustainability and its embedded call for carbon reductions is now a firm requirement for business processes demanding extensions to the way we model, measure and mine processes. Adequate enhancements of BPM can help organisations with external reporting and compliance requirements (e.g., ESG).

Demographic changes include the new work movement, inclusive processes, and a focus on total experience design, customers and employees, when managing business processes. This demands extensions of current design practices. For example, organisations need to make their processes accessible to diverse customer cohorts and find ways to better understand employees’ desired process experiences. Preference-based workload allocation is one way for how tomorrow’s processes could be adopted to these changes – the Like-It button finally finds its way into internal workflows.

The rise of advanced technologies increases the need for processes to be responsible meaning reliable, transparent, explainable, fair, private, secure, contestable and accountable. We will see companies that will explore these attributes as the next source of their competitive process advantage. A process might not be the most efficient or streamlined one but stands out because of its degree of responsibility.

In terms of new design options, emerging low-code, highly capable technologies powered by analytical and generative AI will make process personalisation scalable. As a result, the common reductionist focus on process simplification will be enriched with a call for process sophistication. Omnichannel, truly elegant, proactive processes previously unaffordable will become reality. This will most likely occur in those digital industries in which processes are now indeed straight-through, friction free, cloud/mobile-first real-time processes. Here, transactional excellence is becoming a hygiene factor and BPM professionals will be tasked to find the next competitive benefit of BPM.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

A continuously maintained AI-literacy will be a key demand for BPM practitioners who need to unlock the next level of productivity gains, especially in processes where difficult and dangerous processes can be replaced with robotic solutions.

Trained lean six sigma experts will need to boost their data literacy to roll-out the data-hungry tools and methods they are so well trained in, but for a long time could not deploy due to their affordability. This also includes a wider uptake of ABC-costing which will benefit from being fed by process mining solutions.

Both of these trends will elevate a further, so far under-developed literacy: ethics. In her BPM 2024 keynote, Prof Flavia Santoro referred to ethics-first, moral transparency and ethics-as-a-process. The more previously unthinkable process designs become possible (can do), the more we need ethics literacy to be able to answer should we?

And as we democratize the design but also the use of processes, we will see an increased demand for conversational literacy to make the best use of new process interfaces enabled by generative AI.

A significant behavioural change will change will be the request for curiosity. As the frequency of new technologies, regulations and demand shifts is increasing, previous deductive knowledge (e.g., process improvement techniques) and inductive knowledge (e.g., evidence as derived from mined logfiles) might no longer be sufficient. As a result, abductive approaches will become more important – creating hypotheses and then testing their validity. The idea of process prototyping, minimum viable processes and A/B-testing processes is still in its infancy. However, I assume it will be the next significant set of skill/tool/datasets that becomes important as possibilities will become as relevant as problems.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The key drivers for change for BPM will come from outside the narrow BPM domain. This means, BPM professionals need to (1) learn beyond BPM and (2) become a translator back to their BPM domain. There are plenty of potential avenues here ranging from new business models and ESG to the various facets of AI and related large language models. Combining any of these with solid BPM capability will surely lead to a contemporary, high-demand profile.

A valuable, but under-explored resource are comparative, better global practices. It stands out that many organisations, and entire countries, start digital process transformations literally from scratch following established (as-is/to-be) lifecycle models as opposed to identifying and then adopting already existing digital process practices. This is in particular the case in the public sector where we observe common process requirements, but idiosyncratic BPM initiatives.

The International Conference on Business Process Management (Seville, Spain) in the first week of September will be the gathering of global experts in 2025. An event not to be missed for anyone who wants to shape future processes with next generation tools and techniques. This event is also a great place to understand the BPM-related offerings provided by universities worldwide ranging from dedicated BPM degrees to micro-credentials.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

The new skill requirements are largely additive and not a substitute. However, the 1.0 version of manual process design, labour-intensive lean six sigma, or manually training RPA engines will come to an end. In 2025, these approaches will be largely grounded in data using advanced BPM solutions.

At the beginning of the BPM hype curve, I see developments such as process model learning (large model sets autonomously capable of self-improvement) or reliable process model-to-video solutions in which process instructions are articulated in instructional videos tailored to its user base. We are also only at the beginning of truly contextual business processes where process change is triggered automatically by environmental changes.

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Michal Rosik

Michal Rosik, Microsoft / Minit is a former CPO at Minit, a process intelligence leader acquired by Microsoft in 2022. Now holding a PM architect role at Microsoft, shaping the form of Power Automate Process Mining, an AI first, robust, hyper-automation solution. In his free time, he is a passionate trail runner.

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WWW: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/power-platform/products/power-automate
Twitter: @rosik

What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

I see the fundamental role of process management in being a safe harbor for any organization in a rapidly changing world.

Years ago, BPM came and established order in the fuzziness of organizational ecosystems, helping them to cope with rapid changes. Today, technology in form of copilots and agents returns with even more fuzziness, unpredictability and non-determinism, and organizations feel the FoMO pressure.

This rings the same bell.

Today, fuzziness is not a bug, but an expected, even wanted feature. And even though process management is also not the same “good old BPM”, it’s role is even more important – to manage the non-determinism, control the unpredictable and give it a shape and form which will become a trusted partner in the enterprise.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

Even though the technological progress seems to be unstoppable, what did not change much, is what we still need to do to keep the pace.

Change the way we think and perceive the world/environment around us.

In short – what was top of mind last year:
[click for the answer from 2024 here]
stays and we just add building trust in newest tech (GenAI, Agents) to it.

Talking to enterprise customers initiated multiple discussions on determinism, predictability, reliability, replicability of outcome. What is our role in this?

Well, it seems it is not the tech itself, that is not reliable per se. It is how we use it, where and when we use it and how we combine it with traditional techniques to achieve the necessary level of trust that customers need, to rely on the outcomes.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

For gaining theoretical knowledge on relevant topics, start with platforms like Udemy, edX, Coursera. One of the most recent tips is an update on the Process Mining in Action course, dealing with Object Centric Process Mining, that is crisp out of oven at edX:
https://www.edx.org/learn/computer-science/rwth-aachen-university-bai-process-mining

For practical skills, just search on Medium and follow relevant authors:
https://medium.com

And I highly recommend following trends and news outside of the narrow BPM field, in other scientific areas, as this broadens the context, motivates innovation and initiates imagination and inspiration.

Business processes do not live in vacuum.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Both object centricity and agentic universe(s) make traditional process modelling techniques less accurate and more outdated. A bigger update in this area would soon be needed to accommodate to the new world view.

In other words, BPMN, DMN and CMMN can describe less and less of the business process reality we all live in.

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Serge Schiltz

Serge Schiltz is CEO and founder of processCentric GmbH, a European consulting and training firm focused on business process management. With his extensive practical experience as a senior consultant working with clients on their BPM challenges in different industries, he has been able to build a solid reputation over the past decades. Author, trainer, university lecturer and conference speaker in English, German and French. Member of OMG’s DMN Task Force and contributor to the OMG Certified Expert in BPM (OCEB) examination. He is also a Regional Director Europe for ABPMP.

WWW: https://www.processcentric.ch/en
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What is the impact of global megatrends such as climate change, demographic shifts, digital technologies, and AI on BPM, and how can process management help organizations adapt to this new reality?

Even more than in the last few years, I see AI as the key game changer. Digital technologies collect more and more data that we as humans don’t have the capacity to analyze any more. The increasing scarcity of skilled personnel adds to this and requires us to find intelligent ways of extracting valuable information from the mountains of data that we are being flooded with. AI systems offer the possibility to automate business processes that so far, we thought require human skills. This opens possibilities for delivering better service faster and at a lower cost to customers, despite the lack of skilled human resources, which is getting worse by the day.

However, I see that many colleagues have a too narrow view of how to build AI systems. There is a tendency to just throw a complex prompt at a Large Language Model (LLM), which often leads to mediocre results. You must understand your data, remove the noise, merge it with other data, present and/or visualize the results … In other words, you need to design a process for collecting, massaging, merging, processing, and presenting data. Will AI systems replace business processes? No, they are a perfect match and complement each other.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

As a BPM practitioner, you must familiarize with AI technology, master it and identify ways of using it to enhance and automate business processes. This may not be obvious at the beginning, but think of it as just another tool or approach that will allow you to improve your business processes. It is not a panacea, but there are really cool tools around!

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Of course, there is a lot of literature and training on AI. Some are helpful, many very superficial. What you need to get is a deep understanding and hands-on experience. Currently, my preferred source are the training modules of Diogo Alves de Resende, a real expert in business analytics and data science.

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Jim Sinur

Jim Sinur is an independent thought leader in applying smart Digital Business Platforms (DBP), Customer Experience/Journeys (CJM), Business Process Management (BPM), AI, Automation (RPA), Low-code and Decision Management at the edge for enhanced business outcomes. His research and areas of personal experience focus on intelligent business processes, business modeling, real-time data feedback with heterogeneous data types, business process management technologies, smart process collaboration for knowledge workers, process intelligence/optimization, AI applied to business policy/rule management, IoT and leveraging business applications in processes. Jim was a contributor to Forbes in AI. Jim is also one of the authors of BPM: The Next Wave. His latest book is Digital Transformation. Innovate or Die Slowly. Jim is also working on a new book with others entitled “Winning at Digital Transformation with Process Modelling” Jim’s personal blog is approaching one million hits to date. Jim is also a well know digital and traditional artist. His recent adventures include songwriting. He is revisualizing his art and marketing his music with generative AI.

WWW: https://www.forbes.com/sites/cognitiveworld/people/jimsinur/
WWW: http://www.james-sinur.com/
WWW: http://jimsinur.blogspot.com
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Twitter: @JimSinur

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2025?

There are a number of skills that BPM folks could pick up as there are many in the middle of digital evolution assisted by AI, but my top seven would be the following:
1) Journey Mapping for Customers, Employees and Partners including touchpoint analysis and persona creation that crosses internal functional stovepipes. Outside-in Thinking.

2) Embedded Advanced Analytic and Visualization Capabilities. Process plus big, fast and dark process/data mining is growing to be more important. Decision Models will become more important as they integrate with process models. Strategic and situational modeling can be helpful in guiding agents and processes.
3) Agentic AI, Adaptive, Smart and Goal Driven Processes (often in Case Management and also Explicit Rule enabled) guided by guardrails and by process/data mining with real time feedback. Concentrating on Agents inside and outside a process or process snippets. Snippets and RPA bots are often candidates for converting into agents. Get ready for specialty agents such as broker agents.

4) AI Productivity Focused looking for opportunities to add automation or more smarts like Generative AI. Machine learning, Deep Learning and 17 other AI technology tributaries. See the 20 AI tributaries by clicking here. https://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2023/11/ai-tributaries-types-for-2024.htm

5) Cognitive Collaboration for Knowledge Intense Processes or Cases. AI Assistance for process resources is on the move right now. Leveraging learning AI software and Agents for knowledge building and simulating potential outcomes.

6) Signal and Pattern Detection at the edge (often needed for agility, IoT and business strategy). IoT integration is a new emerging theme. This can be taken to the level of digital twins and by merging control on the edge with central control.

7) Business Professional Process creation, adaptation, and optimization by leveraging lite BPM/workflow, Process/Data Mining utilizing Low code and generative AI.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

While there are no skills that one should drop, there are several that are considered common and receding. My top three would be the following:
1) Central Control Only approaches with siloed skill sets. More lateral thinking is and collaborative control is needed today.

2) Water Fall Only project methods are taking a second seat to incremental development leveraging Generative AI, RPA and rapid experimentation. We are living in an emergent world with emergent responses required.

3) Large blocks of dumb frozen code are giving way to smart and instrumented components, micro services and late binding rules guided by constraints. Turn dumb code into adaptive agents where possible.

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Below you can find the answers from the following experts:
Sasha Aganova
BJ Biernatowski
Thomas Hildebrandt
Sandeep Johal
Morten Marquard
Jan Mendling
Amy Van Looy
Roland Woldt

Now, let’s dive into the answers.

Sasha Aganova

Sasha Aganova brings innovative ideas to the intersection of new forms of business processes, business design, and cultural transformation. Her forward-thinking, pragmatic approach to today’s challenges is based on over 20 years as a leader of business process modernization. This approach was developed while working with diverse companies around the world to improve their ways of operating.

Sasha writes thought-provoking articles for publications like BPTrends and the Huffington Post. She enjoys sharing her knowledge with the broader community at conferences as a frequent presenter, and keynote speaker. In addition to her consulting and training work, Sasha is also currently teaching an undergraduate-level course in Integrated Systems Design at the University of Toronto.

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What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

The rise of generative AI will have a transformative impact on business process management. By automating numerous aspects of BPM, generative AI can substantially reduce project timelines and improve the quality of deliverables. During gathering of the current state, generative AI can rapidly synthesize explicit knowledge about existing processes and detect terms inconsistencies. For analysis, it can facilitate data analysis, perform risk assessment, and generate insights. When redesigning the future state, generative AI can be used to enable rapid ideation. For implementation, it can generate procedures, training content, and onboarding materials. Finally, for continuous improvement, it can provide knowledge at the fingertips to support activities. With capabilities spanning the entire BPM lifecycle, generative AI promises more efficient and effective process improvement initiatives. This evolution will require rethinking some BPM methodologies, but holds great promise for transforming how organizations manage, optimize and innovate their processes.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

I believe the impact of generative AI on business process management will be similar to the impact of robotics on manufacturing. It will provide a tool to make work faster and more efficient. However, deep expertise will still be required to understand the processes that need to be improved. The core skills that have always been critical in BPM will remain the most important in 2024. These include curiosity to ask insightful questions, thinking strategically about the big picture while also mastering the details, learning agility, stakeholder engagement, and synthesizing information into actionable insights. While generative AI will transform how process improvements are executed, human skills like curiosity, critical thinking, understanding of cultural environment and values of the parties, collaboration and analysis will be indispensable. The professionals who thrive will combine their human strengths with the power of AI to drive impactful process innovation.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The skills I mentioned—curiosity, critical thinking, collaboration, and analysis—are not easily developed from books alone. Like playing the piano, they are skills honed through extensive hands-on practice and mentorship. No amount of reading or watching videos can substitute for actively applying these skills under the guidance of experts. Aspiring business process management professionals should seek out mentors in the industry and immerse themselves in real-world experiences that exercise their ability to ask probing questions, think creatively, engage stakeholders, and synthesize insights. Only through practice can they develop and transform conceptual knowledge into mastery of the core skills that drive impactful process innovation. There are no shortcuts when developing the human capabilities that will remain indispensable alongside generative AI. Dedication and experience are key.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Any previously acquired skill can be useful when applied appropriately. All skills are tools in your toolbox—some used more often than others, but none completely obsolete. In business process management, I cannot identify any skill that has become entirely useless. There are no single solutions for everything, just as few skills are truly redundant. The most valuable skills are those leveraged thoughtfully in the right contexts. With experience, professionals gain wisdom about when and how to apply their capabilities. An open mindset enables transferable skills to remain relevant amidst changing environments. Rather than declaring skills useless, effective process managers find creative ways to extract value from diverse capabilities.

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BJ Biernatowski

BJ Biernatowski is a BPM Practitioner with over 20 years of technology experience. He has practical expertise implementing Low Code DPA platforms including Microsoft Power Platform on large scale business transformations.
BJ is a Process and Execution Manager on Microsoft’s Global Finance Operations Team.
KM World has featured BJ’s work, and he has presented internationally on workplace transformations of Fortune 500 companies.
In his spare time, he is coauthoring a new book titled “Mastering Digital Change by Transforming Business with Analysis and Modeling”.

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Twitter: @bjbiernatowski

What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

Artificial Intelligence (AI) overall will play a critical role in shaping the landscape of Digital Change programs. It will transform organizations by:

1. Further consolidating and bringing together AI, DPA & RPA, self-learning, adaptability, decision management, and global infrastructure into one hybrid Cloud platform.

2. Breaking architectural patterns that rely on centralized decision management and pushing GenAI-enabled bots into previously unreachable ‘corners’ of workflow management ecosystems. Envision an organization with multiple versions of its operations embedded as ‘process blueprints’. These bots will be capable of deploying different scenarios based on situational awareness and changing market conditions.

3. Shifting the focus from process-based workflow optimization to one focused on business outcomes and adaptability. While prior generations of DPA platforms have touted this benefit, the infusion of AI into multiple layers of the tech stack will finally deliver on this vision.

4. Introducing advanced pattern recognition to aid document management and unstructured data processing, improving accuracy and speed of critical decision-making during process execution.

5. Traditional process analysis and discovery projects will get a second life making companies reconsider which approach to take during Discovery. Process Mining will lose a bit of its luster as the work of Copilot enabled Citizen Architects and Developers starts generating unprecedented results.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

1. As AI starts assisting practitioners in their daily lives, adjusting to working alongside the machines will require taking a fresh look at what the actual job is. I do not see machines as competitors taking our jobs, but more as amplifiers of professional skillsets. In the age of AI, skillsets and experience still matter.

2. AI will accelerate the progress of mundane and effort-intensive project activities, leaving enough time for strategy, business, and process architecture. In the past, projects may have been consumed by difficult phases like discovery and analysis, sometimes pushing the ultimate project end goal into secondary focus.

3. With Copilot’s assistance, more challenging cognitive tasks will get an uplift, allowing teams to test hypotheses and explore problem solutions more holistically and much quicker.

4. Knowing the craft inside out will still matter in the world where machines can reason over vast data sets quickly. Knowing vs. being able to connect different business scenarios still requires critical thinking and solid process skills – so humans will always be in the loop.

5. Staying on top of the BPM Common Body of Knowledge (CBOK). This will be so much easier with Copilot.

6. Problem-solving, collaboration, adaptability, communication, resilience, and digital detox to navigate upcoming changes with a positive and refreshed mindset.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

1. Support for Six Sigma methodology, with its rigid structure and focus on precision, seems to be waning in the context of knowledge work. Involvement of Six Sigma consultants in process transformation projects usually means delays, despite the wealth of science brought in. Six Sigma may come back built into process management frameworks.

2. Documentation. Excessive documentation, especially in the form of lengthy process manuals, is no longer practical. Instead, concise, and visual process models are favored for ease of understanding. Rely on Copilot and similar chatbots for details.

3. Separation of IT and Business Teams: While not a skill, the siloed approach between IT and business is outdated and, in today’s world, artificial. Collaboration and cross-functional understanding are essential for successful BPM driven Digital Transformations. Citizen Developer platforms continue to bridge this gap.

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Prof. Thomas Hildebrandt

Thomas Hildebrandt has since 2018 been full professor at the Department of Computer Science, Copenhagen University and founder of the research section for Software, Data, People and Society. Thomas has been working as PI and co-PI on inter-disciplinary research and development projects jointly with industry partners in the area of technology and methods for business and workflow management systems for more than 20 years and has and has been a senior PC member of the BPM Conference for several years. Thomas initiated the research on DCR Graphs in 2008 and has since then led the research in collaboration with his research groups and Morten Marquard, the CEO at DCR Solutions. Thomas is also an active speaker on AI and digitalization for industry and public sector organisations and is member of the Danish Standards group for AI, who is part of the European (CEN/CENELEC) and Global (ISO) standardization bodies.

WWW: LI profile

What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

GenAI is presently at the top of the hype curve and lots of resources are used trying to find useful applications of the technology that can be trusted beyond pilots. This may lead to a lot of sub quality solutions and delay the advancement of more useful improvements of process management.

When the hype settles I think the technology can help experts to speed up tasks related to production of context, in domains where they can easily spot mistakes, e.g for the generation of process models from textual descriptions. It may also help providing useful conversational interfaces to workflow and business process management systems, although the technology at this point still suffer from hallucinations and mistakes.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

I strongly believe that BPM practitioners can create tremendous value for their organizations by learning how to capture the knowledge behind business processes using modern declarative process notations supported by both process mining, design tools and execution engines, such as Dynamic Condition Response (DCR) Graphs combined with Decision Model and Notation (DMN), instead of keep trying to capture process flows with standard imperative flow-graphs such as BPMN.

As long as the practitioners stick to flow-graphs they will suffer from too rigid processes that cannot be easily updated when business policies or regulations change and only be able to support the most predictable and stable processes.

With declarative models one can at the same time automate small rigid sub processes and the knowledge processes that ties them together – and adapt to ever changing contexts and regulations, thereby reach the level of “hyperautomation”.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Declarative process modeling and process mining with DCR Graphs have been described in many research articles at the yearly BPM and ICPM conferences on respectively Business Process Management and Process Mining. This conferences are highly relevant! ICPM 2024 will be in Copenhagen which is also the home of the DCR research teams and the DCR Solutions company developing the DCR tools.

We are currently writing on two books on DCR Graphs planned to be published later 2024 – one providing a coherent introduction to the DCR modeling notation (and the interplay with DMN), a method for declarative modeling and the tools available at DCRsolutions.net – the other one providing a light introduction and several example of the use of DCR Graphs provided by domain experts using the notation with the NEC WorkZone Enterprise Information System widely used within the Danish public sector but also being marketed in UK and Australia. Until the books come out I can recommend creating a free trial account at DCRSolutions.net and looking into the substantial online documentation available.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I think most classical BPM skills are still relevant and will stay relevant- but they are limited to rigid and stable processes and not feasible for knowledge processes. I do not think generative AI has proven to be practically applicable for anything truly transformative in BPM yet.

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Sandeep Johal

Sandeep is a Managing Director & Principal Consultant at Nano Business Technology with over 15 years of Business Process Management and Digital Transformation experience, specifically in enterprise wide system implementation process design, process improvement, strategic sourcing, capability uplift, strategy alignment, thought leadership in energy, utilities & resources; finance; and government bodies across Australia, New Zealand, Middle East, and North America

Sandeep’s consulting takes him to both national and international destinations including the Americas, Middle East, New Zealand and the UK. He is often invited to speak at national and international conferences and is regarded as a contributor to the Business Process Management body of knowledge. He holds a Masters in Information Technology (BPM), an honours in Business Management and a diploma in Mechanical Engineering.

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WWW: Company website

What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

The impact of GenAI will be widely felt in every discipline with process management being no different. The value added by GenAI is enormous and should be viewed as a formidable tool to achieve results. As such, process practitioners should be open to learning and changing the way they deliver results. Organisations will have less funds and time to achieve grand process outcomes. For the first time, process practitioners have the opportunity to enable AI to do the ‘heavy lifting’ (e.g. quantitative analysis of big data) while deriving important (and novel) decisions for enhanced (or revolutionary) improvement. The key difference here is ‘decisions’. Process management will focus on decision management (i.e. data-driven etc.), safely reducing the ‘burden of decision” for small and large organisations.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

– Process Mining (including the ability to understand ‘self-correcting’ processes)
– Data Science (to facilitate big data analysis using BI)
– Resurgence of RPA (Robotic Process Automation) – including Intelligent Process Automation
– Foundations of machine learning (as a superset of AI)
– Less focus on hard skills (quantitative analysis) and increased spotlight on change management and decision management

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

– Process Mining 2.0 (various tool offerings including IBM, Apromore, Celonis etc.)
– RPA foundations: https://academy.uipath.com or any other RPA provider
– YouTube (a wealth of amazing videos – too many to list here)
– Digital Transformation. (https://www.thirdstage-consulting.com/thought-leadership/)

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

All skills are still relevant and the newer ones will be built on a solid foundation.

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Morten Marquard

Morten Marquard has dedicated his entire professional journey to addressing the challenges faced by knowledge workers, including lawyers, social workers, and other professionals dealing with complex work processes. The struggle to navigate these processes efficiently while complying with ever-changing laws and regulations has been a persistent issue. Traditionally, compliance has relied on laborious reading and understanding of lengthy paper-based documents—a cumbersome task that often hinders productivity.

Recognizing the need for a transformative solution, Morten embarked on a mission to leverage technology for the benefit of knowledge workers, not only enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of employees but also alleviating the burden of manual compliance checks and reducing stress levels.

Morten realized the limitations of using Business Process Model and Notation, BPMN, to streamline process digitalization as the rigidity of the processes failed to meet the requirements of end-users. It was during this critical juncture, approximately 15 years, that Morten collaborated with professor Thomas Hildebrandt, and together, they propelled the development of dynamic condition response graphs, DCR. This innovative approach has since been embraced by over 40 different customers, primarily in Denmark, with expanding reach into international markets such as Italy and the United Kingdom.

Morten’s journey exemplifies a commitment to pushing the boundaries of technology to empower knowledge workers, offering them a more streamlined and stress-free approach to managing their intricate work processes. The impact of his work extends far beyond national borders, contributing to a global shift in how organizations approach digitalization and compliance in the modern age.

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What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

Computers often appear surprisingly rigid, as what might look as minor issues can lead to errors that are hard to understand. This difficulty in communicating with computers has spurred continuous efforts to find effective solutions over the decades.

