BPM business management process

As I mentioned in a previous post, the abbreviation BPM stands for Business Process Management. So I guess my title is a little confusing, if you expand it, it says Business Process Management Business Management Process. Confused now? This topic is something that I am interested in, I do not know everyone about it, but I have been gathering lots of information and resources on the topic, as well as involved from the IT point of view from the business that I am in. Lets start with a little history on the subject.

History of Business Process Management ( BPM )

Business Process Management is basically a management style or approach that promotes business effectiveness and efficiency. But it was not always like this. In the early 1900's as management styles, theories and ideas started to flow and be developed among different industries, they were basic management ideas. By the mid 1900's, people started to find that leadership and management were directly related and motivation of workers helped a company thrive. That further developed into organizational development, were not only were the people, but the entire organization was viewed. Different management styles evolved over time, from performance based, and other management styles, none really took on the role of integrating all aspects of the company or enterprise. My about 2000, the Business Process Management evolved from early work flow solutions several years earlier. People discovered that not only can you map and show the flow of work, but also every other business process. The BPM focus became enveloping of all aspects, such as human interaction, system interaction, process flow , input, output and then tying them all together. This was a revolutionary concept and very few people understood it. Now, many years later we are seeing a huge increase , almost explosive increase in business and companies looking for and using these theories and tools to help improve their business.

Early modeling was based mostly on the business, or enterprise alone, known as enterprise modeling... Guess what, it did not go far, it was only a piece of the puzzle. These models were nice on paper, but did not work in practice. One of the big reasons is that it was a static model that took far too long to develop and by the time they were "ready to implement" , the entire business or enterprise had changed. The enterprise models were built and architected to integrate system and improve cross-function processes across the business, however, all the data was static and did not evolve as the business did. In the end, it never does work, something has to give and process tend to be re-written to follow the business as it grows and changes. This is where the business process management tools come into play and where you will need to develop or find your business process solution.

Today, we have business process management, not enterprise modeling. Not to be confused with business process modeling. Although that term is still applicable in today's market, it is not what I am discussing here. Business process modeling is basically a process that is used to review, improve and implement more efficient process of an existing business. This is used as part of the process management suite. The term business process management is more a system and all-covering system. This system is the management of the processes, people, tools, services and more. The management system needs to be able to adapt to the on-going changes to a business or market. The processes themselves will change or be replaced as part of this evolution, but it is still the management system that keeps it all together. This management of change is really what you doing. So , from an early view of management as being just the people, we now are into a reality where everyone and everything is managed together as part of a system. A change in one part of the system can affect the rest and that is there the need for a business management system comes in.