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Blog: Craig SchiffJanuary 2, 2007Reasons to be Fearful, Part IAs we start the new year I'd love to be optimistic and believe that people have learned from their past mistakes. Unfortunately I keep finding examples that prove just the opposite to be true. As an example here is an IT chat room post, unedited except for the removal of the name of the guilty party: December 1, 2006Questions I Get Asked A lot - #2 BPM vs. BPMContinuing to address frequent user questions that come up at conferences let's look at BPM vs. BPM, Business Performance Management vs. Business Process Management. These two initiatives do in fact have more than their acronyms in common. When executed properly each one can improve the bottom line. How they accomplish it though is very different. Process Management is focused on optimizing individual business processes at a fairly detailed level. Improving the flow of loan paperwork and the review and approval process in a bank would be an example of this. A more efficient process should reduce costs and also potentially allow for more revenue opportunities. Performance Management focuses on higher level strategic goals. Increasing the profit margin or revenue growth rate or market share might be part of an initiative of this type. In fact, improving the efficiency of various business processes (Process Management) might be necessary to accomplish some of the strategic profitability goals of the company (Performance Management). It would seem then that the two BPMs are in fact complementary initiatives. However, don't jump to the conclusion that you should work on them together as part of one overarching 'BPM' project. It's too much for anyone to bite off. Each project has it's own set of detailed and unique requirements. The vendors that provide these solutions are different for each BPM so you have two different vendor evaluation processes to go through. Sample Performance vendors: Hyperion, Cognos, OutlookSoft. Sample Process vendors: Metastorm, Appian, Savvion. Lastly, the skill sets and domain expertise required of the team members and/or consultants also differs based on which BPM you are focused on. Our suggestion is to do the two BPMs sequentially, focusing first on where you have the greatest pain. November 1, 2006Questions I Get Asked A lot - #1 BPM vs. BII just returned from the annual BPM Summit held in beautiful Greenwich, CT where I once again heard the same three questions I always get asked. So, I thought I'd answer them here and maybe not have to answer them at the next conference I speak at (I know, not likely). Question #1: How does BPM differ from BI? BPM, Business Performance Management, is actually the application of BI (business intelligence) to address a strategic business need. BPM is a collection of BI tools, domain expertise, and specialized applications to help a company, plan, monitor, and hopefully improve its performance. Whether a BPM vendor sells and manufactures BI tools or not, they are always part of the BPM solution, maybe just bundled in and hidden. BPM makes extensive use of relational databases, multi-dimensional databases (OLAP), datamarts, unstructured data repositories, extract transform and load tools, report and query capabilities, portals, and dashboards. A Performance Dashboard is a BI dashboard tool populated with a collection of key performance indicators, sometimes called a scorecard (Balanced or not). The current momentum and interest in BPM is helping drive the accelerating adoption of BI across the enterprise and explains why every BI vendor wants to be part of BPM either through mergers or partnerships. May 31, 2006Build vs. BuyAll of the data I get from our clients, our annual BPM Pulse survey, and conversations with BPM vendors seems to indicate a continuing demand for pre-built applications in the BPM space. There is a sizeable group that likes to see the application vendor also provide a set of BI tools to customize and expand that application's capabilities. The data shows a shrinking minority looking to reinvent the wheel and build BPM solutions themselves. However, I just read this article by a former Gartner analyst that basically says all of my data is wrong. In the enterprise application space (where BPM falls) he claims that the pendulum is swinging back from 'buy' to 'build'. I don't 'buy' it (pardon the bad pun). What are you seeing? March 22, 2006How NOT to Select a Performance SolutionEver been to an IT chat room or forum? They are great places to get solid answers to pressing technical challenges. Leveraging the combined experience of all participants in the room or on the distribution list is probably one of the best ways to get a quick, authoritative answer to a detailed syntax or command question that the vendor failed to adequately document. However, I have recently seen these forums used for a purpose that I don't believe they are well-suited for: BI and/or business performance management vendor selection. The typical query runs something like this: 'we are a large, complex bank and we are looking at Microstrategy or Cognos to analyze our data, which would you recommend?' Just in case the problems with this approach aren't already obvious to you, let me spell them out. Continue reading "How NOT to Select a Performance Solution" » November 28, 2005The Simplicity of DashboardsWhen talking to IT executives about their performance dashboard initiatives, I am often surprised by their perception of the task ahead of them. More often than not they seem to think they have their measures and key indicators under control, and just need to look at one or two technology options to find the right vehicle for displaying those measures. Compare this to the typical finance manager looking for a budgeting solution. They first want to spend a good amount of time up front developing and/or refining their requirements and then move on to look at 4 to 6 vendors. I believe both of these BPM initiatives are very similar in challenge and complexity, yet they are being executed differently. Continue reading "The Simplicity of Dashboards" » August 25, 2005The Fight with FinanceI just don't get it. There is a fairly consistent theme in our talks with BPM prospects: the business users driving the project (usually in Finance) are in a battle with IT. Corporate America, 2005, and IT and Finance are fighting. Over what? A lengthy list: who's in charge, what's really needed, and most importantly - what solution to purchase. I must be missing something. When I was in IT it was pretty clear to me that my job was to meet the needs of the end user. Now I have Finance organizations in major companies telling me their IT group won't let them get what they really want. |
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