In November 2022, the introduction of ChatGPT marked a paradigm shift in computer interaction. Suddenly, individuals could communicate in natural language and receive responses that made sense. This breakthrough paved the way for a novel approach to computer communication.

When business professionals articulate how tasks should be executed or processes managed, they frequently resort to elaborate documents filled with diverse diagrams and drawings. These serve to capture the knowledge the desired process.

Enter generative AI, a tool that has the potential to revolutionize this scenario by translating non-formal process descriptions into formal ones comprehensible to computers. This shift sets the stage for a truly non-code approach to business process management. The pivotal question arises: what specific formal descriptions should we task generative AI with creating? Equally important is the ability to assess whether the generated formal descriptions align with expectations.

At DCR Solutions, we have integrated generative AI capabilities to assist business professionals in converting rules into formal semantics. For instance, envision a CFO wanting to implement a rule ensuring that invoices are always dispatched within four days of goods delivery. Generative AI in DCR can seamlessly create such rules.

Watch this video to learn more:
https://youtu.be/r5rf-4i0b5w

Moreover, it aids in crafting expressions required in intricate business processes, such as specifying conditions like “if the amount exceeds 200,000.” Crucially, DCR can present generative AI-suggested rules in natural language format, allowing business personnel to verify their validity.

In essence, while generative AI facilitates the comprehension of text, the ability to verify understanding through natural language representations of formal descriptions, as exemplified by DCR, remains critical.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

To commence, it is crucial to grasp the multifaceted nature of value within organizations. Traditionally, value has been synonymous with automation—a process wherein tasks previously executed by humans are now handled by computers. While automation undeniably contributes to efficiency, it is not the sole avenue for generating value in Business Process Management, BPM. BPM often involves intricate coordination among numerous individuals, necessitating meticulous planning. This is an area where computers excel, as they adeptly streamline planning processes that typically consume considerable time.

In the realm of BPM, not all tasks can be automated, especially those contingent upon the completion of other activities. Moreover, discerning critical priorities can be challenging. Here, technology can serve as a facilitator for knowledge workers, alleviating the burden of details and eliminating the need for incessant status inquiries through emails. The objective is to empower knowledge workers to focus on substantive aspects without being bogged down by operational details.

Looking ahead to 2024, a foundational skillset involves expressing work processes in a formal manner. While this may appear straightforward, the reality is nuanced. Numerous rules govern processes, leading to subtle variations that defy conventional flow chart representations. Despite our inclination towards envisioning a swift and uncomplicated trajectory for tasks, the practicalities often differ. Acknowledging this, it becomes imperative to confront and describe the challenges posed by detailed aspects, acknowledging that simplification may not always be achievable.

Humility is paramount in our approach, recognizing the importance of details. It is sometimes more prudent to leave tasks unfinished with explanatory notes, rather than erroneously asserting a comprehensive capture of all details. Importantly, we must abandon the notion of a one-size-fits-all approach, as simplicity is not universal in complex scenarios. In essence, acknowledging the complexity, embracing humility, and appreciating the significance of details will fortify our capacity to effectively articulate and manage the landscape of work in BPM.

What is the purpose of processes in your opinion?

The purpose of processes is to make operations more efficient and effective, but the transformation of the organization with people and systems are often overlooked and not getting proper focus. Classical change management approaches might be useful transforming the business given the new processes, but it is very labor intensive and hard to do. The reason is that the processes often focus on the 80% that is common, and in reality therefore does not focus on the 20% that is difficult and where employees really needs assistance.

As the DCR approach focus on the details and tries to fully capture the process knowledge we focus on the 100% of the process – not just the 80%. Listening to Will van der Aalsts presentation about process mining, it means we address 100% of the value – and not just 20% from classical BPMN projects!

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Engaging in hands-on experiences is pivotal for effective learning and mastery. The incorporation of dynamic condition response graphs provides a refreshing perspective on the learning journey. Initiate your exploration by vividly describing and immersing yourself in the nuances of a process through our online process simulator. If you encounter any gaps or inaccuracies, revisit the model, refining it to precisely capture the rules and activities inherent in your process.

Embark on this educational adventure by creating a complimentary trial account on our website, www.dcrgraphs.net. Immerse yourself in a trove of instructional videos and explore comprehensive information available on our documentation site, documentation.dcr.design. Engage in our online exercises designed to impart detailed knowledge of formal semantics. Uncover a multitude of process examples, ranging from employee onboarding to troubleshooting issues like lost credit cards, offering practical insights to augment your comprehension and application of these concepts. Additionally, elevate your expertise by enrolling in our training course and achieving DCR certification. Become a certified professional and enhance your proficiency in dynamic condition response graphs.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Let’s address a reality: Flowcharts are considered harmful!

The skills associated with flowcharting and BPMN may no longer be essential and hinder the advancement of BPM journeys! It is time to consider abandoning these practices to foster more efficient processes. The pursuit of “straight-through processes” should be reconsidered. Instead of searching for external experts, we should recognize the expertise within our current workforce. Our existing knowledge workers are adept, and the belief that there are superior experts elsewhere should be dismissed. We already possess the experts we need!

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Prof. Dr. Jan Mendling

Prof. Dr. Jan Mendling is the Einstein-Professor for Process Science with the Department of Computer Science at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, adjunct professor at Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien, and Principal Investigator at the Weizenbaum Institute, Berlin. His research interests include various topics in the area of business process management and information systems. He is co-author of the textbooks Fundamentals of Business Process Management and Wirtschaftsinformatik. He has published more than 500 research papers and articles, among others in IEEE Transaction journals and MIS Quarterly. He is inaugural Co-Editor-in-Chief of Process Science and Co-Founder of Noreja, a tool vendor focusing on causal process mining.

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What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

In general, generative AI (and here I focus on text generation such as provided by ChatGPT) has a positive impact on process management, because it has a positive impact on implementation efficiency. ChatGPT and related tools are already intensively used by software developers to build systems faster. Implementing business processes by help of digital workflows or robotic process automation benefits from such gains in efficiency. But this is not all! Therefore, I also consider this question:

What is the impact of process management on GenAI?

So far, people have often explored Generative AI tools unsystematically. The process perspective is the key for finding opportunities to use GenAI systematically and at scale. This will lead to the re-engineering of business processes by using classical tools for process automation enhanced with GenAI capabilities for supporting specific tasks in our business processes.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

A key skill remains to understand end-to-end processes in detail. Process analytics is essential for navigating the process landscape and driving an evidence-based digital transformation. Next to that, companies have to systematically monitor and explore new technology trends and match them with their business requirements. The key challenge here is to overcome the knowledge gap of technological details and application opportunities.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

There are some seminal ideas that continue to be highly relevant. All process redesign initiatives have to take an informed decision on the degree of automation. How this degree relates to human skills and knowledge is at the heart of human factors research. Some foundational ideas are described by Parasuraman et al. (2000): A model for types and levels of human interaction with automation. IEEE Transactions on systems, man, and cybernetics-Part A: Systems and Humans, 30(3), 286-297: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/844354.

In our own research, we developed methodological guidance for finding new process designs in Gross et al (2021): The Business Process Design Space for exploring process redesign alternatives. Business Process Management Journal, 27(8), 25-56: https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/BPMJ-03-2020-0116/full/html.

Our startup presents important ideas for improving processes in a biweekly newsletter: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/peaking-process-excellence-7127319663822221313/.

Finally, you must not miss the 22nd International Conference on Business Process Management, which takes place in the first week of September in beautiful Krakow, Poland: https://bpm2024.agh.edu.pl/.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

We are done with flat event logs and old-generation process mining. Complex processes like Order-to-Cash with orders that are split up into order items, which are in turn bundled into shipments cannot be captured appropriately with flat event logs. New tools and new approaches give more accurate insights into such complex processes in production, logistics, or the service industry with 1:n relationships between relevant entities.

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Prof. dr. Amy Van Looy

Prof. dr. Amy Van Looy holds a Ph.D. in applied economics. Before entering academia, she worked as an IT consultant. Being an associate professor at Ghent University, she coordinates the research cluster of “Process orientation” at the Department of Business Informatics and Operations Management. She teaches, among others, courses on research methods, process management, technology innovation and social media. Amy Van Looy is the recipient of the “Highest Award for Achievement” at the Dale Carnegie Consulting Program in 2007, the “Award for Best Contribution” at the OnTheMove Academy in 2010, the faculty’s “PhD Tutor Award” in 2022, as well as paper nominations (e.g., BPM2018) and paper rewards (e.g., BPM2019). She was nominated in the top-10 for “Young ICT Lady of the year 2014” by the Belgian magazine DataNews, and was recognized as a tech role model by the non-profit “InspiringFifty Belgium” in 2020 (i.e., for being one of Belgium’s 50 most inspiring women in technology).

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What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

I believe that the effects of generative AI on process management are profound. With the advent of generative AI and large language models, many jobs will face a significant shift in the coming years, necessitating adjustments in employees’ roles and the underlying business processes. This shift allows for allocating more time to specialized tasks, which are often more aligned with one’s expertise and interests. However, this shift also underscores the growing importance of lifelong learning for employees to maintain an updated skillset. In other words, generative AI should be seen as a complementary tool, akin to a co-pilot, and offering new avenues to rethink and enhance business processes rather than entirely replacing human workers. This complementary nature is important because the replacement of human employees remains a highly sensitive issue. Similarly, the discipline of process management can gain substantial advantages from the integration of generative AI throughout the diverse phases of a standard process lifecycle, namely from gathering requirements, to designing process models, and deploying processes, as well as during process optimization. Despite its relatively recent emergence, generative AI has already earned a lot of attention, and many scholars are eagerly scrutinizing its potential, including the implications for process management. For instance, the use of generative AI can be applied for handling complaints more effectively, or it offers an approachable support for improving writing assignments and for preparing presentations. Additionally, generative AI can assist in decision-making processes, and so streamlining operations and reducing the probability of errors or arbitrariness. Moreover, generative AI has the potential to foster innovation by generating new ideas and solutions that may not have been considered otherwise. Therefore, we can anticipate a proliferation of generative AI applications in the near future, and for which a successful integration within the field of process management also requires a thoughtful and strategic approach.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

Given that the business climate in which many organizations operate is facing volatile changes (e.g., due to political instability, elections, wars, pandemics, or natural disasters), resilience emerges as a critical organizational trait. Similarly, organizations will need to learn how to balance the exploitation of existing business processes with the exploration of new business opportunities. Regarding this exploration lens, organizations can potentially reflect on novel digital business models such as servitization, namely shifting from a more product-centric to a more service-centric logic, and thus disruptively rethinking an organization’s business processes. In sum, innovation skills and fostering openness to business process ambidexterity (which aims at balancing process exploitation and process exploration) will be more prominent for creating business value and maintaining competitiveness in the market. Moreover, skills for leveraging AI tools into process management will become more critical, such as skills related to data preparation and the utilization of AI-generated insights in business processes. Finally, business value can be created by investing more in collaboration skills, and especially for better aligning business and IT. For instance, practitioners must exhibit adaptability and agility to effectively navigate the dynamic IT landscape and to stay ahead of emerging digital technologies (not just limited to AI), and therefore requiring strong coordinating efforts from the IT department as well.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I am currently writing a book on digital innovation, which will appear in 2024. This practitioner-oriented book will also consider how real-life case organizations have rethought their business processes by adopting emerging digital technologies. Therefore, this book serves as an excellent follow-up resource for further insights, which I can provide as my first tip. Stay tuned for updates on its publication through my LinkedIn and Twitter. Additionally, for the latest advancement in process management research, I recommend the annual International Business Process Management Conference, which is typically held in September.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

The perspective on business process ambidexterity highlights the necessity of exploiting conventional process methods, techniques, and skills, while also exploring the more innovative ones. Given this required blend, I would not necessarily consider some process methods, techniques, or skills as irrelevant. Instead, it becomes much more important to understand which ones are rather conventional, and thus better fit for process exploitation, and which ones will rather help for innovation and thinking out of the box. For instance, although just applying methods such as Lean or Six Sigma in an organization may not result in many disruptive ideas, I still consider the latter as highly relevant for more incremental process improvements. However, certain skills may currently lag behind even though they hold promise and relevance for the future. As an example, I would mention applications related to automatically tracking compliance with sustainable development goals using process models. Generative AI might also stimulate continued research that deals with automatically deriving process models from textual documentation. Likewise, we have only seen a tiny bit of generative AI’s potential yet.

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Roland Woldt

Roland Woldt is a well-rounded executive with 25+ years of Business Transformation consulting and software development/system implementation experience, in addition to leadership positions within the German Armed Forces (11 years).
He has worked as a Team Lead, Engagement/Program Manager, and Enterprise/Solution Architect on many projects. Within these projects, he was responsible for the full project life-cycle, from shaping a solution and selling it, to setting up a methodological approach through design, implementation, and testing, up to the roll-out of solutions.
In addition to this, Roland has managed consulting offerings throughout their life-cycle, from definition, delivery to update, and had revenue responsibility for them. This also included the stand-up and development of consulting teams, and their day-to-day management. Roland worked as a Vice President at iGrafx, Director in KPMG’s Advisory, as a Practice Director at Software AG/IDS Scheer, and as a project manager at Accenture.

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What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

That is an interesting question and a lot of hype is built around it, while the vendors try to figure out what “AI” really means in their tools. Today we see things like predictions based on machine learning in process mining tools, but I think that there is a huge whitespace – for example, AI could be used to automate the creation of simulation models, so that whenever you press save in your BPM tool it triggers x simulations (variations) and the tool comes back with statements like “If you add x resources more to step y your capacity in that process grows by 30%”.

Another example could be the “auto-modeling” of processes by using speech to text features in chat bots and a diagram will be changed on the fly.

However, I see AI as a productivity enhancer who will take away the mundane tasks and answer simple questions. It is not the “genie in a bottle” that will take away the thinking from the people (and that is a good thing).

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

IMHO there are base skills in BPM that everyone need to have – analysis (with or without mining), design and simulation, basic automation skills. Governance is obviously still a topic – how do we run the show, and how can we adapt this to our program or organization.

What is relatively new is that BPM practitioners need to learn “IT skills” that you typically haven’t seen in BAs. Things like data transformations (and a lot of vendors force you to use SQL, even though there are visual tools out there like KNIME), or understanding things like CI/CD for rolling out and managing automations.

Lastly, there are also the evergreen skills – soft skills like facilitation, stakeholder management, business planning, managing teams, etc.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

There are tons of resources out there, but I lastly I liked Michael Schank’s book “Digital Transformation Success” and I love podcasts. And of course I am biased, but I highly recommend mine (together with J-M Erlendson): “What’s Your Baseline? Demystifying EA and BPM” – available wherever you get your podcasts and at whatsyourbaseline.com.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I wouldn’t say that any skills are generally irrelevant, but I think that BPM is more than just creating a diagram, as it was until a few years ago. That just produced virtual artifacts that “collected dust”. You need to actively make the diagrams evergreen and being used every day (by feeding it with real-time data, or to configure automations).

Think of Google Maps – the value-add is not the map itself (even though that is a major accomplishment to keep it up-to-date with the creepy self-driving cars with cameras on top), but things like predicting the correct route (simulation in BPM), crowd-based info collection during runtime (“speed traps!”), etc. BPM needs to step up its game to be as real-time as Google Maps IMHO.

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What to expect in 2024? Which skills will be hot?

Since my clairvoyance skills are rather weak I want to invite you to read the thought provoking answers from 10+ BPM experts.

PS. At the end of the post you will find a link to “New Process Podcast” episode #44 where Mirko and I talk about the “BPM Skills” cycle.

As always, you can either read everything or use the navigation below. Enjoy!
Wil van der Aalst
Tony Benedict
Lloyd Dugan
Marlon Dumas
Ian Gotts
Mathias Kirchmer
Mirko Kloppenburg
Harald Kühn
Brian Reale
Pedro Robledo
Michal Rosik
Michael Rosemann
Serge Schiltz and Naïla van Kommer
Jim Sinur
Roger Tregear
Podcast episode

Which BPM skills will be hot in 2024

Now, let’s dive into the answers.

Prof. Wil van der Aalst

Prof.dr.ir. Wil van der Aalst is a full professor at RWTH Aachen University, leading the Process and Data Science (PADS) group. He is also the Chief Scientist at Celonis, part-time affiliated with the Fraunhofer FIT, and a member of the Board of Governors of Tilburg University. He also has unpaid professorship positions at Queensland University of Technology (since 2003) and the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven (TU/e). Currently, he is also a distinguished fellow of Fondazione Bruno Kessler (FBK) in Trento, deputy CEO of the Internet of Production (IoP) Cluster of Excellence, co-director of the RWTH Center for Artificial Intelligence. His research interests include process mining, Petri nets, business process management, workflow automation, simulation, process modeling, and model-based analysis. Many of his papers are highly cited (he is one of the most-cited computer scientists in the world and has an H-index of 161 according to Google Scholar with over 121,000 citations), and his ideas have influenced researchers, software developers, and standardization committees working on process support. He previously served on the advisory boards of several organizations, including Fluxicon, Celonis, ProcessGold/UiPath, and aiConomix. Van der Aalst received honorary degrees from the Moscow Higher School of Economics (Prof. h.c.), Tsinghua University, and Hasselt University (Dr. h.c.). He is also an IFIP Fellow, IEEE Fellow, ACM Fellow, and an elected member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Royal Holland Society of Sciences and Humanities, the Academy of Europe, and the North Rhine-Westphalian Academy of Sciences, Humanities and the Arts. In 2018, he was awarded an Alexander-von-Humboldt Professorship.

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What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

Both generative and predictive AI complement process management in three different ways. The current focus is on GenAI, but this does not replace other data-driven techniques like predictive AI and process mining! The distinction between generative and predictive Artificial Intelligence (AI) is crucial in understanding their roles in process mining. Generative AI focuses on creating new data or patterns, like ChatGPT, which generates human-like text. Predictive AI, on the other hand, analyzes existing data to predict future outcomes. Advances in AI are mostly fueled by breakthroughs in Machine Learning (ML); therefore, the terms are often used interchangeably. Large Language Models (LLMs) like ChatGPT have experienced a rapid uptake across various industries due to their advanced natural language processing capabilities. Their ability to generate human-like text, answer queries, and automate tasks is revolutionizing how businesses and individuals interact with technology, fostering innovation and efficiency. It is clear that human tasks can be partly automated. For example, Microsoft Copilot, a tool integrated into Microsoft 365 applications, helps accelerate tasks typically done by people. However, thus far, AI (both generative and predictive) does NOT play a role in the core process mining algorithms for process discovery and conformance checking. While traditional process mining techniques like process discovery and conformance checking do not benefit from mainstream AI and ML methods, they complement each other. There are three areas where AI/ML techniques complement process mining: (1) Support the creation (of new forms) of event data, (2) Create ML models to answer process-related questions, and (3) making interactions with PM/BPM software more human-like, easier, and supportive. Generative AI is quickly changing the way that people interact with software, including process mining software. Users would like to pose process-related questions in natural language. Just like ChatGPT can generate SQL queries, it is possible to ask a process mining tool to create process-related queries. Example questions include: “What is the biggest bottleneck in this production process?”, “Which suppliers are causing production delays?”, and “What do these deviating cases have in common?”. However, the need for dedicated process mining techniques remains the key to success.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

As the adage says: “Crawl before you walk, and walk before you run”. Therefore, to ensure efficient, compliant, and optimized operational processes, one needs to take things step-by-step. Just like ChatGPT cannot replace basic tools like calculators, AI cannot replace core process-mining techniques, such as process discovery and conformance checking. Process models annotated with performance and compliance problems remain crucial for organizations to understand and optimize their processes. Object-Centric Process Mining (OCPM) provides a way to structure information about objects and events in a system-agnostic manner. As we move forward, it’s essential for organizations to first master the “process and data management basics” before embracing more sophisticated forms of AI and ML. The future of process management lies in a balanced integration of Object-Centric Process Mining (OCPM) and AI, leading to more efficient, compliant, and optimized operational processes, 2023.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

• W.M.P van der Aalst. Object-Centric Process Mining: Unraveling the Fabric of Real Processes. Mathematics, 11(12):2691, 2023. https://doi.org/10.3390/math11122691
• W.M.P. van der Aalst and J. Carmona, editors. Process Mining Handbook, volume 448 of Lecture Notes in Business Information Processing. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-08848-3
• A. Berti, D. Schuster, and W.M.P. van der Aalst. Abstractions, Scenarios, and Prompt Definitions for Process Mining with LLMs: A Case Study, NLP4BPM’2023, 2023 https://arxiv.org/abs/2307.02194
• L. Reinkemeyer, M. Röglinger, W. Kratsch, L. Fabri, S. Schmid, J. Wittmann. Exploring the Interplay of Process Mining & GenAI. Whitepaper Celonis and Fraunhofer FIT. 2023. https://www.celonis.com/report/fraunhofer-study/genai/
• W.M.P van der Aalst. Process Management after ChatGPT: How Generative and Predictive AI Relate to Process Mining https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/process-management-after-chatgpt-how-generative-ai-wil-van-der-aalst-lyyzc/

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

As indicated before: “Crawl before you walk, and walk before you run”. Make sure that the people get the basics right first and stop having traditional process-modeling workshops. Traditional BPM, centering around yellow notes and process schemas, is no longer a good idea. At the same time, it does not make any sense to focus on advanced ML techniques when the two biggest challenges are: (1) extracting the data and (2) implementing organizational changes. How can ChatGPT help you if you cannot extract your structured data?

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Tony Benedict

Tony Benedict is a Partner with Omicron Partners, LLC, a strategy advisory firm. He is a senior level operations executive best known for transforming organizations, improving operational excellence and profitability. Most recently, he served as Interim Vice President of Operations for Rising Pharma, managing all phases of complex $200M post-merger integration of 2 acquired companies (36 CMOs, 2 3PLs) within expedited timeframe, while concurrently launching a state-of-the-art pharma distribution center. Consolidated 3 ERP systems into a single SAP instance within 6 months. Benedict previously worked at HonorHealth as Vice President, Procurement and Supply Chain where he was responsible for over $600M in spend management. One of his accomplishments was in the restructuring of the procurement and supply chain organizations post-merger within 12 months and consolidating two ERP systems within 18 months while implementing $60M in cost reduction initiatives. Previously, he was Chief Information Officer, Vice President of Supply Chain for Tenet, and Vice President, Supply Chain, Vanguard Health Systems at Abrazo Community Health Network in Arizona.
He is currently serving as President and Director, Board of Directors for the Association of Business Process Management Professionals International and is a co-author of the Business Process Management Common Body of Knowledge versions 2, 3 and the recently released version 4.
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What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

Very little in the short term as GenAI pilots aren’t tackling big problems that generate enterprise value. You might see it in social marketing for generating leads, but leads still need to be converted into actual sales, which GenAI can’t do (yet). It might be another 2-3 years until you see major wins in large companies that can afford to invest, experiment, pilot and have broad implementations that impact enterprise value. Until then, you will see smaller pilots to test the technology to discover business cases for generating value, and most of us will watch closely on what those companies are doing.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

The most basic and important set of skills is creating value whether it’s revenue or profit based. It’s fundamental to understand performance and it’s corresponding measurements in process management. The techniques are many, so it’s important to become proficient on 2-3 that cover most of what one would encounter in enterprise level business change and transformation. The associated technologies will follow, but are secondary to the first two things noted. The failure rates for “Digital Transformation” are still over 70% because it’s more about people, their skills, competencies and capabilities coupled with organizational culture change that will push companies ahead in this economy.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I’m a little biased in that there are several non-profits out there that provide Bodies of Knowledge, Competency models, and Certifications that can help people understand what skills are needed, and what competencies are required to be proficient in certain areas like Business Analysis (IIBA), Business Process Management & Architecture (ABPMP), and Supply Chain (ASCM) to name a few. There’s no point in reinventing the wheel. The three organizations mentioned either can provide educational training or they have training providers that they partner with who can provide the requisite training. There are ancillary books out there that are helpful on subjects like Strategy, Change Management, Organizational Design, Systems Thinking, and Value Creation that I would recommend.
I would also recommend any class on data science and how best to deal with large amounts of data (preferable structured) for making decisions and solving problems. There are some good, free courses out there on data science online from MIT, Stanford and a few other big name universities. There’s also plenty on YouTube.

See also AI Report from WSJ: https://www.wsj.com/news/collection/artificial-intelligence-report-e48d5827

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

There is a segment of the population out there that will be upset with me for saying that Six Sigma hasn’t necessarily fallen out of favor, however, it’s not the process panacea that it was made out to be 10-15 years ago. It’s still a good methodology in manufacturing and is heavily depending on good, clean data.

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Lloyd Dugan

Lloyd Dugan is a widely recognized thought leader in the development and use of leading modeling languages, methodologies, and tools, covering from the level of EA and BA down through BPM, Case Management, and SOA. He specializes in the use of standard languages for describing business processes, systems, and services, particularly BPMN, CMMN, and DMN from the OMG. He has developed and delivered BPMN 2.0 training to the U.S. Department of Defense and large consultancies. He has over 38 years of experience with public and private sector clients, and has an MBA from the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University. He is an OMG-Certified Expert in BPM (OCEB) – Fundamental, and is a past member of the Workflow Management Coalition and its BPSim Working Group, and also the OMG’s BPMN Model Interchange Working Group (MIWG). He is a Contributing Member (author) and Collaboration Team Member for the BA Meta Modeling and BPM-BA Alignment of the Business Architecture Guild. He represents the Guild on the OMG Task Force for the BA Core Metamodel standard. He is a frequent speaker at national and international conferences on BPM, BPMN, Case Management, SOA, and BA. He is a published author or co-author on BPM, BPMN, and BA. He is leading the effort to develop a new OMG certification for integrating BPMN, DMN, and CMMN, known as BPM+. He serves as the Chief Architect for Serco, NA, on its CMS Eligibility Support Program, which provides back-office processing of applications to access the Federal Health Care Exchange created under the Affordable Care Act (aka, ObamaCare). He still delivers BPM-related training, and when asked also provides client advisory services on BPM-related matters and technologies.

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What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

Gen AI, as generally understood by the masses, is where an AI tool that is given a question or a task examines a large dataset to extract the most likely answer based on its algorithmic logic (which can be trained to get better over time in a supervised or unsupervised manner). There are certainly situations in business processes where such a result can be of value in achieving better efficiencies or more effective outcomes or both, such as: sentiment or meaning analysis in communications to improve them, pattern recognition of noteworthy business objects to support automated processing of them, etc. However, much of the execution logic of business processes, and the technologies that enable them, use deterministic logic, which requires (if you will) deterministic data. I believe that something called Declarative AI will prove more impactful as it prescribes how to use AI/ML results in support of deterministic data-based decision-making and workflow processing. Decision Model and Notation (DMN) has already laid the foundation of this by including the concept of the Business Knowledge Model, wherein AI/ML logic can be included (e.g., as a service that is called). In general, what AI and its sub-variants will enable is even more “headless” automation and better-informed “headfull” automation.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

Modeling skills never go out of style, so strength in the modeling languages used to model operational behaviors are still important: Business Process Model & Notation (BPMN), Decision Model & Notation (DMN), and Case Management Model & Notation (CMMN). The OMG is preparing a new certification that combines these into an integrated approach to using these singly or in combination, known and BPM+, which will launch early next year. (To fully disclose, I’ve been leading the effort to create it, along with other, more notable gurus in this space.) Understanding the business as well as its operations being modeled is still key, and OMG has released a new standard for that known as Business Architecture Core Metamodel (BACM) which will be gaining adoption by vendors and practitioner groups in the coming years. (To fully disclose, I’ve been a part of the effort to bring this into being, working with the Business Architecture Guild and other notable organizations in the BACM Task Force.) Finally, data science skills are ascendant because the need to parse large datasets for meaning and patterns keeps growing in importance, and understanding the concepts of AI/ML and how to use them is the next wave for BPM relevancy. (Knowing Python, Excell, and SQL well are nice to have in young BPM analysts.)

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Practical experience is still the best teacher, IMO, but there are plenty of books, articles, and courses out there to find and to use. BPMN and DMN courses are abundant, but CMMN not so much, which may force a more targeted search or even some self-teaching. Certifications are often available from the training sources to document the acquired competency. Doing Business Architecture modeling – especially the core types of Value Stream Mapping, Capacity Mapping, Information Mapping, and Stakeholder Mapping – is of value for what it will teach one about the overlap with the operational modeling languages, and there are also abundant training sources for this as well. Same comment about certification. Data science seems to be more self-taught in my experience, especially in the growth of young analysts and developers into this space. Numerous sources exist online to support this, and certifications are emerging (such as Google’s). The modelers of tomorrow will have more skills and tools with which to work than we old fogies could ever dream of having at our disposal. I envy those newly rising into this workspace, and wish them all the best!

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

BPMN and DMN are going strong, but CMMN not so much. However, I believe CMMN’s time has come as more and more of business processing becomes event-driven, declarative in its execution semantics, and reliant on facilitation via AI/ML. Java remains important for many BPM and Case Management platforms, but is not a career discriminator, so bring something else to the table. Acquire and cultivate the skills that transcend the specifics of any one platform, as this has largely become a commoditized market. Learn Excel (e.g., pivot tables), Python, and SQL for data science before learning specific ML programming languages. RPA is moving from 1st-gen to 2nd-gen as it is married up with decision logic and AI/ML that do more than just screen-scraping and virtual UX-emulation, but it too has become commoditized, so learn the stuff that applies regardless of platform, and recognize that RPA is really a midwife to a mix of user-mediated actions and automatic actions to execute operational processes.

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Prof. Marlon Dumas

Marlon Dumas is Professor of Information Systems at University of Tartu and Chief Product Officer at Apromore – a company dedicated to developing process mining and AI-driven process optimization software. While continuing to grow the Apromore product, he conducts a research backed by the European Research Council with the mission of developing AI-based techniques for automated discovery of business process improvement opportunities. He is a widely published researcher, having co-authored over 300 scientific articles, 10 patents, and a textbook (Fundamentals of Business Process Management) used in over 350 universities worldwide.

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What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

GenAI will considerably change the landscape of BPM tool capabilities.

For one, it will expand the scope of data sources that BPM practitioners will tap into to discover and analyze their processes. With GenAI, we will see more textual data being used for process discovery and analysis. For example, GenAI makes it possible to determine which elements of a textual work instruction or in policy document, relate to a given activity in a process. This allows business stakeholders to dig deeper into steps in the work instructions, or guidelines in a policy, that are having an effect on KPI violations.

But where I expect GenAI to have the biggest impact, is in the redesign phase of BPM. GenAI makes it possible for business teams to generate improvement options, by combining relevant documentation (work instructions, policies, process models, etc.) with insights extracted from process mining platforms, to generate business process improvement options. For exampl,e, given a time-to-resolution KPI, currently violated in 15% of cases, a business analyst can ask “How can we slash KPI violation rates by 10 percentage points at constant resource cost?”.

Also, GenAI in conjunction with simulation, will enable business stakeholders to explore what-if scenarios conversationally, by asking questions like: What reduction in SLA violations would we get if we achieve an automation rate of 20% or 25% on one or more activities? What would be the impact on wasted effort? On waiting times?

And last but not least, GenAI allows business stakeholders to identify which additional questions or factors they may need to consider when making changes to a process, for example, which compliance rules they need to take into account in their redesign. In other words, GenAI will allow business analysts to be more thorough in their analysis of improvement options, and to make better-informed redesign decisions.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

Being “data-driven” continues to be the attitude and behavior that helps organizations to create sustained value from their BPM practice. Organizations that are using process mining methods and tools to drive their digital transformation are reporting large and sustained value. I see almost everyday organizations uncovering business value in the order of millions or tens of millions of dollars, yearly, thanks to their continued process mining and operational intelligence initiatives. It requires a lot of persistence, but it pays off.

Being data-driven is not enough on its own. Data-driven methods can generate many insights, but these insights are worth nothing if they are not turned into changes and actions. So being data-driven needs to go hand in hand with being enthusiastic about change and continuous improvement. BPM practitioners need to foster a culture that welcomes change, a culture of “always trying to do better”, and a culture that accepts trial-and-errors.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

For aspects related to process mining and data-driven process management, I follow the Mining your Business podcast: https://www.processand.com/insights/podcast/

For aspects related to building a change culture, I recommend the “New Process Podcast”: https://www.linkedin.com/company/newprocesspodcast/

On the conference front, I recommend the International Conference on Process Mining (ICPM) which will be held in Copenhagen, and the International Conference on Business Process Management (BPM), to be held in Krakow, Poland. These two conferences bring a magnificent combination of BPM practitioners and researchers. You can learn a lot, not only from the talks and panel discussions, but also just talking to people in-between sessions.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

While GenAI is definitely going to make many things possible, that were previously impractical or unthinkable, it’s important to use it cautiously. There is a lot of hype around it. I am very skeptical about statements that GenAI tools can “reason”. Sure, they can line up statements, some relevant, others less relevant, and some inaccurate or erroneous. That’s not the same as thinking! You need to apply a LOT of critical thinking when using GenAI. Always ask your GenAI tools to consider multiple alternatives, and make sure to double-check its outputs at each step.

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Ian Gotts

Ian is CEO and founder of Elements.cloud, tech advisor, investor, speaker and author. He has written 12 books on BPM, change management, and compliance, and can be found on the professional speaking circuit or in a plane!!! 

Elements.cloud helps customers clean-up, document and build their app implementations, focused on Salesforce. But valid for any low code app platform.
WWW: https://iangotts.medium.com
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What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

For the last 20+ years the BPM community has been dreaming of a time when you could map a process with stakeholders and that map is implemented. The prayers have been answered, but not from more sophisticated BPM engines, but from GPT coming in from left-field.

The evolution of BPMN was because humans were forced to think and communicate like computers so that the BPM engines could interpret the maps. That is why BPMN has 300+ shapes each with a particular meaning,

GPT has now allowed computers to think and communicate like humans. So now we can map processes in a way that is more natural for humans – UPN (Universal Process Notation) – and then GPT can interpret it.

GPT can accelerate process management by 1000x. Yes really!!!! We are already seeing this with consultants and our customers. They can take the output from an interview with stakeholders and GPT will automatically build process maps – in a simple UPN format – combining their requirements and best practices from the GPT model. This can be refined. Or, you can go back to the stakeholders for clarification and simply get GPT to redraw the map.

GPT can then build user stories with acceptance criteria. It does an amazing job because the UPN format is a clearly defined standard and a user story format with its acceptance criteria is well established.

And finally, GPT can look at systems configuration and recommend the changes to deliver the user stories. This is a game changer. It is more than just a time saver. GPT can evaluate 100,000’s of system configurations against every acceptance criteria in every user story. This is unrealistic to be done by any human.

And this is now. Roll the clock forward 5-10 years and there will be no need to actually configure the systems. GPT will build the applications. If it doesn’t do a good job, get it to throw away the 10,000 lines of code and rebuild it.

What becomes really important is how you prompt GPT, the input, and that is the documentation created during the business analysis phase – process maps, ERD, architecture diagrams, user stories and systems configuration descriptions.

That is why the business analyst will become a pivotal and highly sought-after role in organizations. The better the quality of the business analysis, the better the results and the less rework. There is a premium on doing complete and rigorous business analysis before you start coding. If we break the habit of jumping into coding before the real need is understood, we can solve a $1 trillion problem. That is the money wasted on failed (poor adoption, cancelled, overruns) IT projects, where the root cause is incomplete business analysis.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

5 skills will be at a premium.
– prompting: delegating, not abdicating to GPT and understanding how to make it the most effective business partner
– business analysis: applying the soft skills to uncover the real requirements and evaluating the results of GPT
– architecture: systems are now more interdependent than ever so understanding how they fit together is critical if you are changing them
– data governance: if GPT is reading the data, how confident are you in its accuracy and pedigree?
– documentation: if GPT is now reading the “documentation” then how you write is vital. GPT is not good with nuance or loose terminology

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

– A process-driven approach with GPT https://youtu.be/satAkDLz3u4
– Prompting is the key to unlocking GPT https://elements.cloud/blog/why-the-prompt-is-the-key-to-unlocking-ai-success/
– Mapping using UPN standard – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTPm0bev5Qg
– The end of coding https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhCl-GeT4jw

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

– No longer relevant. Detailed technical level process mapping notations – e.g. BPMN, UML

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Dr. Mathias Kirchmer

Dr. Kirchmer is an experienced practitioner and thought leader in the field of Business Process Management (BPM) and Digital Transformation. He is Managing Director of Scheer Americas, previously BPM-D US. He co-founded BPM-D, a consulting company focusing on performance improvements and appropriate digitalization by establishing and applying the discipline of BPM. Before he was Managing Director and Global Lead of BPM at Accenture, and CEO of the Americas and Japan of IDS Scheer, known for its process modelling software and process consulting.

Dr. Kirchmer has led numerous transformation and process improvement initiatives in various industries at clients around the world. He has published 11 books and over 150 articles. At the University of Pennsylvania and at Widener University he has served as affiliated faculty for over 20 years. He received a research and teaching fellowship from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.

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WWW: http://bpm-d.com
Twitter: @mtki2006

Business Process Management – Skill Predictions for 2024

Digital Transformation as an ongoing journey and the vision of the Composable Enterprise continue to shape the discipline of business process management (BPM). Important trends and predictions for 2024 as well as related skills, techniques and behaviors include the following:
• Process-led Digital Transformation to realize the Composable Enterprise: The composable enterprise refers to an organization that is agile, flexible, innovative and efficient through an appropriate combination of the right information systems and decentralized process-oriented organizational structures. An increasing number of companies target such an organizational vision. However, in most cases this is not realized in one big transformation but in manageable steps. Process-led digital transformation organizes this approach in a way to achieve best value.

This requires a set of key skills and techniques: The identification of the relevant processes can be done though operating model design as an entrance point into a process hierarchy. Processes are prioritized in a process impact and maturity assessment. The transformation itself is enabled through process models that show the business impact of digital technologies. In many cases, these process models can be developed leveraging reference models reflecting common practices. Applying such reference models and developing them has become an important skill. The approach is managed using modelling and repository tools supporting description methods like BPMN.

• End-to-end Process Visibility and Governance: The process-led digital transformation requires an end-to-end view on the business process to understand up and downstream impacts of the digitalization, even when only some subprocesses are in the initial scope. Transformed processes must be governed appropriately to ensure the value-realization of the initiative and keep the transformation journey going.

The end-to-end view can be achieved through an appropriate process hierarchy and the relation between subprocesses connected through “catch and throw events”. The necessary modelling and design skills are key. The governance approach is operationalized through appropriate roles and related governance processes, defined through the process management discipline for all relevant payers. Process management tools like modelling, simulation and mining tools are effective enablers. Related skills are required.

• Value-driven and Data-based Process Standardization, Optimization and Innovation: Many process-led transformation initiatives start with a process standardization, followed by a company-specific optimization or innovation of processes. The appropriate process standardization across regions or business units often delivers key benefits of a transformation initiative. The expected business value of the transformation initiatives must be clear and based on specific data to support business cases justifying related investments.

The discipline of process management provides skills for standardization, e.g. to define the appropriate level of detail and abstraction of the standard processes, improvement methods that make digitalization effects transparent, e.g. by using process reference models, and innovation techniques, e.g. through operationalization of design-thinking approaches, leveraging techniques like customer journey maps, reference models and scenario techniques. Pragmatic process simulation and bottom-up control through process mining deliver the quantitative data to validate and realize a business case.

• Emerging Impact of Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI): Generative AI is in the meantime at least discussed in most organizations. Process management helps to define where processes can be improved or completely newly invented based on those AI capabilities. The process of process management itself also benefits from GenAI, e.g. by supporting an efficient process analysis or generating a draft version of to-be processes.

Hence, process management practitioners need to know about the business capabilities of GenAI and the already available AI-based process management tools. Business processes are analyzed based on the potential impact of GenAI applications. Modelling and Mining tools are used more efficiently leveraging AI capabilities – if appropriate underlying data is available. While all this is still an emerging field, related know-how becomes increasingly critical for the discipline of process management.

Traditional process management approaches, relying mainly on face-to-face activities as well as pencil and paper, have lost importance. Process management has become digital and enables the digitalization of a company. Hence, process improvement skills become part of the wider process management discipline, enabling the overall strategy execution of an organization. Process practitioners need to make this shift to stay relevant.

Here some readings to learn more about those trends and predictions:
• Scheer, A.-W.: The Composable Enterprise: Agile, Flexible and Innovative – A Gamechanger for Organizations, Digitalization and Business Software. 4th ed., New York, Berlin, e.a. 2023.
• Kirchmer, M.: High Performance through Business Process Management – Strategy Execution in a Digital World. 3rd ed., New York, Berlin, e.a. 2017.
• Franz, P., Kirchmer, M.: Value-driven Business Process Management – The Value-Switch for Lasting Competitive Advantage. New York, 2012.

Specialized consulting and education organizations offer training and eLearning for those areas, such as Scheer with its academy and publications (www.scheer-americas.com). Industry organizations, like APQC (www.apqc.org), ABPMP (www.abpmp.org) or the BPM Institute (www.bpminstitute.org), provide related resources. Forward thinking universities and research organizations address related topics, for example the August-Wilhelm Scheer Institute for Digital Processes and Products (www.aws-institut.de ), Widener University with its master program for Digital Transformation and Innovation (www.widener.edu) or the University of Pennsylvania (www.upenn.edu).

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Mirko Kloppenburg

Hi, I’m Mirko. I’m 42 years old and I’m living in Hamburg, Germany, with my wife and our two daughters.
For 20+ years, I have been working in different process management positions at Lufthansa Group. But today, I’m transferring all my BPM experiences to other organizations to help them to inspire people for processes.
Therefore, I combine New Work and Process Management to form New Process and I founded NewProcessLab.com as a platform to share experiences and to rethink processes.
I focus on a human-centric transformation approach, experience design, and community building.
I’m also the host of the New Process Podcast where I’m sharing all my learnings from my journey to rethink processes.
For more information, please have a look at my LinkedIn profile.

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What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

Besides the hype about GenAI, I see first Process Owners and Architects start to apply GenAI to enhance their processes. So, we as BPM guys must understand GenAI too. Not only to support the business processes, for example by enabling and consulting Process Owners and Process Architects to use GenAI to improve their processes, but also on the meta level to ai (is this already a verb? the process of process management.

Several BPM tool vendors are already experimenting with GenAI to, for example, create ideas for improvement, develop KPIs, identify risks and so on by handing over the process model and a well-designed prompt to GenAI. — Initial results are fascinating and I’m excited to explore this in more detail in 2024. And you should do it too.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

Beyond GenAI skills, I’d recommend to processes with higher BPM maturity to start with process mining and process automation as early as possible. But first, you have to inspire and enable your people for processes!

Based on my latest survey, 64% of organizations have the challenge “to get people excited about processes” on their list for 2024. For me, it is fundamental to the success of an organization to be capable of managing their business processes professionally. To accomplish this, you not only have to enable your people, but also to build a process culture, establish process thinking, and rethink your approach to processes.

An idea to explore this in more detail is to think like a process influencer and apply the tools and methods of influencers to get people excited about processes.

So, this year, my assignment to you is to learn what a Process Influencer is and how you can use this for your process!

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

To learn more about GenAI and BPM, I can refer to a New Process Podcast episode with AI expert Benjamin Dehant:
https://newprocesslab.com/episode29-how-to-apply-artificial-intelligence-to-rethink-processes-with-benjamin-dehant/

To dive even deeper into GenAI and BPM, we’ll have an extended session at this year’s New Process Conference with ChatGPT expert Matthieu Sabourin. And there will also be some more experts from other disciplines to get new ideas on how to inspire people for processes at the conference. So, don’t miss the BPM event 2024:
https://newprocesslab.com/new-process-conference-2024/

Finally, I’d like to invite you to become a member of New Process Pro. New Process Pro is THE community for BPM enthusiasts like you and me. — I know the BPM journey can be hard. So, don’t do this journey on your own! Let’s join forces:
https://newprocesslab.com/pro/

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I know it’s a provocative thought, but in my view it’s not worth modeling processes holistically in BPMN 2.0.

Yes, it may be helpful for individual processes that are to be automated, but when it comes to speaking a common language, creating a common understanding, and getting people excited about processes, then full-blown BPMN 2.0 is no longer relevant.

So don’t waste your time modeling processes with BPMN 2.0, use an easy-to-understand language that inspires people!

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Harald Kühn

Dr. Harald Kühn is a member of the management board of the BOC AG. He is responsible for the product management and the related strategic aspects of BOC’s ADONIS and ADOIT product portfolio. Dr. Harald Kühn works in the areas of BPM, EA, their integration and the usage of innovative technologies in these domains.
He is an author of over 20 publications about various aspects of BPM.

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What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

The expected impact of Generative AI on Business Process Management will be as huge as in any other knowledge-intensive and experienced-based discipline. You could ask for instance tools such as ChatGPT or Bard .

I expect some concrete short-term impacts as follows, but there will be many more:
• Process Modeling: (a) cross-functional process design with easier input from a broader range of stakeholders, (b) generation of process design proposals, (c) helping to consider domain-specific compliance rules already during process modeling.
• Process Documentation: (a) assistance in creating automated and/or semi-automated process documentation, (b) help to contextualize existing process documentation and to improve its accessibility, (c) support in consistency checks to reach a more complete process documentation with reduced efforts.
• Process Analysis: (a) predictive analysis of expected process results, e.g. to test it in various scenarios, (b) automated process mapping from various sources to extend input especially for the analysis of complex processes, (c) support in risk analysis of specific processes and to provide input to implement controls to mitigate these risks.
• Process Assessment: (a) tailoring of assessment metrics to the specific needs of a specific business domain, (b) incorporate data from a much broader set of sources than manually possible, to allow a more holistic process assessment, (c) allow a more agile approach of process assessment e.g. by reacting faster to changing assessment goals by easier assessment possibilities.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

1. Continuous Learning: As the work environment, used technologies, practices, methodologies etc. are continuously changing, the learning process must do so as well. Continuous learning involves the persistent broadening of knowledge and abilities. Within the realm of workplace professional development, it focuses on acquiring new competencies and insights, as well as reinforcing previously acquired skills and knowledge.

2. Hands-On on GenAI Tools: To effectively integrate GenAI in BPM, practitioners should focus on continuous learning through formal training, online courses, and industry events. Hands-on experience with pilot projects and collaborations with tech teams is crucial for practical understanding and application of GenAI in BPM, e.g. on contextualized prompt usage and on topics considering information security and data privacy using company data together with public GenAI systems. Additionally, staying engaged with the BPM and AI community through professional groups, case studies, and networking with experts is essential for keeping abreast of emerging trends and best practices.

3. Intensified Use of Conceptual Modelling: Modern BPM approaches take into account a variety of different perspectives and views such as the value proposition of the product and service portfolio, the user touchpoints in the customer journey, considers both the process architecture and the digital service ecosystem for the technical process execution as well as data-science oriented techniques such as mining, machine learning (ML) and GenAI. The result is an intensified use of multi-perspective and domain-oriented conceptual modelling, using a mix of different design, analysis and data-science techniques as part of a consistent BPM methodology. For instance, the modern BPM practitioner uses GenAI to accelerate results creation as stated in the above impact section.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

There is a huge amount of online resources to learn and train the relevant skills. Below is a small selection.

Continuous and Lifelong Learning:
https://www.techtarget.com/whatis/definition/continuous-learning
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lifelong_learning

Hands-On GenAI Tools:
https://openai.com/chatgpt
https://bard.google.com/chat

Books on Conceptual Modelling:
Domain-Specific Conceptual Modeling (Part 1): Concepts, Methods and Tools, Domain-Specific Conceptual Modeling (Part 2): Concepts, Methods and ADOxx Tools

Free Conceptual Modelling Tools:
Library of various OMiLAB Modelling Tools, ADONIS Community Edition, ADOIT Community Edition, BOC Academy Programme

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Any knowledge and experiences gathered in the past will influence decisions for the future. Therefore, even if specific skills, techniques or technologies are not really relevant any more, they are important to evaluate, decide on and apply new upcoming approaches.

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Brian Reale

Brian Reale is a serial entrepreneur. Brian founded a telecommunications company in 2000 called Unete Telecomunicaciones which provided, voice, data, and satellite services in Latin America. Brian sold Unete to a publicly traded US telecom company in 2000. Brian was also the co-founder of Spotless LLC, an entertainment technology company that developed projection mapping technology for major live entertainment industries.

Brian has been involved in the workflow and BPM industry since he co-founded ProcessMaker in 2000. ProcessMaker is a leading open source BPM suite which has just released its 4th generation product – a modern lightweight BPM designed for both human tasks and microservices orchestration. The ProcessMaker BPMS has been recognized with numerous awards and pushes the bounds of BPM with a fundamental belief that process management can be simple, elegant, and easy to use.

Brian graduated magna cum laude from Duke University in 1993 and was awarded a Fulbright scholarship in linguistics in Ecuador in 1994.

WWW: https://www.processmaker.com
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Twitter: @breale
Twitter: @processmaker

What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

Quite simply, GenAI changes everything, and process management is no exception. Anything that has high complexity and has been hard to model is now infinitely easier to model. Process Management is a perfect use case. In just the past twelve months most of the BPA/BPM vendors have already added significant amounts of GenAI to their process tools. There are two general areas where GenAI is being added to process management tools: in the designer and in the run-time engine.

On the design side many BPA/BPM vendors have now released some form of genAI process modeling. For some this is just a basic set of helpers. For others, this already means much more. For example, ProcessMaker now offers a full text to process modeler, a full text to form designer for forms, and complete text based scripting and connector building capabilities. Of course, report writing and search should also now be almost fully natural text based for best in breed BPA vendors. You should no longer have to drag and drop filters for reports and you should not have to use some sort of weird vendor driven query language for searching through your data. This should all be done now with natural language making the process design and automation experience truly accessible and democratized. If you are working with a BPM vendor that has not turned these corners then you should be concerned because your vendor is struggling to keep up with the fast pace of innovation. These features I am mentioning are now table stakes for process design and modeling tools.

It gets more interesting when we talk about the run-time engine. Run-time engines are beginning to offer predictive execution and self-healing and/or self-developing processes. These concepts have actually been around for a while. The difference is that previously it was much more difficult to do. Now, the models are much better and much easier to deploy. Vendors and/or customers that have access to training data sets will be able to take advantage of their data and gain competitive edges in the delivery and automation of certain types of processes. In these scenarios, the customer will be able to more quickly eliminate human labor from decision points and also increase the quality of the decisions being made in their processes.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

Everyone now needs to have a good understanding of GenAI and where and how this will create opportunities for their clients. This is a new skill set for most people. There are lots of resources and materials available, so there is no real excuse for not staying up to date. Besides getting up to date on GenAI and its potential impact, many of the same skills hold true for BPM practitioners. Communication skills are probably the single most important skill set. Practitioners need to be able to sit down with process owners and stakeholders to truly understand their process, understand sources of conflict and inefficiency in existing ways of doing things, and understand the expectations surrounding the outcome of any project that is being undertaken.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Udemy and Coursera continue to be great resources for learning most skills.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Blockchain as applied to BPM has proven to be a lot of hype so far. I don’t really see this changing anytime soon.

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Pedro Robledo

President and co-founder of the Spanish chapter of ABPMP International, Pedro Robledo stands out as a prominent figure with significant influence in Process Management, specializing in the BPM (Business Process Management) discipline. This influence is underscored by his substantial online following, boasting nearly 30,000 followers on LinkedIn. With over 21 years dedicated to advancing the knowledge of Business Process Management in Spain and Latin America, Pedro is a trailblazer in the field.

Currently serving as the Director of the Master’s Degree in BPM for Digital Transformation and the Director of the Master’s Degree in Strategic Process Management at the International University of La Rioja (UNIR), Pedro also imparts his expertise as a Professor of Innovation Management in UNIR’s MBA program. Beyond academia, he acts as a BPM consultant, guiding organizations in their BPM initiatives, Digital Transformation endeavors, BPM maturity diagnosis, ROI calculations, supplier selection, and comprehensive training and advice on BPMN process modelling, CMMN and DMN decisions. His strategic guidance extends to offering roadmap advice for the progressive implementation of BPM and Enterprise Architecture.

As the Director of BPMteca, Pedro Robledo further contributes to the BPM landscape. A Computer Engineer from the Polytechnic University of Madrid, Pedro has honed his skills through leadership roles in multinational software companies, including Borland International, Ask Group, Computer Associates, Progress Software, Teamware, and Oracle.

Pedro’s commitment to excellence is evident in his role as a jury member for the international WfMC Awards for Excellence in BPM and Workflow, a position he held from 2013 until the conclusion of WfMC. He shares his wealth of knowledge on BPM and Digital Transformation through his blog, “The White Paper on Process Management” (http://pedrorobledobpm.blogspot.com.es/), and regularly contributes insights to various blogs and magazines. Pedro Robledo’s multifaceted contributions make him a leading authority in BPM, shaping the discourse and practices within the industry.

WWW: pedrorobledobpm.blogspot.com.es
WWW: LI profile
Twitter: @pedrorobledoBPM

What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

GenAI, or generative artificial intelligence, is leaving a significant mark on the business world, especially in process management. One of the standout aspects is the enhanced automation and efficiency. The application of AI, including generative models, enables the automation of routine tasks, resulting in increased efficiency and a reduction in manual intervention at various stages of a workflow.

Furthermore, the capacity for data analysis and decision support is crucial. AI technologies can swiftly analyse large datasets and extract meaningful insights, facilitating informed decision-making based on data-driven analysis.

Another key aspect is the predictive capability. AI models can foresee future trends or outcomes based on historical data, which is essential for optimizing processes by identifying potential issues before they arise, allowing for proactive management.

Personalization also plays a vital role, especially in customer-oriented processes. AI can personalize user experiences or tailor processes based on individual preferences or behaviour patterns, enhancing customer satisfaction and engagement.

Generative artificial intelligence models based on natural language processing (NLP) are revolutionizing communications. Chatbots and virtual assistants, for instance, significantly improve customer service and internal communication.

In the logistics realm, supply chain optimization is an area where AI demonstrates its value. The ability to predict demand, manage inventory levels, and enhance logistics contributes to cost savings and overall improved supply chain performance.

Product or service quality also benefits from artificial intelligence. AI systems can be used for quality control in manufacturing or service delivery processes, identifying defects or anomalies in real-time and enhancing overall quality.

Finally, process adaptability is a crucial aspect. AI can make processes more adaptable and responsive to changes. Machine learning models can learn from ongoing operations and adjust processes in real-time to optimize performance.

In conclusion, the impact of GenAI on process management is multifaceted and powerful. However, it is essential to note that this impact may vary depending on the specific industry, organizational goals, and the nature of the processes involved. Staying updated on the latest advances in artificial intelligence and its applications is crucial to understanding how these emerging technologies might influence process management in the future.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

In 2024, business process management (BPM) practitioners are expected to possess a diverse set of skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes to create substantial value for their organizations. Proficiency in process modeling and analysis remains fundamental, enabling practitioners to identify inefficiencies and optimize workflows effectively. Furthermore, a strong foundation in data analytics and business intelligence is crucial, empowering practitioners to derive actionable insights from large datasets and make informed decisions to enhance process performance.

The integration of automation and emerging technologies is a key aspect, demanding skills in robotic process automation (RPA) and intelligent process automation (IPA). BPM practitioners need to leverage these technologies to streamline operations, reduce manual intervention, and enhance overall efficiency. Change management expertise is equally essential, ensuring smooth transitions during process improvements, with effective communication to garner support from stakeholders.

Maintaining a continuous improvement mindset and a commitment to customer-centric approaches are enduring attitudes that remain critical. BPM practitioners must actively seek feedback, adapt processes based on lessons learned, and design workflows with a focus on meeting customer needs. Cross-functional collaboration is pivotal, necessitating effective communication and the ability to engage stakeholders from various departments in collaborative process improvement initiatives.

Project management skills are indispensable for successfully planning, executing, and monitoring BPM projects. Ethical decision-making should underpin all BPM practices, with practitioners considering the ethical implications of process changes on stakeholders. Additionally, a commitment to innovation and creativity is vital, encouraging practitioners to explore novel solutions and stay abreast of emerging technologies and industry best practices.

In addition to the aforementioned skills, proficiency in Enterprise Application is becoming increasingly imperative for BPM practitioners in 2024. As organizations rely more on integrated software solutions to manage their operations, BPM professionals need a robust understanding of Enterprise Application platforms. This entails the ability to navigate and optimize complex applications that span various business functions. Moreover, expertise in configuring and customizing Enterprise Applications is vital for aligning them with evolving business processes. BPM practitioners should be adept at leveraging these applications to facilitate seamless communication, data sharing, and process automation across different departments within the organization. As businesses continue to invest in digital transformation, a mastery of Enterprise Application skills positions BPM practitioners to harness the full potential of technology in streamlining processes and enhancing organizational efficiency.

In conclusion, the evolving landscape of BPM in 2024 demands a dynamic skill set that not only encompasses traditional BPM competencies but also incorporates a deep understanding of Enterprise Applications. The ability to integrate and optimize these applications is crucial for aligning technological capabilities with business processes. BPM practitioners equipped with Enterprise Application skills are better positioned to drive innovation, foster cross-functional collaboration, and navigate the complexities of modern business environments. By embracing this holistic skill set, BPM professionals can effectively contribute to organizational success by facilitating efficient processes and leveraging the full potential of enterprise-level applications.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

To acquire the essential skills for effective business process management (BPM) in 2024, a wealth of resources is available, catering to both traditional and emerging competencies. Books such as “Business Process Management: Concepts, Languages, Architectures” by Mathias Weske provide a solid foundation in BPM concepts. Online platforms like Coursera offer courses like “Business Process Management: An Introduction to Process Thinking,” covering core BPM principles.

For a deeper dive into Enterprise Application skills, professionals can explore specific courses on platforms like edX, such as “Essential Skills for Business Process Analysts.” Books like “The Lean Six Sigma Pocket Toolbook” by Michael L. George can complement this learning, offering practical tools for process improvement. LinkedIn Learning’s “Business Process Improvement” course is another valuable resource for honing skills in this domain.

Moreover, the evolving nature of BPM underscores the need for specialized knowledge. Pursuing a postgraduate degree in Management by Processes and Operational Excellence, such as the Master’s Degree in Business Process Management for Digital Transformation or the Master’s Degree in Strategic Process Management offered by UNIR, provides a holistic understanding of BPM throughout its life cycle. These programs not only focus on business aspects but also delve into the technology side, aligning with the demands of digital transformation.

International certifications from ABPMP International and OMG are increasingly relevant, signifying a practitioner’s commitment to global BPM standards. The emphasis on knowledge and experience in BPM, Automation, BPMS, RPA, Process Mining, BPMN/DMN, ROI, and AI highlights the need for a well-rounded skill set. Specialized master’s studies and certifications play a pivotal role in acquiring these competencies.
In alignment with these trends, me (Pedro Robledo), as the director of two online University courses at UNIR and President of ABPMP Spain, contribute significantly to the education landscape in Spanish-speaking regions. To complement formal education, my blog provides a wealth of resources, including bibliography, videos, and articles covering various BPM topics. The inclusion of a calendar of BPM events on the blog ensures that professionals can stay updated with the latest industry insights and trends. I am commitment to offering ad-hoc BPM Learning-by-doing training as a consultant further emphasizes the practical application of BPM skills to drive business growth, and my followers in LinkedIn are close to 30.000.

In conclusion, the most impactful action for professionals aiming to excel in BPM is to consider pursuing a postgraduate degree or certification specifically tailored to BPM or process improvement. The offerings at UNIR, coupled with my educational initiatives and comprehensive blog resources, exemplify a holistic approach to acquiring and applying BPM skills in the evolving landscape of 2024.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

In the realm of Business Process Management (BPM), it’s crucial to recognize that, as a management discipline, all BPM skills remain fundamentally relevant and practically applicable. Continuous improvement in BPM skills is paramount, aligning with evolving trends, best practices, and lessons learned.

However, within the landscape of monitoring and analytics, Business Activity Monitoring (BAM) skills have become obsolete. Instead, the contemporary focus shifts towards embracing Process Mining and Task Mining within Business Process Management Systems (BPMS). These advanced techniques provide more comprehensive insights into processes, facilitating better decision-making and optimization.

The evolution of BPM demands a perpetual commitment to skill enhancement. While traditional BPM skills remain indispensable, the shift away from BAM in favor of Process Mining and Task Mining underscores the need to stay abreast of emerging technologies and methodologies. BPM practitioners must adapt to these changes to ensure continued effectiveness in managing and improving business processes.

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Michal Rosik

Michal Rosik, Microsoft / Minit is a former CPO at Minit, a process intelligence leader acquired by Microsoft in 2022. Now holding a PM architect role at Microsoft, shaping the form of Power Automate Process Mining, an AI first, robust, hyper-automation solution. In his free time, he is a passionate trail runner.

WWW: LI profile
WWW: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/power-platform/products/power-automate
Twitter: @rosik

What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

With one word – disruptive.

Even though I personally tend to be conservative and put GenAI further after the “good-old” process data analytics and use of problem specific AI models, we can not overlook the enormous power this tech brings into areas such as:
– natural language processing (NLP) and understanding,
– document processing and data extraction,
– data quality enhancement,
– information synthesis,
– generating process documentation and process storytelling aka augmented process intelligence communication fine tuned for specific audiences.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

Object centricity
In physics, we all learned, that it is pretty easy to calculate forces acting on an object on inclined slope if we neglect several characteristics of the environment and idealise the object and the slope itself.

The same applies to processes and their management.

Of course, the simplified approximation might be good enough for the outcome we would like to achieve, but to unlock the full potential of the process, we need to lift our process intelligence to the next level.

Thinking about processes in multidimensional, but still understandable space consisting of interacting objects, is not only an inevitable shift of process management precision, but also a more intuitive and understandable depiction of real world.

Language thinking
If design thinking is a way of approaching problems by thinking as a designer, approaching problems by thinking as a LLM might be called language thinking.

I sincerely hope, that instead of blind application of new technology to any more or less complex problem, we are going to see a shift towards an opposite approach in 2024. Questioning, if a process management problem can not be converted into a “language problem“ by defining specific process / use-case grammar and syntax, should be a great way to unblock the full power of this undeniably groundbreaking tech stack.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I believe that 2024 will shift our approach to learning from “find and consume” to “create and synthesise”. The popularity and availability of small open-source language models, that are able to be fine tuned to specific process management areas and even use cases and executed locally, will allow each enterprise and even each individual BPM practitioner to train their own knowledge base in the form of an interactive sparing partner.

Creating a specialised market for such agents and their monetisation might go beyond the horizon of 2024, but not much further.

On the topic of object centricity, I would recommend wonderful work of Dirk Fahland from TU/e on Multidimensional view on process analysis (https://multiprocessmining.org) as well as core academic work and various contributions on object centric approach to process mining by prof. Wil van der Aalst from RWTH Aachen.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Most parents and guardians know the phenomenon of kids having so called “selective hearing”. The hype around Generative AI and Large Language Models is a nice example that selective hearing is not a children specific issue. Exceptional outcomes of the technology have unintentionally biased the perception into a simplified “AI and Large Models”, creating yet another anticipation of a silver bullet technology that knows, understands and analyses.

With the core of the technology being exactly in the omitted words Generative and Language, I believe year 2024 will be about rationalising expectations and understanding the right places for the technology to excel and create value.

With that said, those who, based on the same disappointment, give up on the GenAI completely, will lose the momentum and miss an important train.

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Prof. Michael Rosemann

Dr Michael Rosemann is the Director of the Centre for Future Enterprise and a Professor for Information Systems at the Business School, Queensland University of Technology (QUT), Brisbane, Australia.
Dr Rosemann’s main areas of research are corporate innovation, revenue resilience, process management and trust management. His work is focused on creating compelling future worlds with today’s possibilities that make current practices obsolete. As a researcher and advisor to board rooms and senior executives he is committed to advancing research-informed knowledge and confidence in order to appreciate the emerging design space and to create an increased ‘sense of ambition’ and innovation appetite.
Dr Rosemann is the author/editor of ten books, more than 350 refereed papers in outlets such as MIS Quarterly, European Journal of Information Systems, Journal of Strategic Information Systems, Information Systems and Journal of the Association of Information Systems, Editorial Board member of ten international journals (incl. MISQ Executive) and co-inventor of US and European patents. His ‘Handbook of Business Process Management’ (with Prof. Jan vom Brocke, second edition) is a comprehensive consolidation of global BPM thought leaders. His publications have been translated into German, Russian, Portuguese and Mandarin. His latest book, ‘The New Learning Economy’ (with Martin Betts), has been published by Routledge in December 2022.
Michael provides advice related to performance, innovation, trust and process management to organisations and their executives from diverse industries including telco, banking, insurance, utility, retail, public sector, higher education, logistics and the film industry. He is also the Honorary Consul of the Federal Republic of Germany in Southern Queensland.

WWW: https://www.qut.edu.au/research/michael-rosemann
WWW: http://www.michaelrosemann.com/
WWW: LI profile
Twitter: @ismiro

What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

GenAI provides an opportunity to extend the traditional BPM focus on transactional capabilities and aiming for faster, less costly, more reliable, etc. processes. Transactional excellence was largely achieved by increasing levels of process automation and standardisation. However, GenAI can help to go beyond transactional value as process autonomization and process sophistication have become possible. No longer are human process designers the only source of process inspiration, and no longer is the simplified, standardized process the pinnacle of BPM.

In terms of GenAI, as opposed to broader AI, I see three types of impact
• Contextual process management has arrived. Large language models (LLM) make context information accessible. As we can expect further reductions in LLM’s latency, i.e. the currency of their content will increase, they provide important points of reference beyond narrow process boundaries. For example, the severity of weather changes could be assessed in terms of their comparative strength and likely process impact based on previous events, policy changes could be evaluated with regards to their process consequences or inspirations for further process improvement could be sourced. And the more the human-triggered enquiry-based interaction with an LLM will be complemented by a subscription-based interaction, in which relevant context is sourced continuously and unprompted, the more powerful contextual BPM becomes.

• Creativity costs are disappearing. Pockets of creativity in a business process describe tasks which require divergent thinking and the exploration of new design options. Such processes exist of course in areas such as advertisement and post-production but can also be found in other, less obvious domains such as engineering, healthcare and trade where often unconventional solutions are needed. So far, the costs and time of such creative tasks have been difficult to predict making them true outliers in otherwise well executed, predictable business processes. GenAI now provides instant ‘creativity on tap’ and with this offers advanced, automated solutions for one of the final puzzle pieces within existing business processes.

• Conversations replace transactions. The transactional view on business processes is dominating and can be seen in the design of large enterprise systems (‘transaction codes’) as much as in the way we decompose processes into tasks and events/states. The conversational GenAI interface is a sharp contrast to this transaction-centred process view and a true game changer for how analysts and end-users interact with processes. No longer do we need to think in process terms, i.e. sequences of discreet transactions, but BPM practitioners can interact conversationally with a process and its design opportunities, for example as part of what-if enquiries. Similarly, end-users can ask questions such as ‘What process delays can we expect in light of the recent (strikes, supply chains issues, weather changes)? and will get increasingly accurate responses back.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

Continuously developing AI-literacy will be a key need for BPM practitioners who like to ‘process design at the edge’. No longer will such skills rest with highly professionalised experts only, but these are now becoming expected complementary skills of BPM practitioners. But there is more to the future of BPM skills than mastering the technical aspects of AI.

As a flow-on effect, we are seeing entirely new process requirements arising. Streamlining a process might be just the new hygiene factor of BPM. In addition to the criteria we are so accustomed to (e.g., time, cost, quality), processes now also need to be trusted, scalable, explainable, responsible, sustainable, etc. How to exactly quantify and ultimately fulfill these criteria is still ongoing work, but surely will provide rich sources of differentiation for those ‘who compete on process’.

Finally, integrative skills will matter more. In the past, we had dedicated Six Sigma experienced Black Belts, Process Analysts trained in capturing process requirements in process models, or RPA developers. In the near future, we will see a stronger merger of these skills leading to more advanced, complementary BPM capabilities. For example, combining lean management with data science and AI will enable to predict types of waste before they even materialise. Process mining can make activity-based costing finally cost effective and with this take economic process assessment to different levels of accuracy.

In such a tech-accelerated environment, it might be more the mindset, and less the skillset, of BPM practitioners that will have to change. Exploring possibilities as opposed to fixing problems, minimum viability over optimized processes, and iterative, bottom-up experimentation instead of systematic, top-down process change are just some of the attitudinal shifts we might see more of.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

In 2024, BPM will be more impacted by the outside than the inside. Thus, I strongly recommend developing and cultivating a culture of continuously learning covering areas such as digital responsibility, ESG, AI, new work, etc.

If I could pick a single book, I would select by colleague’s. Marek Kowalkiewicz’s ‘The Economy of Algorithms: AI and the Rise of the Digital Minions’, which will come out early March. The International Conference on Business Process Management (Krakow, Poland) in the first week of September will be the gathering of global experts, where tomorrow’s BPM will be presented and critically discussed. An event not to be missed for anyone who wants to shape future processes with contemporary tools and techniques.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I would assume that the new developments discussed above are largely additive and not substitutional, i.e. we will always need well-educated BPM professionals with a sound understanding of process requirements engineering, process lifecycle models, change management and process technologies so that we can continue to streamline business processes for enhanced convenience and experience. The ongoing democratization of process development, i.e. the rise of low-code solutions, will certainly impact the technical skills required. Instead of relying on a few expert developers, we will see an increased dependence on a broader cohort of process designers and developers meaning more rapid and local response capabilities and less friction at the interface of domain and development expertise.

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Serge Schiltz and Naïla van Kommer

Serge Schiltz is CEO and founder of processCentric GmbH, a European consulting and training firm focused on business process management. With his extensive practical experience as a senior consultant working with clients on their BPM challenges in different industries, he has been able to build a solid reputation over the past decades. Author, trainer, university lecturer and conference speaker in English, German and French. Member of OMG’s DMN Task Force and contributor to the OMG Certified Expert in BPM (OCEB) examination. He is also a Regional Director Europe for ABPMP.

Naïla van Kommer conducts product work out in the areas of artificial intelligence and machine learning. She is also responsible for the visual identity of processCentric. During her artistic education in Bern, Naïla developed her graphic expression, which underlines our approach to process and project management. Currently, she is a master student at Utrecht University and is involved in numerous project groups in the field of innovation.

WWW: https://www.processcentric.ch/en
WWW: LI profile – Serge
WWW: LI profile – Naïla

Interview: Naïla and Serge, do you think Generative AI will have a significant impact on BPM?

Serge: When we look at classical, sequential business processes typically defined using BPMN, GenAI might come into play with service tasks providing an input otherwise created by a human actor or supporting a human actor, thus increasing his productivity. This is typically what we already see with RPA tools integrated into processes.

Naïla: You have to be aware that the effectiveness of GenAI depends on the quality of available data. It stands out as a valuable brainstorming aid, complementing but not supplanting human input. However, when faced with data beyond its training parameters, GenAI may generate misleading or inaccurate content, often indistinguishable due to its realistic nature. Ultimately, the combination of GenAI and human judgment can lead to more effective and efficient decision-making. Without human oversight or reliable data, the utility of GenAI diminishes significantly.

Serge: This leads to a second facet of BPM, business rules as described using DMN. Will we need DMN at all in the future? Why make the effort to precisely define business rules if GenAI can easily learn how to take decisions? Well, we often do not understand how and why GenAI comes to a conclusion. So if there is a way to deterministically calculate an outcome, this may be preferable. Especially if the consequences of an inaccurate decision are not acceptable. But what if it is too costly to define or execute the exact rule and the negative consequences of an inaccurate decision are not that relevant? Then, GenAI may be a good alternative. But let’s not forget that some decisions that we model are not fully deterministic. How would you model a doctor in an emergency room who within just a few seconds must decide on which treatment to apply to a patient in order to save his life? He will apply his expert skills, based on his experience.

Naïla: I would suggest not to forget that, just as humans, AI tools are not flawless. AI, when trained with data, can learn to make precise decisions in specific scenarios and act immediately. Unlike humans, it is not influenced by stress or emotions that might otherwise impact its decision-making. Therefore AI can be a great help, but it is not a panacea!

Serge: What about case management, the third approach in the BPM trilogy? Tasks are typically being activated by human actors based on their expert knowledge, correct? Yes and no. What I just described is the classical paradigm. But technically speaking, it is actually the sentries that allow tasks to activate based on IF and ON conditions. The if conditions are acted upon either by the human performer or by business rule tasks that set case file items. And now we are back to DMN, where now that we have widespread availability of GenAI, we can use this new technology side by side with deterministic algorithms. Suitability and economics will guide us when deciding which approach to take.

Naïla: Clearly, BPM is not only about sequencing repeatable steps, but it involves decision making and creativity. This is where we’ll see a lot of GenAI applications assisting human actors in the very near future!

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Jim Sinur

Jim Sinur is an independent thought leader in applying smart Digital Business Platforms (DBP), Customer Experience/Journeys (CJM), Business Process Management (BPM), AI, Automation (RPA), Low-code and Decision Management at the edge for enhanced business outcomes. His research and areas of personal experience focus on intelligent business processes, business modeling, real tine data feedback with heterogeneous data types, business process management technologies, smart process collaboration for knowledge workers, process intelligence/optimization, AI applied to business policy/rule management, IoT and leveraging business applications in processes. Jim was a contributor to Forbes in AI. Jim is also one of the authors of BPM: The Next Wave. His latest book is Digital Transformation. Innovate or Die Slowly. Jim is also working on a new book with others entitled “Winning at Digital Transformation with Process Modelling” Jim’s personal blog is approaching one million hits to date. Jim is also a well know digital and traditional artist. His recent adventures include songwriting. He is revisualizing his art and marketing his music with generative AI.

WWW: https://www.forbes.com/sites/cognitiveworld/people/jimsinur/
WWW: http://www.james-sinur.com/
WWW: http://jimsinur.blogspot.com
WWW: LI profile
Twitter: @JimSinur

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

There are a number of skills that BPM folks could pick up as there are many in the middle of digital evolution assisted by AI, but my top seven would be the following:
1) Journey Mapping for Customers, Employees and Partners including touchpoint analysis and persona creation. Outside-in Thinking.

2) Embedded Advanced Analytic and Visualization Capabilities. Process plus big, fast and dark process/data mining is growing to be more important. Decision Models will become more important as the integrate with process models

3) Adaptive, Smart and Goal Driven Processes (often in Case Management and also Explicit Rule enabled) guided by guardrails and by process/data mining with real time feedback.

4) AI focused looking for opportunities to add automation or more smarts like Generative AI. Machine learning, Deep Learning and 17 other AI technology tributaries. See the 20 AI tributaries by clicking here: https://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2023/11/ai-tributaries-types-for-2024.html

5) Cognitive Collaboration for Knowledge Intense Processes or Cases. AI Assistance for process resources is on the move right now.

6) Signal and Pattern Detection at the edge (often needed for agility, IoT and business strategy). IoT integration is a new emerging theme. This can be taken to the level of digital twins and by merging control on a the edge with central control.

7) Business Professional Process creation, adaptation, and optimization by leveraging lite BPM/workflow, Process/Data Mining utilizing Low code and generative AI.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

While there are no skills that one should drop, there are several that are considered common and receding. My top three would be the following:
1) Central Control only approaches with siloed skill sets. More lateral thinking is and collaborative control is needed today.

2) Water Fall project methods are taking a second seat to incremental development leveraging Generative AI, RPA and rapid experimentation.

3) Large blocks of dumb frozen code are giving way to smart and instrumented components, micro services and late binding rules guided by constraints.

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Roger Tregear

Roger Tregear spends his working life talking, consulting, thinking, presenting, recording, and writing about the analysis, innovation, improvement, and management of business processes. He helps organizations improve performance.
As Principal Advisor at TregearBPM Roger provides business process management consulting, training, and coaching services. 36 years’ experience as a business, management, and IT consultant means that he has well-developed insights into business improvement and problem resolution.
Roger’s practice and client base are global with assignments completed in Australia, Bahrain, Belgium, Jordan, Namibia, Nigeria, Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Switzerland, New Zealand, United Arab Emirates, UK, and USA.
Roger writes, presents, and records on many topics related to process-based management. That material can be accessed via https://bit.ly/TregearBPM_Resources.

WWW: https://www.tregearbpm.com
WWW: LI profile
Twitter: @rogertregear

What is the impact of GenAI on process management?

Of course, generative AI is an important tool development that will have impacts, positive and negative, on all aspects of life. Alongside the positives for process management, I can also see a significant negative where GenAI puts yet another technology layer between managers and their processes. I see many examples today where organizations are doing a lot of process documentation, automation, improvement, transformation etc., but lack anything like the profound knowledge about cross-functional processes needed to really know how they work to execute strategy. Lots of intelligence, not much insight.

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2024?

A relentless focus on delivering proven, valued, business benefits, i.e., benefits to the business, valued by the business, and proven with data about which there is no dissent. That requires a useful combination of many “skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes” but the dominant requirement is to be driven to understand in detail how high-impact processes bring together many resources (not just technology) in order to deliver value in complex, changing environments.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

You are in the middle of your own laboratory. Use it. Discover, document, and manage your organization’s process architecture and learn how to use that to deliver genuine improvement in organizational performance.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Clairvoyance.

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Podcast episode

https://newprocesslab.com/the-hot-bpm-skills-in-2024-with-zbigniew-misiak/

Below you can find the answers from the following experts:
BJ Biernatowski
Sandeep Johal
Harald Kühn
Michal Rosik
Steve Towers

Now, let’s dive into the answers.

BJ Biernatowski

BJ Biernatowski is an advanced BPM Practitioner with 21 years of IT experience. He has practical experience with Microsoft Power Platform, K2, Appian, Pega, and Tibco AMX BPM, including large-scale business transformations.
He is currently employed by Microsoft as a Process and Execution Manager on the Business Operations Team.
BJ’s work has been featured by KW World, and he has presented internationally on workplace transformation. He has also served as an advisor to Fortune 500 companies.

WWW: LI profile
Twitter: @bjbiernatowski

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

Understanding the issues driving transformation strategies can offer practitioners a substantial competitive advantage. Some problems are too difficult to solve by outside experts. Business process owners who can take on the role of a Citizen Developer will be able to provide immediate value to their organizations.

As a discipline of many pillars, BPM requires cultivating a wide range of skills. To become truly blue, or to achieve that perfect balance between business and technology knowledge, one needs to spend a lot of time building up the practical, hands-on experience. The way I approach my practitioner journey is by continuously learning about different aspects of the profession, even if that means changing teams, jobs, or companies.

Practitioners should follow ecosystems that allow them to continually reinvent themselves every few years, as many technical skills have an expiration date. For example, if someone is asked to invest two years into a specialized DPA skills development program, they may want to question it. However, a 30-minute self-learning course on RPA may not give them the breadth of knowledge they need to succeed either.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

For generic BPM knowledge, the BPMinstitute.org portfolio of training courses offers comprehensive coverage of all major pillars of the discipline. In 2021, I was fortunate enough to participate in BPMInstitute’s training. The depth and the historical background behind work automation was incredible. Compared to a similar course I took from Boston University over ten years ago it was difficult not to notice how the discipline grew over the last decade. Being a practitioner in 2022 requires a lot more focus on studying!

If you want to learn how to implement DPA & Low Code solutions, almost every software vendor offers courses aligned with job roles, and the amount of high-quality training is practically infinite. Microsoft Academy offers 400 courses on the Power Platform and most of the training is available for free. Practitioners beware: if you are interested in becoming an expert in BPM and DPA, don’t start your learning journey with the implementation training. If you do, you will be introduced to the discipline through the back door, skipping many business fundamentals and concepts.
If you are looking for unbiased, balanced, and global perspectives – check out publications by Future Strategies, O’Reilly and Springer. For process modeling, UDEMY’s best-seller course ‘BPMN for business analysts’ has been my favorite recommendation for many aspiring process architects. Learning from true experts in the field leads to better results.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I’ve seen many presentations hyping up the impact of Virtual Reality on DPA. In my view, the affordability dimension still limits the applicability of VR solutions to a limited subset of the market. On the other hand, we should be seeing more traction in the overlap of AI, data science, and process mining fields. Therefore, traditional Business Rule and Process Architects should be paying close attention to how these ongoing developments impact their careers.

What is the role of process-related skills in the “new normal”?

The ‘new normal’ continues to surprise us each day. However, the demand for strategic adaptability remains constant. A few years ago, I was trying to benchmark the time to drive a change through a large-scale BPM application in a highly regulated healthcare environment. In that environment, deploying a process change to production in 2-3 days was considered a world record. In today’s business realities, some use cases require redesigning and deploying process changes in a day, if not hours. Unless you have a thorough understanding of your existing process landscape, even just as a starting point, it may be challenging to accelerate the digitization of your organization. Thus, process skills also need to keep up with the constantly increasing pace of adoption of low-code solutions. Look for innovative ways to accelerate your process discovery by supplementing your discovery sessions with Process Advisor, Microsoft’s most recent capability of Power Automate.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

The Covid pandemic
– Introduced even more business uncertainty
– Created additional work siloes by enabling hybrid working models
– Put a greater focus on leadership skills

Companies not planning and preparing for digital transformations found themselves responding to business model changes almost overnight. While you can launch a low-code app in a few hours, other facets of process digitization don’t move at the same pace. So, if speed is everything in today’s business environment, how do we justify the weeks and months required to lay the right conceptual frameworks for Business and Process Architectures? That’s where leadership, communication, and strategic planning skills can help.

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Sandeep Johal

With over 13 years of Business Process Management and Digital Transformation experience, specifically in enterprise wide system implementation process design, process improvement, strategic sourcing, capability uplift, strategy alignment, thought leadership in energy, utilities & resources; finance; and government bodies across Australia, New Zealand, Middle East, and North America

Sandeep’s consulting takes him to both national and international destinations including the Americas, Middle East, New Zealand and the UK. He is often invited to speak at national and international conferences and is regarded as a contributor to the Business Process Management body of knowledge. He holds a Masters in Information Technology (BPM), an honours in Business Management and a diploma in Mechanical Engineering.

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Twitter: @deepology

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

Rapidly (and consistently) delivering results – should be mindset of BPM practitioners today. Being comfortable that the role of process professional will change significantly when Process Mining, RPA, AI (machine learning), NLP etc. continually become mainstream.

Technical skills: deep understanding of digital transformation where business analysis will still be important. However, it needs to be reimagined. Much of the painstaking work of trawling through documents and workshops should be in systems in most modern businesses. Focus should be placed on asking the right questions just ask much as facilitating the target state.

Soft skills: I don’t believe we will be applauded for having great frameworks or methods anymore. The business world has ‘been there and done that’, most of the time walking away with minimum value. Which leads me to think there will continually be a rise in ability to facilitate, to convince and to influence. Particularly in business readiness and change management disciplines. BPM practitioners need to be involved across the transformation lifecycle.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The usual sites which others here have mentioned are mine too. Also worth mentioning diverse podcasts which challenge conventional thinking: Ted Talks Daily, How I made it (Australian Financial Review), and Impact Theory.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I believe being skilled at collecting requirements will be less relevant in the future. Instead, there’ll be a pivot to co-creating a valuable outcome that may be obscure at first and will only be solid with collaboration. Basically, more emphasis will be placed on clever discovery aligned to objectives and targets.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

People are more open to improving remotely. They bring diverse perspectives now that they have been exposed to another side of business (remote working). However, I improvement may take a little longer mainly due to stakeholder engagement time constrains and challenges.
Another thing to note is the gradual rise of the metaverse. It presents opportunities for businesses and BPM practitioners to explore fresh ways to connect, facilitate, influence and change.

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Harald Kühn

Dr. Harald Kühn is a member of the management board of the BOC AG. He is responsible for the product management and the related strategic aspects of BOC’s ADONIS and ADOIT product portfolio. Dr. Harald Kühn works in the areas of BPM, EA, their integration and the usage of innovative technologies in these domains.
He is an author of over 20 publications about various aspects of BPM.

WWW: boc-group.com
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

1. Revival of Conceptual Modelling
Modern BPM approaches take into account a variety of different perspectives and views. This starts with the value proposition of the product and service portfolio, takes into account the user touchpoints in the customer journey, considers both the process architecture and the digital service ecosystem for the technical process execution as well as data-science oriented techniques such as mining and machine learning (ML). The result is a revival of multi-perspective and domain-oriented conceptual modelling (“Conceptual Modeling 2.0”), using a mix of different design, analysis and data-science techniques as part of a consistent BPM methodology. For instance, the modern BPM practitioner uses AI-based approaches such as pattern recognition, irregularity detection, predictive alerts, user guidance etc. as part of his/her conceptual modelling for digital process design and analysis.

2. Design Thinking as part of the Digital Process Innovation
Design Thinking methods and innovation labs provide great tools and creative environments to capture ideas, improvements and new approaches. As no-code/low-code approaches provide means for fast and efficient process implementations, design thinking provides means to approach process change in much more efficient ways. This is backed by a steadily increasing number of simple and collaborative design thinking tools. For example, Scene2Model bridges in real-time the world of haptic on-site workshops with fully digitized design sketches. Experimental environments for digital process innovation are provided by light-weight innovation labs and Open Innovation Communities such as OMiLAB.

3. Digital Process Ecosystems and On-the-Fly Computing
Business process designs are highly influenced by digitization. Modern, digital process designs use a plethora of internal and external digital services, online services, micro-services, pre-fabricated components, cloud infrastructure, legacy infrastructure etc. Such processes use and run in one or more digital ecosystems. DevOps brings already development and deployment tasks together. But only partially addresses the underlying complexity. On-the-Fly Computing provides largely automated configuration and execution services for complex digitized business processes, related digital ecosystems and their combination.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

There is a huge amount of online resources to learn and train the relevant skills. Below is a small selection.
Books on Conceptual Modelling:
Domain-Specific Conceptual Modeling (Part 1): Concepts, Methods and Tools, Domain-Specific Conceptual Modeling (Part 2): Concepts, Methods and ADOxx Tools

Free Modelling Tools:
Library of various OMiLAB Modelling Tools, ADONIS Community Edition, ADOIT Community Edition, BOC Academy Programme

Free Learning Materials for Digital Ecosystems:
Microsoft Learn, Google Learning, AWS Training

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Any knowledge and experiences gathered in the past will influence decisions for the future. Therefore, even if specific skills, techniques or technologies are not really relevant any more, they are important to evaluate, decide on and apply new upcoming approaches.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

The COVID-19 pandemic made immediately obvious what an insufficiently digitized process means. A major impact on the work of BPM people has dependency analysis. This means, the analysis of any touchpoint a customer has with the company’s processes, its related organization as well the digitized services. Important techniques for BPM people and touchpoint analysis are customer journey analysis, business impact analysis as well as value proposition analysis.

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Michal Rosik

Product Visionary & CPO, Minit

As Product Visionary for Minit, Michal defines the Research & Development direction for this process mining solution, develops close ties to the academic community in this area and evangelizes process mining benefits to enterprises worldwide. Michal previously lead Microsoft Consulting department in Siemens and was involved in several large enterprise projects as a consultant and project manager. In his free time, he is a passionate trail runner.

WWW: http://www.minit.io
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Twitter: @minit_io

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

Art skills.

No, I am not insane. I believe it is about time to change the way BPM practitioners are perceived by decision-makers, budget holders, executioners, and – well – by BPM practitioners themselves. Instead of a nerd crowd, they should be thought of as artistic minds.

We can distill it down to 2 foundational skills:

1) CREATIVITY. Technology and software tools are here to make your life easier and help you; they don’t automatically solve the problems of your enterprise. They give you the tools and techniques, but without creative problem solving and a creative approach to process management, which is in your hands, they are useless.

2) MASTERY OF CRAFT. Technology and software tools are shortcuts to your creative goals, but without knowing/having experience with the longer and more difficult way, the goal can hardly be achieved. You will not create beautiful illustrations just by learning how to work with Adobe Illustrator.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

There has always been a gap between academia and praxis. But that is no longer the case. Scientists and professors – people behind the initial research and theories – are joining forces with companies overflowing with strong engineering skills, starting their own startups, or becoming scientific advisors that impact technological improvements in software products.

Lectures, courses, and books created as a result of these “joint ventures” are some of the best sources of knowledge. Instead of mentioning specific curricula, I’ll just mention a few names: Wil van der Aalst, Marlon Dumas, Jan Mendling, Josep Carmona.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Graph technologies.

Complex enterprises do not only have complex business processes, but they are complicated social ecosystems with relationships, dependencies, and structures where everything is interconnected, and each connection has its specific properties. Only once we master the graph technologies and their complexity and performance will we be able to build a true digital twin of an organization.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

In the before-covid times, we have already been evangelizing the market on proper and efficient use of technologies and software instead of the tedious way of interviewing, workshop organizing, and manual process mapping. Covid is showing us that almost everything that was considered impossible (home office for the whole enterprise, contract signing without pen and paper aka paperless office, etc.) is suddenly possible. With a bit of exaggeration, revolutionary changes in the enterprise world are taking place almost daily. As a result, using technology has become inevitable and vital as opposed to “just” useful and efficient.

A poet would say: there is no other option than continuous adoption.

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Steve Towers

Steve is passionate about helping people and businesses transform to better ways, with happier lives. Whether that is individuals, teams or companies I apply proven and tested ways from the very best individual and corporate achievers to help you codify your own success, happiness and future.

Named one of the 30 most influential Global Customer Experience Experts in 2022. An experienced business transformation leader with over 40 years of success in driving and achieving organizational goals in both the private and public sectors in a variety of key ‘C’ leadership and top-level consulting positions. Recognized across industries including Business Process Management, Enterprise Architecture, Customer Experience and Lean Six Sigma

WWW: https://www.bpgroup.org
WWW: http://www.stevetowers.com/
Latest bestseller: Dare!
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Twitter: @stowers

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

BPM practitioners have always needed a blended skillset, including the appropriate tools, techniques, technology, and people understanding. For 2022 there is an imperative need to broaden the knowledge of related disciplines (including outside-in thinking, customer experience, low code modeling techniques, and AI approaches).
Flexibility (rather than rigidity) is the watchword as organizations innovate to deliver improved business and customer outcomes. With this in mind, an adaptable and quick to apply approach is essential. Being the go-to facilitator as someone not locked into a functional silo will let the successful practitioner deliver immediate results and benefits for the company, its employees, customers, and shareholders.
Approaches like the CEMMethod (now in version14) are a great example of the modern toolkit that produces results ‘the business’ values in double-quick time.
In summary, the 2022 BPM practitioner is a multi-skilled, people-oriented, success-minded, and flexible, professional able to work across their company and partners. Contrast this with the nerdy technical and often introverted counterparts of ten years ago!

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

A portfolio of resources ranging from books, social media contributors, supporting networks, and professional colleagues is a prerequisite for success. Additionally, the need for practical (rather than the overly theoretical and academic) resources are the ones to go for.
A great starting point is the thinking around ‘OutsIde-In’ and working backwards (as Jeff Bezos calls it). My book, initially written in 2010 and completely updated for 2021, is free (see below).
Likewise, there are books and resources from BPM Giants like Jim Sinur, who keeps his finger on the pulse of the rapidly evolving BPM universe. His blog is always very insightful and entertaining.
Extending resource exposure to areas like Customer Experience and Business Transformation is also a great use of limited time.

As a starting point, I would recommend the following resources:
Outside-In The Secret (2021 version) – (free): https://bit.ly/OIbook2022
Dare! The story of the worlds best transformation project: https://bit.ly/DARE_2022
Jim Sinur blog: Jim Sinur
CEMMethod®: https://cemmethod.com
The qualifications that use the CEMMethod® include The Certified Process Professional Master® (CPP Master®): https://experienceprofessional.com/cppm_preview

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Twenty-five years ago, Steve Jobs encouraged us to ‘start with the customer and work backwards’ (video here). Early adopters of this approach have proven time and again that starting any project with a clear understanding of customer needs. (Don’t be fooled by the voice of customer advocates as that is more about learning ‘wants’).

The implication of Steve Jobs sentiment has been a shift away from detailed current state process assessments towards techniques that provide a laser-like focus on the customer. Combined with this steady evolution of thinking spreading its ways into our methods and technologies, the pandemic has now put on steroids the need for accelerated innovation. A recent research survey amongst European leaders concluded that leaders must put ten years of innovation into six months.
Net: Net, the top BPM Practitioners, has moved away from a reliance on technical aptitudes towards broader strategic thinking coupled with a ‘connecting the dots’ mindset that links everything and everyone to the purpose of processes, i.e., the delivery of successful customer outcomes.
Avoiding the hype and snake oil merchants is essential now, encouraging those practitioners with political where with all. You could hide in the shadows in the past, not so for 2022!

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

Process-related skills, including the expanded portfolio mentioned earlier, are less linear, left to right, and top to bottom. The new normal with work-life themes like the ‘Great Resignation’ place greater opportunity for the able practitioner to become a pivotal force within their organizations utilizing multiple tools and techniques. As a BPM advocate for more than thirty years, I would call this new opportunity to coin the phrase ‘The Great Renaissance’ for BPM Practitioners.
Bring forward the Art and the Science, execute quickly and build a reputation beyond the confines of traditional process thinking and practice.

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Below you can read answers from 10+ BPM experts. You can either read everything or use the navigation below. Enjoy!
Wil van der Aalst
Tony Benedict
Lloyd Dugan
Marlon Dumas
Scott Francis
Ian Gotts
Paul Holmes-Higgin
Adeel Javed
Mathias Kirchmer
Mirko Kloppenburg
Holly Lyke-Ho-Gland
Brian Reale
Adrian Reed
Pedro Robledo
Tomislav Rozman
Serge Schiltz
Jim Sinur
James Taylor
Roger Tregear
Miguel Valdés-Faura

Which BPM skills will be hot in 2022

Now, let’s dive into the answers.

Prof. Wil van der Aalst

Prof.dr.ir. Wil van der Aalst is a full professor at RWTH Aachen University, leading the Process and Data Science (PADS) group. He is also the Chief Scientist at Celonis, part-time affiliated with the Fraunhofer FIT, and a member of the Board of Governors of Tilburg University. He also has unpaid professorship positions at Queensland University of Technology (since 2003) and the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven (TU/e). Currently, he is also a distinguished fellow of Fondazione Bruno Kessler (FBK) in Trento, deputy CEO of the Internet of Production (IoP) Cluster of Excellence, co-director of the RWTH Center for Artificial Intelligence. His research interests include process mining, Petri nets, business process management, workflow automation, simulation, process modeling, and model-based analysis. Many of his papers are highly cited (he is one of the most-cited computer scientists in the world and has an H-index of 161 according to Google Scholar with over 121,000 citations), and his ideas have influenced researchers, software developers, and standardization committees working on process support. He previously served on the advisory boards of several organizations, including Fluxicon, Celonis, ProcessGold/UiPath, and aiConomix. Van der Aalst received honorary degrees from the Moscow Higher School of Economics (Prof. h.c.), Tsinghua University, and Hasselt University (Dr. h.c.). He is also an IFIP Fellow, IEEE Fellow, ACM Fellow, and an elected member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Royal Holland Society of Sciences and Humanities, the Academy of Europe, and the North Rhine-Westphalian Academy of Sciences, Humanities and the Arts. In 2018, he was awarded an Alexander-von-Humboldt Professorship.

WWW: http://www.vdaalst.com
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

Data-science skills remain very important. However, it becomes increasingly clear that being an expert in machine learning is not enough to solve real-world challenges. These techniques are always applied in a particular context and need to be combined with domain knowledge. Process mining can facilitate the generation of machine learning problems to address real-world challenges. When being confronted with thousands of tables in an ERP system like SAP and additional data scattered over other home-grown information systems, one cannot start by creating a neural network. This can only be applied to very specific problems. However, with process mining you can regain control over the data and put this in a business context. Then you can generate your neural networks or other machine learning models to answer business questions. Process mining provided the missing link between model-based process analysis and data-oriented analysis techniques. Skills related to the combination of data science and process science have become more critical over time, and 2022 will be no exception.
The COVID-19 pandemic showed that accurate data are vital to managing operational processes. Global supply chains were taken by surprise, and vulnerabilities were exposed. Process mining can be used to create full transparency on what is happening in a supply chain and recommend actions.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

What is new in 2022 and very suitable for people starting in BPM and process mining is the course “Process Mining: From Theory to Execution” released in December 2021. The course is for free and can be found here: https://www.celonis.com/wils-process-mining-class/. This new process mining course aims to bridge the gap between the theory of process mining and the practical application using a commercial tool and real-life data sets. This 10-hour course “Process Mining: From Theory to Execution” can be taken at any time and provides software and data sets. After taking this compact course, participants will have learned about current trends in process mining and automation, know the key process discovery and conformance checking algorithms, and also study comparative and predictive process mining techniques allowing organizations to perform root cause analysis of performance and compliance problems.
Next to this course, my process mining book “Process Mining: Data Science in Action. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, 2016.” still seems the most obvious place to start to prepare for the convergence of data science and process science. The book is supported by the Coursera course with the same name, see https://www.coursera.org/learn/process-mining.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

My answer is the same as last year; not much changed actually. I sense that most of the traditional skills are still relevant, but the emphasis has shifted from modeling and gathering requirements to more data-driven skills. Many people are obsessed with BPMN, DMN, and CMMN, living in an imaginary world very disconnected from reality. People stressing such standards without looking at the actual processes’ traces will not contribute to actual process improvements. Also, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Deep Learning (DL) have been promising things that are simply unrealistic. The fact that neural networks work surprisingly well for some tasks does not imply that they can be applied to any problem, e.g., process management.

What is the role of process-related skills in the “new normal”?

Due to COVID-19, digitalization and new ways of working moved up in the list of priorities. Poor processes and outdated IT-infrastructures have been exposed, and people realize that it is time to rethink things and that changes are possible if there is a sense of urgency. Organizations built on spreadsheets and politics are unable to tackle the challenges related to COVID-19, e.g., tracking whether people get a third or fourth dose, ensuring that the right people get the vaccines, and detecting counterfeited or incorrectly handled vaccines. Due to my complex official first names (my full name is “Willibrordus Martinus Pancratius van der Aalst”), Covid-apps storing my COVID certificates cannot match my first two vaccinations with the third one, even not after reissuing the certificates three times.

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Tony Benedict

Tony Benedict is a Partner with Omicron Partners, LLC, a strategy advisory firm. He is a senior level operations executive best known for transforming organizations, improving operational excellence and profitability. Most recently, he served as Interim Vice President of Operations for Rising Pharma, managing all phases of complex $200M post-merger integration of 2 acquired companies (36 CMOs, 2 3PLs) within expedited timeframe, while concurrently launching a state-of-the-art pharma distribution center. Consolidated 3 ERP systems into a single SAP instance within 6 months. Benedict previously worked at HonorHealth as Vice President, Procurement and Supply Chain where he was responsible for over $600M in spend management. One of his accomplishments was in the restructuring of the procurement and supply chain organizations post-merger within 12 months and consolidating two ERP systems within 18 months while implementing $60M in cost reduction initiatives. Previously, he was Chief Information Officer, Vice President of Supply Chain for Tenet, and Vice President, Supply Chain, Vanguard Health Systems at Abrazo Community Health Network in Arizona.
He is currently serving as President and Director, Board of Directors for the Association of Business Process Management Professionals International and is a co-author of the Business Process Management Common Body of Knowledge versions 2, 3 and the recently released version 4.
WWW: http://www.abpmp.org
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

I would add additional skills for systems thinking from an integration standpoint. What is meant by that? There are 10 core capability elements in every Enterprise. The term capability is used/misused way too often and tends to point to or focus on technology to much. While technology is one of the core capability elements, it is by no means the most important. At the center (of graphic) is customer experience, and surrounding that is business performance, then process and data. What guides the focus of those elements are Strategy, Organizational Structure and Human Capital. These 3 are the primary capability elements that you can control, where the most change will happen and represent what you can “mold” into whatever is needed to support achieving an optimal customer experience with high business performance. Process and Data are what PEOPLE WILL DO (AND USE) to achieve those outcomes/goals. Technology and Infrastructure are investments that are made as part of the overall plan, however, integrating the first 7 on the list is what creates the premium value. If you focus too much on one (technology) or two of the elements without integrating the others, then the risk of failure increases. 70% of transformation still fail even after 20 years of efforts.

Bottom line: Integrating the 10 core capability elements will be a critical skillset for BPM now and in the future in order to truly transform enterprises.

They are noted below:
1. Customer Experience,
2. Strategy,
3. Business Performance,
4. Business Process,
5. Information,
6. Organizational Structure,
7. Human Capital,
8. Supporting infrastructure,
9. Enabling Technology,
10. Policy & Rules

Here’s the graphic:

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Lloyd Dugan

Lloyd Dugan is a widely recognized thought leader in the development and use of leading modeling languages, methodologies, and tools, covering from the level of EA and BA down through BPM, Case Management, and SOA. He specializes in the use of standard languages for describing business processes, systems, and services, particularly BPMN, CMMN, and DMN from the OMG. He has developed and delivered BPMN 2.0 training to the U.S. Department of Defense and large consultancies. He has nearly 30 years of experience with public and private sector clients, and has an MBA from the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University. He is an OMG-Certified Expert in BPM (OCEB) – Fundamental, a member of the Workflow Management Coalition and its BPSim Working Group, a member of the OMG’s BPMN Model Interchange Working Group (MIWG), and a Contributing Member (author), Meta Modeling and BPM-BA Alignment Collaboration Teams Member, and Advisory Board Member of the Business Architecture Guild. He is a frequent speaker at national and international conferences on BPM, BPMN, Case Management, SOA, and BA. He is a published author or co-author on BPM, BPMN, and BA. He serves as the Chief Architect for Business Process Management, Inc. (see www.bpm.com), for whom he delivers BPM-related training and client advisory services on BPM-related matters and technologies.

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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

BPM practitioners should expand their understanding of related disciplines (including core concepts, modeling techniques, and methodologies), strive to do deeper and more meaningful (while still relatable) process modeling and BPM-related analyses, and continue to keep current with the impacts of emerging and evolving technologies. Regarding the first point, process modelers need to improve how they define scopes for processes and activities, which increasingly will require a technology-agnostic grounding in what are the outcomes that are produced or required by associated business capabilities. This is normally the purview of Business Architecture, but better alignment of BPM work with what the business does or needs requires an interdisciplinary approach to provide business or technology solutions of meaningful and enduring value. A Business Architecture standard from the OMG should start to emerge this year that will help make this happen, and BPM practitioners should engage with any outreach along these lines. Regarding the second point, integrated use of the languages available for modeling operational behaviors (DMN/CMMN/BPMN) is slowly but inevitably marching towards a critical mass of interest and practice. BPM work can (and should) be as demanding and rewarding as any engineering discipline, but this will only happen if BPM practitioners see their work as essential (and can prove it). Regarding the last point, RPA continues to evolve, but the 1st gen technologies of automating via emulation routine and repetitive work is already maxing out in impact, so the incorporation of machine learning and AI is up next as 2nd gen technologies to extend the value proposition of RPA.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Really good BPM practitioners have – by training, experience, or both – the equivalent of advanced education (akin to an MBA here in the US). This requires a serious of purpose and a commitment to learn and to do, and to learn by doing. There are several websites that provide training (including bpmtips.com), some of which cost money while others are essentially free. Too many to list here, but I’ll mention (in completely self-serving way) BPM.com and BusinessProcessIncubator.com. Books and literature are also widely available and too numerous to mention. What I suggest is that one seeks out training and reference material, try to get a sense of (if not a listing of) the source material used in the training so that the curriculum is clear as well as what certification of having learned really means. Ultimately, this is more about what matters to the practitioner than to the market.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Facilitation skills are not, IMO, as much in demand anymore, as BPM practitioners have become an essential expertise that is hired from without or developed within or a bit of both. In other words, BPM practitioners are increasingly expected to be THE experts to solve problems, and to do so largely on the largess of their own skills, experience, and training. This means that BPM practitioners need to be able to go the extra mile in divining the root causes of problems and to craft impactful solutions to those problems, as the client will largely see this as outsourced endeavor. This becomes high-risk, high-reward for those brave enough to keep doing it. Grounding in applied operational management theory or industrial engineering remain, IMO, essential, but they continue to be hard and/or expensive to come by. Hopefully this can change with greater access to resources.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

IMO, COVID has broken the back of the old employment model that has governed how staff engage to delivery value to or on behalf of the business. We know all CLEARLY know that remote work is not only doable but can be effective. We also CLEARLY know that only knowledge workers can be the beneficiaries of this realization, as front-line service workers, first responders, and other workers who HAVE to be somewhere physically cannot. What this means for the BPM practitioner is that knowing how to outfit an effective remote workforce is now a critically needed solution for high-knowledge situations, but solutions for other workers are still needed that better enable high-touch situations. Otherwise, class divisions that are already bad will get worse. BPM should not add to this inequality but should work to bridge it, realizing that solutions have consequences. It is hard to imagine how any of these realizations would have happened without COVID exposing these things. As a society, as a species, we cannot go back to the past. We do not have that luxury in a post-pandemic world.

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Prof. Marlon Dumas

Marlon Dumas is Professor of Information Systems at University of Tartu, Estonia, and co-founder of Apromore Pty Ltd, a company dedicated to developing and delivering open-source process mining solutions. He is currently recipient of an Advanced Grant from the European Research Council with the mission of developing algorithms for automated identification and assessment of business process improvement opportunities from event data. His research in the field of business process management and process mining has led to numerous research publications, several US/EU patents, and a textbook (Fundamentals of Business Process Management) used in over 250 universities worldwide.

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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

The need for agility and adaptability has clearly increased during pandemic times. Organizations are pushed hard to continuously monitor their processes, and to detect, preempt, and react to changes.

Not surprisingly, we see an increased attention to process mining and data-driven process management. Managers need full transparency into their process to understand how to surgically intervene in order to continuously adapt to changes in customer demand and expectations, to workforce behavior, and to other changes in the business environment. They also need to predict what will be the impact of internal and external changes, such as the impact of reduced workforce availability, supply chain disruptions, or increasing or decreasing demand for different types of products. Because of this, managers are seeing value in deploying digital twins of the organization, and particularly digital process twins.

Against this backdrop, we are seeing increased adoption of predictive and prescriptive analytics technology, which allow operational managers and process workers to foresee and to preempt issues in their processes (e.g. out of stock situations, customer churn). As we move forward inside the 2020s, predictive and prescriptive analytics, and other AI technology, will mature and drive increased business value.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

A data-driven company by Richard Benjamins gives a lightweight overview of what it means to run a data-driven company.

To learn from what other successful companies are doing, I recommend the book of “Business Process Management Cases” by Jan vom Brocke, Jan Mendling and Michael Rosemann, which is now available in two volumes.

To keep up with ongoing technology developments and news on process automation (but also BPM more generally), I recommend following the Linkedin account of Tolani Jaiye-Tikolo.

For Spanish-speakers, I recommend Coursera’s data-driven process optimization course in Spanish “Analítica de Procesos: Optimización desde los Datos”: https://www.coursera.org/learn/analitica-procesos-optimizacion-desde-datos

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

In an era of continuous change, there is a less pressing need to solidify and standardize processes. As a result, process standardization skills are less in vogue than they were a few years ago. This does not mean, however, that the need for these skills is gone forever. Not at all. I bet we will see them back on the table soon enough.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

Covid has had two major effects. First it has made flexible and remote work a norm. Second, it has created a continuous need for adaptability. Both of these trends have heighten the need for business transparency methods and technology, including process mining and digital process twins.

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Scott Francis

Scott Francis is CEO and Co­-Founder of BP3, a BPM specialist firm focused on accelerating process innovation for customers. Scott and his team have grown BP3 into a Leader in Forrester’s Wave for BPM Services Providers, a top 10 Company in Fortune’s Great Places to Work, a top 10 company in Austin’s Fast 50, and to 120 employees worldwide. Scott is a speaker at conferences such as: bpmNEXT, BPMPortugal, and BPMCAMP, and is the primary author of BP3’s blog.

WWW: http://www.bp-3.com
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

Let’s assume this person *already* knows BPMN, knows a value stream map from a failure mode effects analysis, and they at least know when to ask for help from someone who is a six sigma guru. I think in 2022, if you’re doing process work, you need to look at adding some skills to your repertoire. First off, if you don’t know RPA yet you should learn how to do RPA with one of the top tools in the space. Each vendor has good free educational resources. Second, learn about Design with a capital D. Not “process design” – but Design. It will help change your perspective on how to build great process solutions. Third, if you aren’t facile with a programming language, take time to get passably familiar with one – javascript or python for example. Both of these are general utility-like languages with lots of use cases. Fourth, if you have the above down already, time to look at expanding your knowledge of data and analysis with R, or AI by going deep on AWS or Google or Azure services… That should be a good start for the new year! While you’re at it, read 20+ books to keep sharp! fiction, nonfiction, business – I don’t think it matters, they all help you improve your self, develop empathy and perspective. In a time when we can’t travel (much), reading is the next best thing.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Most of the software vendors provide great educational content online for the self-directed learner. We’ll be offering educational options for clients this year for our own take on what matters most! This kind of offering will be helpful to clients who want to make sure their teams are all on the same page – getting the same background and educational framing to support working together on process and automation projects.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

The main change is that our clients and BP3 are doing our work from anywhere now. This was true before – but with many clients wanting a certain amount of time in the office together. Now those requirements have lapsed and we do our work from quite literally anywhere, and do our connecting on Zoom and Slack and other collaboration tools.

We’ve had to learn new ways to collaborate on process designs and software design – but equally, it was needed – because even pre-pandemic our clients have national and global teams that need to be included in the process. So we see it as progress. Now the question for 2022 and 2023 – is how do we add back the more personal human connection, while retaining the benefits of working together from anywhere in the world?

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Ian Gotts

Ian is a founder of Elements.cloud, tech advisor, investor, speaker and author.

Elements.cloud helps customers clean-up, document and build their app implementations, focused on Salesforce. But valid for any low code app platform.
WWW: https://medium.com/@Q9ELEMENTS
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

1. COVID accelerated digital transformation in every organization. In the early days of COVID, a cobbled-together on-line offering was good enough, but now having an online offering is table stakes. The differentiator is execution. Can your back office deliver the promise your website is making? That requires end to end process thinking, definition and delivery through a combination of technology and people. And that means process is at the heart.

2. Low-code apps showed how you could hack together an app really quickly. That was fine when it was tactical, small or self contained. If it wasn’t right, then throw it away or tweak it. But now low-code is being used for strategic systems. Therefore we need to reinforce (or reinstate) the value of business analysis before you start building. That will be a challenge as it feels like it is slowing down innovation. But what it is doing is removing rework. It is delaying app development, but it ultimately accelerates time to value because you are building what the business needs – first time.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Spending time doing the upfront analysis is called “Shift Left”. Shift Left means find the problems earlier, when they are cheaper to fix.

There is no shortage of information on how to capture requirements, map processes and write user stories. We’ve developed courses based on 20+ years experience in our Academy.elements.cloud

Also Salesforce has launched a business process mapping course as part of its certified architects program, but it is relevant to any process practitioner https://elements.cloud/2020/12/18/salesforce-training-course-endorses-upn/

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

We need on-line actionable diagrams embedded inside apps. So flowcharts are finally dead. And this is why https://elements.cloud/2020/06/08/the-evolution-of-process-diagramming-i-e-why-flowcharts-are-so-1980s/

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

See ans to Q1

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Paul Holmes-Higgin

Dr Paul Holmes-Higgin, Chief Product Officer and co-founder of Flowable. Previously, as co-founder and CPO of Alfresco he brought Activiti to the fore of the company’s innovation. A long-time Open Source advocate, he believes it still has an important role to play in making innovation more widely available. His PhD and background in AI gives him a deep understanding of the opportunities and realities of Machine Learning. He sees innovation around the standard models of BPM as the best way to bring together his passions for user-centred software and intelligent automation in today’s highly dynamic business and social environment.

WWW: https://flowable.com
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

With our customers, we’re seeing a move towards resolving end-to-end (E2E) automation problems, rather than point solutions – though point solutions may make up part of that E2E result. There’s a lot of focus on low-code, but not in a compartmentalized way it might be expressed by the market, which often separates no-code, low-code and pro-code. What businesses are asking for is the optimal approach for the problem at hand, and that changes as a project or solution evolves. We’re seeing no-code being heavily used for prototyping and departmental solutions, but then low-code when there’s more complexity (through scale, user experience, or integration), with pro-code being needed at the extremes of this (where time and money are more often acceptable). So, platforms or combinations of tools that facilitate the spectrum of no-low-pro-code solutions are attractive (by the way, we call it flow-code for short, but we would, wouldn’t we!).

One of the key capabilities that this end-to-end focus has highlighted is the easy assimilation and distribution of data. For me, business automation is all about the flow of data from and to systems and humans. Generally, in the process market we’ve been focused on process, case and decisions/rules – the “triple crown”. Data really belongs at the same level of importance. The ability to connect with databases and web services in no-code and low-code approaches is critical to delivering on the E2E no-low-pro-code opportunity. In my mind, data is the raw material extracted from systems or people to create business value. Data needs to flow through a number of stages of refinement, enrichment and evaluation to create an effective end-to-end solution. Ideally, you want the best of breed systems involved in the automation and life-cycle of the solution. That might be for process mining, machine learning, IoT and so on, or devices connecting people through chat, voice, video or augmented reality.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Doing it! There’s only so much you can learn on specific technologies or techniques when it comes to applying them together in an E2E automation solution. I still believe CMMN as an open standard offers a great way to model automation end-to-end, and there’s books, articles and open source tools that can support learning of that.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

End-to-end business automation has a couple of areas where practical reality is still behind expectations. First, Robotic Process Automation: the RPA vendors don’t seem to have grasped that their current technologies don’t meet the needs of E2E. I expected acquisitions to happen in the last year to address this, but nothing significant happened.
Second, AI/ML is still something people are hyping without telling the full story and implications. We’re starting to see this in some of the no-code, AI-driven process automation tools that are being promoted. At the end-to-end business level (and many other places), AI needs to be explainable, otherwise there’s a real risk of bias of some form or other. At a macro-level, AI that generates BPMN, CMMN or DMN is good, as a human can inspect and adjust the machine learnt logic. At a micro-level, black box machine learning is very useful, but can’t be taken as magic – its implications need to be understood in the context they’re used.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

These BPM people suddenly had many more projects they were asked to deliver on – and in shorter timescales! This really accentuated the no-code and low-code buzz that was already starting to happen. For some companies, they’d already started adopting and adapting their approach to process-rich automation, so it just accelerated that. For others, the covid situation drove them to introduce formal processes to adjust to remote and auditable working; also to consider process agility for more frequent absence of staff; and automation adaptability to even more rapidly changing markets and regulations.

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Adeel Javed

Adeel Javed is an intelligent automation architect, an author, and a speaker. He helps organizations automate work using low-code, business process management (BPM), robotic process automation (RPA), analytics, integrations, and ML. He loves exploring new technologies and writing about them. He has published two books with Apress, “Building Arduino Projects for the Internet of Things: Experiments with Real-World Applications” and “Robotic Process Automation using UiPath StudioX: A Citizen Developer’s Guide to Hyperautomation”. He shares his thoughts on various technology trends on his blog (adeeljaved.com).

WWW: https://adeeljaved.com
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

In my opinion, understanding of what I refer to as the Automation Stack will be very important. While orchestration is still the central component of this stack, we need to think beyond the traditional human-input tasks, and API-based system integrations. I would recommend exploring these areas.
• Robotic Automation: The hype might no longer be there, but RPA is still a necessity. The ability to integrate with legacy systems that do not support APIs, or systems that are hard to integrate with (due to numerous constraints) is extremely important to digitalize processes.
• Intelligent Document Processing: Still a bit clunky, but the ability to process documents intelligently can reduce a lot of manual work.
• Next Best Action: Most platforms now connect with some sort of AI services that can be used to augment human tasks with next best action recommendations.
• Process Mining: Not there yet, but it is definitely coming up, and is a good skill to get into now.
• Agile: Nothing new, but the ability to better breakdown process automation projects into user stories is still a challenge, so mastering this skill will be very beneficial.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I do believe that most of the standards (such as BPMN, CMMN, DMN) have not really been adopted really well, and I do not see them being very relevant at this point.

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Dr. Mathias Kirchmer

Dr. Kirchmer is an experienced practitioner and thought leader in the field of Business Process Management (BPM) and Digital Transformation. He co-founded BPM-D, a consulting company focusing on delivering performance improvements and appropriate digitalization by establishing and applying the discipline of BPM. Before he was Managing Director and Global Lead of BPM at Accenture, and CEO of the Americas and Japan of IDS Scheer, known for its ARIS Software.

Dr. Kirchmer has led numerous transformation and process improvement initiatives in various industries at clients around the world. He has published 11 books and over 150 articles. At the University of Pennsylvania and at Widener University he has served as affiliated faculty for over 15 years. He received a research and teaching fellowship from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.
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WWW: http://bpm-d.com
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Business Process Management – Predictions for 2022

Business Process Management (BPM) continues to drive value from digital transformation and becomes the management discipline to keep the transformation journey going – while getting digitalized itself. Here are four key trends and predictions I see for 2022:

• Process-led Digital Transformation: Digital technologies delivers value through new and enhanced business processes. Therefore, digital transformation is best organized through a process lens. The discipline of business process management (BPM) enables process-led digital transformation using an appropriate “process of process management”. Organizations will keep on increasing their focus on establishing and applying the required BPM-Discipline as “value-switch” for the digital world.

• Digitalization of the Process of Process Management: To achieve the agility and effectivity required in a digital world, business process management (BPM) goes through a digital transformation itself. The Process of process management is implemented through an integrated set of digital tools, such as process prioritization tools, process modelling and repository applications, or process mining environments. These tools are increasingly integrated with underlying process automation platforms and software applications. Organizations select their “ERP for BPM” and implement it in an outcome-driven way in the context of specific improvement and transformation initiatives. This value-driven digitalization of BPM leads to rapid business benefits while building a sustainable process management capability; the BPM-Discipline.

• Innovation through Business Process Management: Business Process Management (BPM) is not just applied to deliver efficiency to drive innovation. It is used to achieve process innovation, leveraging techniques like customer journey mapping or software-based reference models and the definition of related process scenarios. This serves to identify, design, and realize new and significantly enhanced processes, fast and reliably. BPM allows to apply design thinking pragmatically and action oriented. In addition, the BPM-Discipline is used to establish and manage a suitable innovation process, realizing goals like an increased number of high-quality innovation projects, reduced time-to-market, reliable cycle time estimations, or an early identification of potential roadblocks.

• Governance for the Digitalization and Transformation Journey: Digital transformation is not just a project or program. It is an ongoing journey. The right business process management (BPM) discipline helps to organize this journey. It defines strategy-based priorities, manages the resulting project portfolio, runs the process transformation initiatives, and realizes the value of those projects. BPM organizes the required process governance to align people and digital technologies to achieve best value for the organization. Organizations establish the BPM-Discipline to master the digitalization and transformation journey.

Highly specialized consulting organizations, such as BPM-D and Scheer Management, industry organizations, for example, ABPMP and the BPM Institute, or academic institutions, e.g. Widener University and the University of Pennsylvania, provide focused education regarding those trends. They also offer readings and eLearning opportunities though their web pages. Software vendors, such as SAP/Signavio, Software AG/ARIS or Celonis, provide tool-specific training.

Traditional, manually applied process excellence tools and approaches continue to lose in significance. They increasingly struggle to follow the pace of change in a digital world. However, the basic thinking that approaches like Lean or Six Sigma provide is still true and valid. It just must be incorporated in a modern, digitally enabled process management discipline.

The pandemic has accelerated and shaped the development of this BPM-Discipline. It has pushed process management practitioners to adjust and digitalized their working style quickly. This resulted, for example, in effective remote process capture and design sessions where the related process models are developed live in virtual sessions, leveraging user friendly modelling and collaboration tools. Process mining approaches are used more widely, enabled through the higher degree of process automation. The required remote work of process practitioner encourages the more formal definition of the “process of process management” with its organizational structure. All in all, Covid has helped to transform BPM even faster into a value-driven and digitally enabled process management discipline.

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Mirko Kloppenburg

Hi, I am Mirko Kloppenburg. Together with my wife and our two daughters, I live in Hamburg, Germany.

For more than 20 years, I have been working for Lufthansa Group in various process management positions. Currently, I am heading the Methods & Tools team for Process Excellence and we are providing process management expertise to the whole Lufthansa Group.

In parallel to my job at Lufthansa, I founded NewProcessLab.com in 2021. NewProcessLab.com is a platform to build a community, to perform experiments, and to share experiences along the New Process approach. New Process is a symbiosis of New Work and BPM and aims to rethink processes. It adds a human-centric mindset to the already proven BPM tools and methods we know from the past.

The year 2022 will bring a big change for me personally, as I will be leaving Lufthansa to concentrate fully on New Process. So, I am looking forward to an exciting year and I would like to invite you to join the New Process community, to build the future of process management, and to rethink processes together!

WWW: NewProcessLab.com
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

For me, the core skill to make a valuable contribution to an organization with BPM is clearly the knowledge on how to implement a structured process management process. By this I mean a procedure for translating the organization’s business strategy into specific processes and bringing them to life. I would go even further here and recommend a holistic transformation approach that considers the purpose of the organization and the individual processes to truly inspire people.

Inspiring people to create excellent processes is one of the New Process principles that are integrated into the New Process Life Cycle. The New Process Life Cycle is an approach to implement exactly the mentioned capabilities in an organization. It is about putting people at the center of process management, trusting them, empowering them, and taking their individual strengths and needs into account.

By the way, New Process can also be combined very well with Process Mining, which is certainly a topic mentioned by many for 2022. Process mining can be used to identify improvement potentials within process strategy and process design phase of the New Process Life Cycle. To interpret the results and derive measures, it is important to also involve the people who work in the process. After all, they are the true experts on the process, and this should be used to further develop the process and implement the changes in a sustainable manner. #NewProcess

And there is another thing that I expect to be an emerging theme in 2022: We will see more and more of the tools and methods used by influencers applied to specific business processes or to BPM in an organization. Process Influencers, so to speak. People who specialize in creating content for the respective process community within an organization: Process related podcasts, videos, events…

I see a great potential to use these influencer tools and methods in BPM and thus to support the transformation process. To push this approach of inspiring people further, I will certainly start some activities.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

You will find a lot of information about New Process on NewProcessLab.com. There is a toolbox with methods and tools along the New Process Life Cycle available.
But of course, I don’t just want to advertise on my own behalf. Beyond New Process, I discovered the “Mining Your Business”- Podcast a few months ago and I can highly recommend the interviews of Patrick Bogner and Jakub Dvořák. – By the way, episode 22 of their podcast series is dealing with New Process, too.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

For me, everything that has to do with “higher, faster, further” is obsolete. In my view, it is time to push human-centric BPM instead. I am so bored of budget discussions and counting FTEs. I wish we can make a positive impact with BPM that really touches and inspires people.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

Business topics can be discussed remotely without any problems, but interpersonal topics often get missed out. That’s why I’m really hoping to be able to hold workshops in person again soon.

As long as this is not the case, I would especially recommend following the New Process Principles and to focus on the people working in and on the process. #NewProcess

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Holly Lyke-Ho-Gland

Building on more than 10 years of business research and consulting experience, Holly Lyke-Ho-Gland is a principal research lead who conducts and publishes APQC research on process management and improvement, quality, project management, measurement, and benchmarking for APQC’s Process and Performance Management research team. Her research supports APQC members and clients across disciplines and centers on helping professionals and project managers solve business problems with strategy, process and measurement.

Holly regularly partners with other APQC research leads to look at improving the end-to-end business processes in areas such as procure-to-pay or order-to-cash where true improvement rests in the entire process versus one functional department. On a biannual basis, she conducts APQC’s extensive research survey and report on The Value of Benchmarking as well as annual surveys and reports on how organizations adopt and use the Process Classification Framework®.

WWW: https://www.apqc.org
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

Knowledge management is rapidly moving beyond a nice to have skill for BPM practitioners. Processes by themselves—even augmented through technology—will only take organizations so far. Instead, they need to be connected to all the relevant process knowledge (e.g., business rules, best practices, and expertise). Over the last couple of years, have seen the divide between process and knowledge disciplines shrink. Knowledge management professionals are partnering with BPM professionals to integrate process into their work. They are also partnering so they can help connect employees to the knowledge they need in the flow of their work. While BPM professionals want to ensure they capture, curate, and ensure accessibility of all relevant process knowledge. Hence, why these days it’s much more common to see BPM teams that will include a knowledge management expert to help them manage their process content. Furthermore in research on productivity, we found that process and knowledge (preferably working together) are vital for virtual work environments.

So much of BPM work relies on people. Hence facilitation and relationship building skills are more important than ever. The virtual nature of BPM work requires professionals to not only re-hone their facilitation skills but become much more purposeful in building relationships with people within the business.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

There are a lot of great books and resources out there on knowledge management:
• APQC: Knowledge Management
• KM World
• New Edge in Knowledge: How Knowledge Management is Changing the Way We do Business by Carla O’Dell and Cindy Hubert
• Thinking for a Living: How to Get Better Performances And Results from Knowledge Workers by Tom Davenport

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Skills don’t ever really lose their applicability; they just evolve and serve as the foundations for new skills.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

Covid-related changes had two big impacts on the work of BPM people. First it has helped bring process work to the forefront. Though teams still conduct a lot of work looking at cost and productivity improvements, they are also being tapped for an array of strategic work—supporting the execution of strategic objectives, organizational transformation, and large-scale technology implementations.

The second major impact is the ubiquitous of technologies. Gone are the days of a group of SMEs huddled together in a workshop using post its or whiteboards. Today BPM professionals are deft at leveraging collaboration tools—to substitute the conference rooms—and digital whiteboards to map out processes. Not only has Covid made technologies more necessary, but it has also spurred vendors to make them easier to use. In our recent priorities survey BPM professionals indicate that collaboration platforms, data visualization tools, and automation are the top technologies intrinsic to their process work.

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Brian Reale

Brian Reale is a serial entrepreneur. Brian founded a telecommunications company in 2000 called Unete Telecomunicaciones which provided, voice, data, and satellite services in Latin America. Brian sold Unete to a publicly traded US telecom company in 2000. Brian was also the co-founder of Spotless LLC, an entertainment technology company that developed projection mapping technology for major live entertainment industries.

Brian has been involved in the workflow and BPM industry since he co-founded ProcessMaker in 2000. ProcessMaker is a leading open source BPM suite which has just released its 4th generation product – a modern lightweight BPM designed for both human tasks and microservices orchestration. The ProcessMaker BPMS has been recognized with numerous awards and pushes the bounds of BPM with a fundamental belief that process management can be simple, elegant, and easy to use.

Brian graduated magna cum laude from Duke University in 1993 and was awarded a Fulbright scholarship in linguistics in Ecuador in 1994.

WWW: https://www.processmaker.com
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Twitter: @processmaker

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

I tend to like the Gartner concept of the “Composable Business” when thinking about BPM. The idea of monolithic iBPMs suites is basically dead. Sophisticated companies want to use a composable architecture to build around a best in class process orchestration engine. They want to be able to choose their low code front end technologies, their favorite RPA and iPaas vendors, plugin in a best in breed document storage, and use AI/ML in a variety of places. In one word, customers want freedom. I think that BPM practitioners need to embrace this freedom and become well versed in many different plugin technologies.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The best resources are free-trials, online tutorials, and vendor documentation. Practitioners need to test and try before they buy. The absolute best resource for this is Github. Fork some code and implement something yourself. Demand openness from your vendors.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Small data. In other words, you really need big data skills to make sense of where all technology trends are leading today. AI and ML will soon be making most decisions for us in most systems. Practitioners need to really understand these trends and where they are heading.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

The real change from COVID is the change to the labor force. The fact is that it is now very difficult to find the right people with the right skills for many types of jobs. As a result, the demand for automation has sky-rocketed. We will look back in 5 years and see that the Great Resignation really was the moment of the Great Start for AI/ML. The one is the exact replacement of the others. We have always talked about AI & ML replacing humans. It makes perfect sense that this really started happening in earnest during the year that all the humans decided to stop working. It is sad, but true.

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Adrian Reed

Adrian Reed is a true advocate of the analysis profession. In his day job, he acts as Principal Consultant and Director at Blackmetric Business Solutions where he provides business analysis consultancy and training solutions to a range of clients in varying industries. He is a Past President of the UK chapter of the IIBA® and he speaks internationally on topics relating to business analysis and business change. Adrian wrote the 2016 book ‘Be a Great Problem Solver… Now’ and the 2018 book ‘Business Analyst’

You can read Adrian’s blog at http://www.adrianreed.co.uk and follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/UKAdrianReed

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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

My angle on this is probably different to some of the other contributors, in that my background is in business analysis rather than BPM specifically. However one trend that seems to have been accelerating at pace over the past few years is that of product ownership and product management. Now, “what does this have to do with process management” I hear you say! One of the challenges is how the two interact.

For example, imagine an organization has several market-facing business units, each with several products/services. There are several product managers and product owners. They have deep expertise in those markets and know what their customers want, but in order for those products/services to be delivered in a sustainable and efficient manner there will probably be processes that flow across the organization. This is nothing new of course, but the move towards a product-centric paradigm means we need to spend more time than ever thinking about the process and enterprise-wide implications of making a seemingly small change in one area.

So, in terms of skills and attitudes, I think it’s very much about working with stakeholders and helping them to take a step back and zoom out, considering the internal and external factors. Again this is nothing new, but it perhaps highlights the importance of a core set of skills.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

There are so many resources out there, generally, about BPM, business analysis and more. Formal learning, such as courses, is one option, and the pandemic has meant that many providers offer online options now.

However, there are also many excellent blogs (including BPMTips of course!) and youtube channels too. So for me, a blend of formal and informal learning is key. But to make this really hit home it’s important to actually use the techniques that are learned. So doing it alongside the day job, to enhance the day job, is key. On a personal level, that’s how I learn best.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I’m not really sure, as so much is context dependent. I tend to think that really all of the core skills are pretty important. I sometimes see hype and argument over particular technical tools, but I think that’s largely a distraction to most practitioners!

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

Well, speaking personally as a business analyst, it meant that I’ve moved very much to a “virtual first” practice. Tools like Mural or Miro are very helpful in running collaborative workshops, and have the advantage that many people can contribute at once (many people can ‘hold the virtual pen’).

I also think Covid showed the importance of BPM. I’m a true believer that if you have a well-formed and well-maintained process architecture then change is easy. Put differently: If you know what you do today and how you do it, then working out how to change and the impact of change is easier.

With a fast-moving business environment, there will always be unexpected events. I believe BPM is a key ingredient in the business agility that many organizations seek.

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Pedro Robledo

President and co-founder of the Spanish chapter of ABPMP International. One of the main referents with the greatest influence in Process Management using the BPM (Business Process Management) management discipline, with +20 years dedicated to promoting knowledge of Business Process Management in Spain and Latin America. Director of the Master’s Degree in BPM for Digital Transformation and Director of the Master’s Degree in Strategic Process Management at the International University of La Rioja (UNIR). And professor of the MBA and executive MBA of UNIR. BPM consultant who helps organizations in their BPM initiatives, Digital Transformation, BPM maturity diagnosis, BPM ROI calculation, BPM supplier selection, training and advice on BPMN process modeling and DMN decisions, and roadmap advice BPM for the advancement of BPM implementation. Director of BPMteca. Computer Engineer from the Polytechnic University of Madrid. He has made his professional career as a manager in multinational software companies such as Borland International, Ask Group, Computer Associates, Progress Software, Teamware and Oracle. Since 2013 he has participated as a jury in the international WfMC Awards for Excellence in BPM and Workflow until the end of WfMC. He writes about BPM and Digital Transformation on his blog: “The White Paper on Process Management”, http://pedrorobledobpm.blogspot.com.es/ and regularly contributes to other blogs and magazines.

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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

In 2022, automation is the main objective of all industries. But automation should not considered as technical project, but rather the consequence of a rigorous study on the improvement of a process in accordance with the company’s annual strategies. But before improving a process, it is necessary to study the efficiency, and efficacy and effectiveness of the process, and the maturity of the process, and if the company has enough maturity of transformation capabilities to make that process change now.

The BPM CoE must have BPM people with sufficient technical, management, transformation and operational skills to execute 12 BPM Maturity analyses around the 7 key pillars of BPM discipline:
1.- Analysis of the level of alignment of the processes to the business strategy, carrying out predictive, proactive and reactive management of the business in real time, seeking operational excellence.
2. Analysis of the level of documentation through modelling, process mining and automation of business processes
3. Process Maturity Analysis (PEMM)
4. Analysis of the application of BPM Technologies for the different roles that participate in Process Management throughout the BPM Life Cycle.
5. Analysis of matrix organization
6. Analysis of the BPM team
7. Analysis of the level of knowledge and skills in BPM of the different roles that participate in BPM initiatives
8. Analysis of BPM team management in reference to the metamodel used, and the application of standards and guides for the proper use of good practices of Process Management.
9. Analysis of the level of use of formal BPM methodologies, well defined and repeatable to carry out BPM and its continuous improvement in the different phases of the Life Cycle of a BPM process
10. Business Culture Analysis towards process orientation
11. Enterprise Transformation Capability Maturity Analysis (PEMM)
12. Innovation Culture Analysis (e.g. J.Rao & J.Weintraub)
If any company performs these 12 analyses every year, they will be able to define their appropriate training roadmap to improve in the BPM discipline and be ready to improve the processes on which the corporate strategy and practice of Enterprise Architecture decide to focus.

On that roadmap, all companies will include the needs to improve on these core skills:
– Business Process Automation Platforms or BPMS
– Robotic Process Automation (RPA)
– Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning
– Decision Model & Notation (DMN) 1.4 (as OMG will be published in Q1)
– Process Mining and Task Mining
– Optimization and Improvement Methodologies (Lean, SixSigma and Theory of Constraints)
– Business Process Simulation (BPS)
– Enterprise Architecture

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

The need for BPM professionals worldwide and especially in Spain and Latin America is growing 13% in 2022 (14% estimated in 2024) and more than 66% of the positions demanded in Business Process Management (BPM) are not currently being covered yet.
The need for professionals and employment opportunities are forcing specialization to achieve specific competencies on BPM discipline and throughout the BPM life cycle: a) There will be greater interest in specialized master’s studies in Management BY Processes and Operational Excellence; b) There will be increased interest in international professional certifications such as those awarded by ABPMP International (Association of BPM Professionals) and OMG (Object Management Group); and, c) More and more knowledge and experience are required in BPM discipline, Automation, BPMS, RPA, Process Mininng, BPMN / DMN, ROI and AI. To help on this, I contribute as director of two online University courses in Spanish for postgraduates in UNIR (Universidad Internacional de la Rioja based in Spain and Latam): Master’s Degree in Business Process Management for Digital Transformation, which covers the entire BPM life cycle, focusing not only on the Business part, but with an extensive scope in the BPM Technology part and its key role in the Digital Transformation of an organization; and Master’s Degree in Strategic Process Management which covers the advanced knowledge about the tools, methodologies and techniques necessary to study the changes on the Enterprise Architecture and achieve the excellence of the operations and processes of any organization, contributing both to its growth and its continuous and sustained development.
ABPMP chapters will push the ABPMP’s BPM CBOK to maintain the global standard for BPM practices and certification.
As BPM consultant I will help companies in Spain and Latam by providing ad-hoc BPM Learning-by-doing training to help companies in their growth on their business process maturity.

In my blog (http://pedrorobledobpm.blogspot.com.es), I have some posts with bibliography by BPM topics, videos and articles about BPM discipline. And anyone can consult the calendar of BPM events on my blog http://pedrorobledobpm.blogspot.com/p/eventos-bpm.html since I include all the BPM events that I discover from Associations, Suppliers, Consulting and my own webinars, so it is possible to be updated by BPM industry experts every week.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

As Business Process Management is a management discipline, all BPM skills are relevant and they are applicable yet, although it is required to improve continuously the BPM skills with the new trends, best practices and learned lessons.
All Business Activity Monitoring (BAM) skills are obsolete and instead of BAM anyone should focus on Process Mining in BPMS.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

Changes related to covid are impacting the work of BPM people like any other job. But growing digitization and automation requirements means BPM people need to learn the skills they need to succeed on projects faster, as companies often have to reinvent themselves, needing to respond to unprecedented dynamism, where innovation must be continuous to survive. The BPM skills now are more required if any company wants to be process oriented and implement innovations. Telework will remain in companies, further boosting the need to digitize processes, which will imply an advance in the adoption of digital technologies and driving the next wave of disruption, agility and productivity in the digital company.

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Tomislav Rozman

Dr. Tomislav Rozman is a founder of consultancy company BICERO Ltd. He is also designing online courses related to BPM, CRM, IT and teaching and mentoring Masters’ students at DOBA Faculty of applied business and social studies Maribor, Slovenia.

He enjoys teaching people about BPM and he has performed projects of implementing BPM in Slovenian companies, public administration organizations and SMEs.

In his free time, he is a runner, guitar & ukulele player and psychology counsellor.

WWW: http://www.bicero.com
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What is the relation between covid and BPM?

In the last year, covid uncovered the same old problems which caused many digital transformation (or, society transformation) initiatives failing in the past: you can not automate (change) what you don’t understand.

The public sector, educational institutions and companies in my country (Slovenia) wanted to quickly deploy IT solutions during the pandemics such as remote learning and work, but many efforts failed or had serious flaws. I was observing some examples of IT development from Slovenia: covid-tracker app, call centre for municipalities system, PCR app.. and transition to remote work in general.
Example 1: Covid tracker app. released by the state had initially many technical flaws, later it wasn’t efficient because the encompassing process was missing. Nobody took time and thought about the process around the app.: how to issue TAN codes, how to persuade people to use it, what to do with the results, how to report bugs etc. The result was low trust in the app and low acceptance rate, somehow affecting higher infection rates.

The next example: Call centre reservation system for municipalities (also initiated by the public administration) was retracted a few days ago because of poor information security. Nobody took time to prepare a proper system requirements specification which resulted in the system being publicly available only for a few days.

Next, remote work in companies took more than a year to catch up. We have done a small research about the remote work acceptance (https://www.bicero.com/projects/remoteworkr) and found out the biggest challenges transitioning to remote work during the pandemic were: lack of social contacts, information security, poorly defined processes and responsibilities, poor communication.

Next, our government issued (at the time of writing) already a 10th package of decrets, which are often in conflict with the previous ones and not many people can properly decipher it. The reason? The creators don’t think in terms of long-running processes, business rules, exceptions, process flow.

What have all these examples to do with BPM? Everything! Without the systematic and structured thinking and setting the solid foundations, systems (IT or people) tend to become chaotic.

Did we learn anything from it? Probably not. Could a more structured and systematic thinking help? Probably, but only rare people have the skills, the capacity and the mental bandwidth to deal with it.
Therefore I still persist in advocating and teaching people how to deal with the complexity of the world.

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Serge Schiltz

Serge Schiltz is CEO and founder of processCentric GmbH, a European consulting and training firm focused on business process management. With his extensive practical experience as a senior consultant working with clients on their BPM challenges in different industries, he has been able to build a solid reputation over the past decades. Author, trainer, university lecturer and conference speaker in English, German and French. Member of OMG’s DMN Task Force and contributor to the OMG Certified Expert in BPM (OCEB) examination. He is also a ABPMP DACH Chapter event management volunteer and Swiss eGovernment (eCH) BPM Task Force Member.

WWW: https://www.processcentric.ch/en
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

I see business process management with its wide range of perspectives as the focal point of all management disciplines. As it touches every little facet of an organization, BPM practitioners can make a substantial contribution to an organization’s success at the strategic as well as the operational levels. But it is important for them to understand business needs and management’s concerns. It is not sufficient any more to just create models and deploy these to business process and rules engines. We need to position ourselves as value-enabling consultants helping management create transparency, shape strategy, design and implement operations. This requires not only targeted BPM training, but also management, leadership and communication skills.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I very much appreciate the wide and practice-oriented curriculum of OMG’s Expert in BPM (OCEB) certifications. They cover important literature with an extremely wide range of topics, specifically for BPM, but also business and technology. And practice, practice, practice … have a lot of profound discussions with diverse colleagues, not only in the BPM area.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

All BPM skills that we have acquired in the past remain important and can be combined with new approaches to create even more value. However, obsession with any of these is counterproductive. Remember those Six Sigma Black Belts who threw statistics at every unsignificant data sample? And there some more recent additions to the BPM toolset like CMMN. Great many do not yet understand its potential, but I am pretty convinced that in the long run, it will gain in importance … but I will not be religious about it.

What is the role of process-related skills in the “new normal”?

Business processes are everywhere, whatever we do is a business process … almost! More and more, regulators insist on transparency in what we do (process documentation), customers require satisfaction (voice of the customer), shareholders expect profits (efficiency), the IT development cycle speed is ever increasing (model-based development), etc. Every role in an organization needs process-related skills. In particular, as working at home and/or outside the office is becoming the “new normal”, we don’t systematically have office mates who we can ask how to do things, so we need well designed and clearly defined business processes that we can rely on.

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Jim Sinur

Jim Sinur is an independent thought leader in applying Digital Business Platforms (DBP), Customer Experience/Journeys (CJM), Business Process Management (BPM), Automation (RPA), Low-code and Decision Management at the edge for enhanced business outcomes. His research and areas of personal experience focus on intelligent business processes, business modeling, results oriented communications (ROC), real tine data feedback with heterogeneous data types, business process management technologies, smart process collaboration for knowledge workers, process intelligence/optimization, AI applied to business policy/rule management, IoT and leveraging business applications in processes. Jim was a contributor to Forbes in the area of AI. Jim is also one of the authors of BPM: The Next Wave. His latest book is Digital Transformation. Innovate or Die Slowly. Jim’s personal blog is approaching one million hits to date. Jim is also a well know digital and traditional artist.

WWW: https://www.forbes.com/sites/cognitiveworld/people/jimsinur/
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

There are a number of skills that BPM folks could pick up as there are many coming out of the digital evolution, but my top seven would be the following:
1) Journey Mapping for Customers, Employees and Partners including touchpoint analysis and persona creation.
2) Embedded Advanced Analytic and Visualization Capabilities. Process plus big, fast and dark process/data mining is growing to be more important. Decision Models will become more important as the integrate with process models
3) Adaptive and Goal Driven Processes (often in Case Management and also Explicit Rule enabled) driven by process/data mining with real time feedback.
4) AI looking for opportunities to add automation or more smarts like Robotic Program Automation (RPA). Machine learning is hot and Deep Learning is starting to gain momentum.
5) Cognitive Collaboration for Knowledge Intense Processes or Cases. AI Assistance is starting
6) Signal and Pattern Detection at the edge (often needed for agility, IoT and business strategy). IoT integration is a new emerging theme. This can be taken to the level of digital twins and by merging control on a the edge with central control.
7) Business Professional Process creation, adaptation and optimization by leveraging lite BPM/workflow, Process/Data Mining utilizing Low code and AI.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

While there are no skills that one should drop, there are several that are considered common and receding. My top three would be the following:
1) Central Control only approaches with siloed skill sets. More lateral thinking is and collaborative control is needed today.
2) Water Fall project methods are taking a second seat to incremental development, RPA and rapid experimentation,
3) Large blocks of dumb frozen code are giving way to smart components, micro services and late binding rules guided by constraints.

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James Taylor

James is founder and CEO of Decision Management Solutions and a leading expert in decision management and digital decisioning. Experienced working with machine learning, business rules, predictive analytics and AI to improve operational systems. Published author – Digital Decisioning: Using Decision Management to Deliver Business Impact from AI, Real-World Decision Modeling with DMN and others – strategy consultant, writer and speaker.

WWW: http://jtonedm.com
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

The best thing I think BPM practitioners could do would be to embrace digital decisioning. We have been digitizing our businesses for a long time now and have succeeded in digitizing our channels, our data and our processes. But too often we are failing to digitize the decisions that use our digital data, support our digital channels and drive our digital processes straight through most efficiently.
Digital decisioning is a way to deliver smarter, simpler and more dynamic processes while effectively applying predictive analytics, machine learning and AI – not to the process itself, but to the critical decisions on which the process relies. Digital decisioning involves identifying and modeling decisions, automating them in decision services that combine machine learning with business rules, and creating a continuous improvement infrastructure for them. It delivers consistent, easy to manage, precise and data-driven decisioning throughout your business.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Obviously I think my new book Digital Decisioning: Using Decision Management to Deliver Business Impact from AI is the best resource for Digital Decisioning but there are also some great papers from Forrester and some good resources from Gartner too (under their Decision Management topic). My blog and company blog have plenty on this topic too.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Attempting to apply business rules, predictive analytics or machine learning/AI directly to business processes should count as irrelevant these days. While you can apply these technologies to processes directly, the evidence that they work so much better when applied to automate and manage decision-making explicitly is overwhelming. Applying a decision management approach with the Decision Model and Notation (DMN) standard and delivering digital decisioning is the future.

It’s also time to retire process capability maps and assessments that don’t consider decisions as first class components of your business architecture. It’s no longer viable to inventory processes – even at Level 0 – without explicitly also inventorying decisions. AI, machine learning and a renewed focus on decision-making (digital decisioning, decision management, decision intelligence) all require that an organization understand its decisions as well as its processes. Decisions are not just part of operational processes, they are a key element of business architecture.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

We saw many companies realize how many of their systems and processes relied implicitly on people being collocated or at least all in an office of some kind. Unpicking that and building processes that worked for remote and hybrid workforces generated some interesting projects for BPM folks. We’re now seeing those companies realize that they don’t understand the decision-making of the people left in the loop well enough to optimize it. These forward-looking companies are asking us to review their processes for critical decisions so they can prioritize decision automation projects and identify processes that need a decision-centric re-design.

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Roger Tregear

Roger Tregear spends his working life talking, consulting, thinking, presenting, recording, and writing about the analysis, innovation, improvement, and management of business processes. He helps organizations improve performance.
As Principal Advisor at TregearBPM Roger provides business process management consulting, training, and coaching services. 36 years’ experience as a business, management, and IT consultant means that he has well-developed insights into business improvement and problem resolution.
Roger’s practice and client base are global with assignments completed in Australia, Bahrain, Belgium, Jordan, Namibia, Nigeria, Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Switzerland, New Zealand, United Arab Emirates, UK, and USA.
Roger writes, presents, and records on many topics related to process-based management. That material can be accessed via https://bit.ly/TregearBPM_Resources.

WWW: https://www.tregearbpm.com
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

I always struggle with questions like this because it invites a perception of a level of similarity and uniformity in the ‘BPM space’ that’s just not there. Even “BPM practitioners” will mean many different things in different organizations—it could (and should) apply to some or all the work of everyone in the organization, and that work is going to be very different if you are the CEO or the RPA expert.

I’ll answer just from my ‘place in the space’ which is defined by the idea that the M is BPM is for management. I prefer the term process-based management which I define as:
Continuous management of the hierarchy of processes by which value is created, accumulated, and delivered, with the active intention of optimizing process performance through mindful, continuous improvement.

So, what capabilities and mindsets are needed to give that a good chance of working well and sustainably:
• Primary need is to be able to see that every organization creates, accumulates, and delivers value across the organization via cross-functional business processes. For some, that is obvious, and they get it immediately. Others, not so much. If this idea doesn’t resonate with you then you aren’t doing process-based management. You might be doing process improvement (aka fixing stuff), but that’s only half the story (see my definition).
• Facilitating conversations about cross-functional collaborative management might require advanced interpersonal skills. Everyone is happy to sign up for continuous improvement but not so much for its prerequisite, continuous problem finding.
I can see that the rest of you have lots of problems, but my area is working just find thank you very much.
• To optimize process performance, you need to love process measurement. It may not be your absolute favorite activity but defining, tracking, and responding to PKPIs must be at least in your top 10, maybe your top 5.
• You need a burning desire to really understand what makes high-impact processes tick—why are they important, to whom, what does good look like, how can they be improved, what would exceptional look like, what is the current performance, what should it be, what will it be, what could it be, etc. And all that long before changes are made to the process.
• We need the ability to choose wisely which processes to analyze, manage, and improve. It’s simply not possible to get optimum organizational performance by improving the wrong processes, and it’s not possible to improve them all.
There does need to be a central team (BPM team, Center of Excellence etc.) with advanced skills and experience, but they can’t (and should not) do it all, so these skills need to exist to varying degrees across the organization.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

All the above and everything else.

Only a small fraction of the needed whole-of-organization development will happen naturally or organically. We need a BPM Capability Development Plan (capability = experience and expertise) that lays out how process-based management capabilities will be developed and maintained at a useful level for all cohorts in the organization. This doesn’t need to be complicated, but it does need to exist. I would structure it using the 7Enablers of BPM (obvs) and define the capability gaps and then make plans to close those gaps.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

It would be nice to think that COVID has been a massive catalyst for enhanced process-based management and that organizations now understand their processes much better and can optimize performance in existing and new processes. It would be a rare benefit from COVID if organizations realized that poorly performing processes could no longer be tolerated — the failing engine is OK on the flat but is totally inadequate when, inevitably, put under load in the hills.

Did that happen? It will have done for some. And it’s not too late for the others!

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Miguel Valdés-Faura

As Chief Executive Officer and co-founder, Miguel leads the charge in Bonitasoft’s mission: to democratize Business Process Management (BPM), bringing powerful and affordable BPM to organizations and projects of all sizes. Prior to Bonitasoft, Miguel led R&D, pre-sales and support for the BPM division of Bull Information Systems, a major European systems provider. Miguel is a recognized thought-leader in business process management and passionate about open source community building.

WWW: http://www.bonitasoft.com
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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2022?

The most valuable attitude in 2022 for BPM practitioners is to identify/prioritize broken processes and coordinate the internal effort to redesign and automate them. In particular, broken processes that involve multiple teams and that create internal inefficiencies in organizations. How are you supposed to deliver great customer service if internally teams are not working in an efficient manner?

Broken and manual processes are causing serious operational problems and burdening business activities with hidden costs and resources. Those issues are accentuated with the work-from-home experience and the hybrid workplace.

In addition to the previous point, BPM practitioners with technical development skills will make the difference in complex process automation implementations. In a world in which IMO we are putting a bit too much emphasis on how citizen developers are involved in BPM projects, practitioners that understand the complexity of internal systems, changing business logic and that have the ability to code will shine!

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

– Fundamentals of Business Process Management
– Covid-19 remote work just broke your processes, this is what to do about it!
– Bonita Camp, free hands on exercises and training on the Bonita open source platform

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Number one is, once again, traditional waterfall development approaches. Customers in all industries are moving away from detailed, long-term project plans with single timelines to embrace a more iterative (agile) development approach.

How did covid-related changes in the business environment impact the work of BPM people?

The great pandemic work-from-home experience has brought the “hybrid workplace” to the fore: one that combines remote and on-site work. Competitive business is always focused on the best possible customer experience, and what’s newly emerging from the hybrid workplace is a “hybrid employee-customer journey” that integrates both through business process applications. Employees and customers both need smooth, painless and supported experiences, and business applications built on digital process automation platforms are going to focus more and more on how everyone involved in critical end-to-end processes has that best possible experience

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Now, let’s dive into the answers.

Prof. Wil van der Aalst

Prof.dr.ir. Wil van der Aalst is a full professor at RWTH Aachen University leading the Process and Data Science (PADS) group. He is also part-time affiliated with the Fraunhofer-Institut für Angewandte Informationstechnik (FIT) where he leads FIT’s Process Mining group and the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven (TU/e). Until December 2017, he was the scientific director of the Data Science Center Eindhoven (DSC/e) and led the Architecture of Information Systems group at TU/e. Since 2003, he holds a part-time position at Queensland University of Technology (QUT). Currently, he is also a distinguished fellow of Fondazione Bruno Kessler (FBK) in Trento and a member of the Board of Governors of Tilburg University. His research interests include process mining, Petri nets, business process management, workflow management, process modeling, and process analysis. Wil van der Aalst has published over 250 journal papers, 22 books (as author or editor), 550 refereed conference/workshop publications, and 80 book chapters. Many of his papers are highly cited (he one of the most cited computer scientists in the world; according to Google Scholar, he has an H-index of 155 and has been cited over 110,000 times), and his ideas have influenced researchers, software developers, and standardization committees working on process support. Next to serving on the editorial boards of over ten scientific journals, he is also playing an advisory role for several companies, including Fluxicon, Celonis, and UiPath. Van der Aalst received honorary degrees from the Moscow Higher School of Economics (Prof. h.c.), Tsinghua University, and Hasselt University (Dr. h.c.). He is also an IFIP Fellow, IEEE Fellow, ACM Fellow, and an elected member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Royal Holland Society of Sciences and Humanities, the Academy of Europe, and the North Rhine-Westphalian Academy of Sciences, Humanities and the Arts (Nordrhein-Westfälische Akademie der Wissenschaften und der Künste). In 2018, he was awarded an Alexander-von-Humboldt Professorship.

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What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2021?

When I started to work on the first process mining algorithms in the late 1990-ties, processes and data were completely disconnected. Most of the people working on process management were focusing on process models and workflow automation. Most of the people working on data mining and machine learning did not consider operational processes. Process mining provided the missing link between model-based process analysis and data-oriented analysis techniques. Skills related to the combination of data science and process science have become more critical over time, and 2021 will be no exception.

The COVID-19 pandemic shows that accurate data are vital to managing operational processes. Global supply chains were taken by surprise, and vulnerabilities were exposed. Process mining can be used to create full transparency on what is happening in a supply chain and recommend actions.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

My process mining book “Process Mining: Data Science in Action. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, 2016. http://www.springer.com/978-3-662-49850-7” still seems the most obvious place to start to prepare for the convergence of data science and process science. The book is supported by the Coursera course with the same name, see https://www.coursera.org/learn/process-mining. Most of the things presented there are timeless. Of course, there have been many recent developments (e.g., better tooling and novel applications). Currently, there are over 35 commercial process mining tools (e.g., Celonis, Disco, UiPath/ProcessGold, myInvenio, PAFnow, Minit, QPR, Mehrwerk, Puzzledata, LanaLabs, Process Diamond, Apromore, Everflow, TimelinePI, Signavio, and Logpickr).

The large-scale adoption in industry happened only in the last five years. Many organizations are using process mining today. To get an impression of this, I recommend the edited book by Lars Reinkemeyer “Process Mining in Action. Principles, Use Cases and Outlook. Springer, 2020. https://www.springer.com/de/book/9783030401719” which describes many case studies. This is inspiring, but I recommend BPM professionals to first truly understand the concepts by taking the course just mentioned. People easily talk about processes and data without having a clear understanding of the core concepts.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I sense that most of the traditional skills are still relevant, but the emphasis has shifted from modeling and gartering requirements to more data-driven skills. Many people are obsessed with BPMN, DMN, and CMMN, living in an imaginary world very disconnected from reality. People stressing such standards without looking at the actual processes’ traces will not contribute to actual process improvements. Many things are overhyped, as is illustrated by “Buzzword Bingo” reports like “RPA Renaissance Driven by Morphing Offerings and Zeal for Operational Excellence” by Gartner. Also, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Deep Learning (DL) have been promising things that are simply unrealistic. The fact that neural networks work surprisingly well for some tasks does not imply that they can be applied to any problem, e.g., process management.

What is the role of process-related skills in the “new normal”?

The COVID-19 pandemic showed that having reliable data and resilient processes is of paramount importance. Some organizations will simply disappear because of the current crisis; others will thrive. Organizations need to be able to address compliance and performance problems systematically, also when circumstances change rapidly. Organizations built on spreadsheets and politics are unable to tackle the challenges related to COVID-19, e.g., tracking whether people get a second dose, ensuring that the right people get the vaccines, and detecting counterfeited or incorrectly handled vaccines. The many problems witnessed will provide new opportunities for digital transformations that go beyond making PowerPoints and playing Buzzword Bingo.

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BJ Biernatowski

BJ Biernatowski is an advanced BPM Practitioner with 21 years of IT experience, 16 of which spent implementing Business Process Management solutions. He has practical experience with Microsoft Power Platform, K2, Appian, Pega, and Tibco AMX BPM, including large-scale business transformations.

He is currently employed by Microsoft as a Process and Execution Manager on the Business Operations Team.

BJ’s work has been featured by KW World, and he has presented internationally on the topic of workplace transformation. He served as an advisor to Fortune 500 companies.

Areas of interest include COEs, Knowledge Work automation, and Citizen Development adoption of Low Code Digital Process Automation (DPA) platforms. UW Foster School of Business alumni and a Monroe, WA resident.

WWW: LI profile
Twitter: @bjbiernatowski

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2021?

I predict that in 2021 the following skills and techniques will be getting more traction in the marketplace:

a) Citizen Developer model goes mainstream: The practical know-how about launching and managing successful Citizen Developer programs in sync with strategic Business and Process Architecture initiatives. Companies who experienced the benefits of combining Low Code technologies with the democratization of solution delivery will start thinking about harnessing this wave for widespread business transformations. This trend will create challenges for old school DPA vendors who banked their product development strategies on highly specialized skill sets, masking the complexities of program delivery. In the quest for simpler but very closely aligned solutions developed by CitDevs vs. technically sophisticated solutions designed by teams of consultants, the democratic model of Digitizing Business Processes should prevail, despite the higher perception of risk. Such programs’ individual success will vary based on the strength of the relationship with BA/Process teams driving Digital Work Ecosystems’ underlying architecture. This phenomenon should bring back some IT jobs previously shipped overseas.

b) Process Mining: the next frontier of business process automation is hiding in logs and digital footprints left by workers in many IT systems. Over the last decade, enterprises pursued automation of business processes as articulated by people who, despite their best intentions and hours invested into discovery sessions, still felt short of capturing the whole breadth of process architectures. Modeling cases, processes, and decisions in highly dynamic environments require specialized tools and access to the right data. Companies who figure out how to mine this data for relevant, process-related pieces of information will be able to realign their automation programs. It’s not just about how fast you go if you end up in Denmark instead of in the goldfields of Alaska.

c) Divergent Thinking: because future architectures of emerging Digital Work Ecosystems can be designed for on-premise, cloud & hybrid cloud from hundreds of complementary Cloud-native services. The number of permutations of the ‘right fit’ solutions continues to become higher and higher. Knowing where and how to start will require imagining these abstract blueprints from multiple points of view.

d) Advanced Visualization Techniques – does the two-dimensional view of the business process truly reflect the three-dimensional and, many times, object-oriented nature of DPA implementations? How can one describe the relationship between business requirements, value chains, customer journeys, cases, business processes, tasks, and workflows using the relatively flat view of CMMN, BPMN, and DMN? If you scale up your process models into the work of hundreds of people, how can you depict each task, activity, and case at every layer of your Enterprise Process Architecture? Add multiple layers of your Cloud infrastructure, and this task becomes pretty challenging.

e) Skills highlighted in my 2020 projections: AI-DP-RP-A, the art of influencing, collaborative teamwork, and approaching BPM as a management discipline.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

a) Tracking Forrester, Gartner, and IDC reports if you have access to subscriptions. Looking for free online events and conferences and hanging out with the crowd. As an employee of Microsoft and a frequent user of our services, one such event I’m looking forward to is the PowerPlatform BootCamp 2021 February 19-20 which offers an opportunity to network and learn. Monitoring Twitter for relevant hashtags: #dpa, #powerautomate, #powerplatform, #rpa, #processmining, #workflow, #PowerCAT, #poweraddict

b) I always like going to the source when diving into a new knowledge area. Professor Will van der Aalst’s book is a great start for any person new to this domain: Process Mining: http://www.processmining.org/book/start Then dive into studying practical applications of Process Mining by reading use cases i.e.: How Microsoft uses process mining to accelerate digital transformation. Whenever you feel ready to ‘just do it’ you can check out the preview release of PowerAutomate’s Process Advisor: https://flow.microsoft.com/en-us/process-advisor/

c) LinkedIn Learning for a crash course or Business Administration degree programs like the one offered by my alma matter, the University of Washington.

d) I am still trying to figure this one out.

e) BPM Tips continues to be my regular go-to source for the most up to date developments on everything BPM and DPA.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Most skills should be reusable as long as they offer the bridge between old and new. It is hard to predict when ‘old’ and ‘new’ skills mixed together will provide you with that one visual meta-model of the future driving your next project to a successful go-live

What is the role of process-related skills in the “new normal”?

Such skills are fundamental and mandatory for the operations of any successful enterprise. Highlighting new trends and updating the body of knowledge should be done at least yearly if not more often. One cannot plan a Digital Transformation without process related skills. The new normal has only upped the bar and accelerated the push to upskill teams. I found recent thoughts coming from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation relevant, as they explore ways the next pandemic could be equally disruptive to the world’s economy: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/health/bill-gates-we-must-prepare-for-the-next-pandemic-like-we-prepare-for-war/

It may be best to sharpen the process toolkit skills sooner than later.

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Adeel Javed

Adeel Javed is an intelligent automation architect, an author, and a speaker. He helps organizations automate work using low-code, business process management (BPM), robotic process automation (RPA), analytics, integrations, and ML. He loves exploring new technologies and writing about them. He has published two books with Apress, “Building Arduino Projects for the Internet of Things: Experiments with Real-World Applications” and “Robotic Process Automation using UiPath StudioX: A Citizen Developer’s Guide to Hyperautomation”. He shares his thoughts on various technology trends on his blog (adeeljaved.com).

WWW: https://adeeljaved.com
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Twitter: @processrambling

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2021?

The scope of BPM has changed. BPM is no longer just focused on managing human-centric processes. An end to end process now involves humans, systems, and robots. So, practitioners need to build a good understanding of the overall process automation landscape, which includes BPM, APIs, RPA, ML, and Analytics.

In addition, Six Sigma knowledge is once again becoming important.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Coursera is a good starting point. For hands-on skills, most vendors now offer free training courses and/or product trials.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Still waiting to see large scale adoption of process mining.

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Sandy Kemsley

Sandy is a “technology catalyst” with a 20-year history of software design and systems architecture in several technology areas, combined with a deep understanding of business environments and how technology can impact them.

She has also founded and run three companies – a systems integration services company, a software product company, and current consulting company – with responsibility for corporate and financial governance, strategic direction, team hiring and management, and day-to-day technical contributions.

Sandy blogs about BPM, enterprise architecture and other intersections of business and technology at www.column2.com

WWW: https://column2.com
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Twitter: @skemsley

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2021?

BPM practitioners need to be enabling change and flexibility within their organization in 2021. Over the last year, companies have found that they need to be able to change their business processes and practices in a very short time to accommodate the impacts of the pandemic: in particular, work-from-home, and supply chain disruptions. BPM practitioners need to be able to identify what needs to change in order to stay competitive, and figure out the reworked business processes required to make it happen. These new processes also need to be flexible to enable constant change, so the old methods of taking a long time to document a process then “cast it in stone” are not going to work. Agile methods can help to support this level of change and flexibility.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Learning about agile methods for organizational change and application development is a necessity for BPM practitioners: they need to be able to understand how to determine the “minimum viable product” in terms of changing a business process or creating a new application to support that process. Some lightweight Agile training is of benefit to them, although most of this can be learned from online resources and books. The bigger issue is being able to convince people within the organization that the change is necessary and provides a way for the organization to survive disruption: this is more of a presentation and negotiation skill than a technical skill. Case studies of other companies that have been able to change their processes drastically, and quickly implement some process automation to support the changing ways of working, can help to educate others within the organization of the necessity of change. There are also a lot of counter-examples that a practitioner can bring as example of how not to do this: the news is full of cases of companies that are unable to handle increased demand and distribution challenges (remember the “great toilet paper shortage” of 2020?), or can’t properly support customers who have problems with an order or product.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

If we look at past years, skills such as AI and data science are probably less relevant to a BPM practitioner. These skills are becoming more commoditized, and also the capabilities that they represent are being built into systems so that they don’t have to be understood on a deep technical level by a practitioner. The role of a BPM practitioner should be more focused on understanding the end-to-end processes, being able to see where change is required in order to survive disruption, and identify the best places where process automation can improve things.

What is the role of process-related skills in the “new normal”?

Process-related skills are more important than ever in this “new normal”, because it’s business processes that are being disrupted. Having a large portion of employees working remotely means that processes need to change: work may flow differently than before, and may need to be pushed to people and remotely monitored to ensure that it’s getting done on time. Different protocols may be required for regulatory compliance, data privacy and information security. The other large process-related disruption is in supply chains, where an organization may have to use multiple new and different suppliers for manufacturing, distributing and supporting their goods and services. This ties in with the work-from-home changes, since companies that usually supply businesses may have had to pivot to supply individual consumers instead. Over the next year, some of these processes will swing back towards the pre-pandemic baseline, but many will end up somewhere in between, as organizations realize that many employees can be just as productive working from home at least a few days each week.

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Mirko Kloppenburg

Hi, I am Mirko Kloppenburg. I turned 40 at the end of January and live with my wife and our two daughters in Hamburg, Germany.

Half of my life, I have been working for Lufthansa Group in various process management positions. I started as a business information systems trainee, worked as process modeler and project manager for the introduction and operations of Lufthansa Technik’s process-oriented, integrated management system. I ran a number of process standardization projects and did a lot of research on BPM governance – especially process management role concepts – in cooperation with University of Bamberg.

Currently, I am heading the Methods & Tools team for Process Excellence and we are providing process management expertise to the whole Lufthansa Group. Since Easter 2020, when Corona brought the aviation industry to the ground, I have been on short-time work and I am only allowed to work one or two days a week to keep our process management system running with the tasks that are absolutely necessary for operations.

Thus, I am currently using my time to reflect my BPM and New Work experiences. – I was also heading a new work project for Lufthansa Technik in 2019. As a symbiosis of New Work and BPM, I came up with the term New Process. New Process aims to rethink processes. It adds a human-centric mindset to the already proven BPM tools and methods we know from the past.

To put this into action, I created the NewProcessLab.com as a platform to build a community, to perform experiments, and to share experiences. I like to invite you to join the community, to build the future of process management, and to rethink processes together!

WWW: NewProcessLab.com
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Twitter: @MirkoKBurg

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2021?

I strongly believe that it will become more and more important to put people in the focus of process management. This means, for example, to trust, involve and empower people working in and on processes. This can be done by creating processes as a framework that enables people to make independent decisions without the need for approval by the hierarchy. Another example would be to encourage the individual development of the people by providing platforms and trainings. These platforms can also be used to inspire people for excellent processes and give meaning to processes or even BPM itself. A more human-centric process management will also help to foster process diversity and to benefit from different cultures instead of standardization for the sake of standardization.

To make this applicable in reality, I have integrated these New Process principles into a New Process Life Cycle. This consists of seven phases that directly take these principles into account:

As innovation and USP in comparison to other process life cycles, the New Process Life Cycle starts with (1) “Define process purpose” as first phase. – Knowing why a process exists will inspire and motivate the people working in and on the process. It will create guidance for process design and execution, and it will support a sustainable process implementation. Based on the process purpose, a (2) process strategy can be developed and a (3) new process designed to fulfill the strategy as well as to contribute to the process purpose. In subsequent phases, the process design will be (4) modeled and (5) implemented. Afterwards, (6) steering of process execution as well as the (7) improvement of process execution takes place. Within all these phases, the New Process Principles can be applied.

To point out some examples, in the process design phase, people working in the process will be involved into the work on the process and they are asked to design a process that provides freedom for independent decision-making instead of constant approval.

For process implementation, process owners are supported by the New Process Life Cycle to develop measures to train the people and to facilitate know-how exchange instead of simply publishing the updated process.

In addition, I believe that the use of process mining for as-is analysis and steering of process execution will continue to increase. I also observe automation approaches with great interest and consider these to be solutions that should be included as part of the process design phase. – I am following the acquisition of Signavio by SAP and the further development of the market with excitement…

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

I have started to build up the New Process Life Cycle as a reference model on how to manage processes. It will be extended to a comprehensive toolbox for everyone working on business processes as well as offering process management to an organization. You will find the current version on NewProcessLab.com
Beyond the New Process approach, I would like to share my favorite resources with you:
– I regularly listen to the Process Pioneers podcast by Daniel Rayner. In particular, the interview with Michael Rosemann published in January is absolutely worth listening to.
– For those who want to pitch ideas, I recommend the book “Beyond the Obvious” by Ole Tillmann. Ole explains very clearly how to develop inspiring presentations with the help of design thinking and storytelling.
– If you are interested in how to use Purpose in a business context, I recommend taking a look at the work of Julia von Winterfeldt at www.soulworx.de or Benjamin Rolff at www.BenjaminRolff.de.

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

I want to emphasize that New Process is not about throwing all the “old” methods and tools overboard. Quite the opposite. They are still relevant. It is about adding human aspects to these well-developed methods and tools to reach a new level in BPM.

However, what I want to leave behind is the pointless counting of FTEs as well as bullshit bingo on PowerPoint slides.

What is the role of process-related skills in the “new normal”?

I think that organizations with a robust process management system can respond much faster to changing conditions. With regard to the new normal, this capability is more relevant than ever. A sustainably implemented process management system will help to develop process changes quickly and scale them globally in no time. Process documentation will help to bring a consistent process to many locations – especially to the many home offices around the world. Processes can help to structure and facilitate communication and processes can help to bring changing strategies to life.

In contrast to many discussions in which the “New Ways of Working” are described as a time when processes are not needed, I believe it is essential to support these new ways of working with processes.

So, let’s rethink processes together!

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Harald Kühn

Dr. Harald Kühn is a member of the management board of the BOC AG. He is responsible for the product management and the related strategic aspects of BOC’s product portfolio. Dr. Harald Kühn works in the areas of BPM, EA, their integration and the usage of cloud technologies in these domains.
He is an author of over 20 publications about various aspects of BPM.

WWW: boc-group.com
WWW: LI profile
Twitter: @BOC_Group

What are the skills, techniques, behaviors, and attitudes that can help BPM practitioners create value for their organizations in 2021?

1. Design Thinking and its Digitization
Design Thinking methods provide great tools and procedures to capture ideas, improvements and new approaches. As low-code approaches provide means for fast and efficient process implementations, design thinking provides means to approach process change in much more efficient ways. This is backed by a steadily increasing number of simple and collaborative tools. For example, Scene2Model bridges in real-time the world of haptic on-site workshops with fully digitized design sketches (http://innovation-laboratory.org/projects/2.1_Design_Thinking_Software_Scene2Model/).

2. Know and estimate the potential of AI/ML
The pace of including more and more AI-based (= artificial intelligence) and ML-based (= Machine Learning) components into digitalised business processes still accelerates. RPA, Process Mining and Bot-technologies are prominent examples. But there are many more AI-based approaches such as pattern recognition, irregularity detection, predictive alerts, user guidance etc. which a BPM practitioner should be aware of in digital process design.

3. On-the-Fly Computing
Business process design is highly influenced by digitization. Modern, digital process designs use a plethora of internal and external digital services, online services, micro-services, pre-fabricated components, cloud infrastructure, legacy infrastructure etc. DevOps brings already development and deployment tasks together. But only partially addresses the underlying complexity. On-the-Fly Computing provides largely automated configuration and execution services for complex digitized business processes and related IT ecosystems.

What are the best resources to learn those skills? (e.g. books, articles, courses)

Universal Methods of Design (Authors: Bella Martin, Bruce Hanington). Rockport Publishers Inc., 2019. E.g. at Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1631597485/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_M89W7D92J426TW3VN8GQ

Scene2Model – OMiLAB: https://austria.omilab.org/psm/content/scene2model/info

5 Main Approaches to AI Learning: https://www.dummies.com/software/other-software/5-main-approaches-ai-learning/

Google AI: https://ai.google/

A Case for a New IT Ecosystem: On-The-Fly Computing (Authors: Holger Karl et al.). Business & Information Systems Engineering, no. 62, pp. 467-481, Springer, 2020: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12599-019-00627-x

Which skills are no longer relevant or not practically applicable yet (hype)?

Any knowledge and experiences gathered in the past will influence decisions for the future. Therefore, even if specific skills, techniques or technologies are not really relevant any more, they are important to evaluate, decide on and apply new upcoming approaches.

What is the role of process-related skills in the “new normal”?

Everybody has seen in the last year what an insufficiently digitized process means. So, any process-related skills and their digitization contribute as “mosaic pieces” to the “new normal”. One day the social distancing will be over, and the pendulum will swing back to desired direct human interaction intensively combined with digital processes.

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