October 6, 2008

Drive BPM Initiatives To Higher Business Value

by Connie Moore for Information & Knowledge Management Professionals

Making Leaders Successful Every Day

For Information & Knowledge Management Professionals

Includes Forrester research panel data October 6, 2008

Drive BPM Initiatives To Higher Business Value

Move Beyond automation To Business Optimization
by Connie Moore with Ken Vollmer and norman nicolson

ExECuT I V E S u M Ma ry
The business process management (BPM) value proposition goes far beyond simple process automation, but unfortunately, that is where many organizations end their efforts. And while automation certainly provides tremendous efficiency, productivity, and reduced cycle time benefits, automation alone cannot unlock the more significant benefits that advanced BPM deployments offer. Enterprises with greater BPM maturity (often derived from establishing centers of excellence) can take advantage of many more features including integrated process modeling, model-driven development, monitoring, collaboration, and optimization features that leading BPM suite (BPMS) tools provide. To capitalize on the transformational power of BPM, develop and implement a plan that advances your BPM capabilities. Specifically, move from process automation to address (in increasing order of value) IT agility, process compliance and consistency, process insight, and, ultimately, business transformation. Information and knowledge managers who use BPM software should follow Forresters maturity model to help advance their thinking about BPM benefits and deployment goals.

TaBl E O F CO n TE nTS
2 Too Many Organizations Shortchange Themselves On BPMs Potential 4 Move Business Process Initiatives Up The Maturity Ladder 9 Widen The Scope Of What BPM Means To You 10 Projects Are Good, Enterprise BPM Is Better
rECOMMEnDaTIOnS

n OT E S & rE S O u rCE S
Over the past 12 months, Forrester has interviewed 72 companies that have deployed BPM and has surveyed 164 enterprise architects in the uS and uK.

Related Research Documents The BPM COE Is Here: now what? June 20, 2008
How The Convergence Of Business rules, BPM, and BI will Drive Business Optimization May 14, 2008 Case Study: Qwest uses Process Simulation To Move at The Speed Of Business Change april 23, 2008

11 Understand Where You Are Headed Over The Long Haul, From The Beginning
wHaT IT MEanS

11 Start Small But Improve Quickly

2008, Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved. Forrester, Forrester Wave, RoleView, Technographics, TechRadar, and Total Economic Impact are trademarks of Forrester Research, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective companies. Forrester clients may make one attributed copy or slide of each figure contained herein. Additional reproduction is strictly prohibited. For additional reproduction rights and usage information, go to www.forrester.com. Information is based on best available resources. Opinions reflect judgment at the time and are subject to change. To purchase reprints of this document, please email resourcecenter@forrester.com.

Drive BPM Initiatives To Higher Business Value

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TOO MAnY ORGAnIzATIOnS SHORTCHAnGE THEMSELvES On BPMS POTEnTIAL Over the past few years, BPM has gained broad acceptance across companies as a valuable methodology and technology. While vendors and practitioners alike talk volumes about business agility, optimization, and centers of excellence, very few companies have gone as far in the real world. As BPMS technology has increased in popularity, many case studies have extolled the financial and productivity gains their BPMSes have supplied. And while most BPM practitioners know that process automation or workflow is only a small part of what a company using a BPMS can accomplish, significantly fewer companies currently use these technology tools advanced features and this is especially true among smaller companies (see Figure 1).1 Most companies see BPMS tools as a way to automate processes for enhanced productivity and are stuck at that level of BPMS maturity. The lackluster efforts of BPM practitioners dont stop there: Many companies have also failed to set up formal BPM centers of excellence (COEs) (see Figure 2). While a companys first BPM project may not require a COE, a COE is a must if BPM is to gain companywide acceptance and our data shows that the existence of a COE strongly correlates with BPMS success (see Figure 3). But organizational structures in both IT and the business and overzealous, overtechnical, or underexcited staff in any department stand in the way of many of these efforts. While simple BPM projects can certainly deliver departmental value, BPM as a business methodology has much more to offer as do the modern BPMS tools available. BPM practitioners wanting to maximize value from their efforts should make use of their total BPM suite and then expand the scope of BPM efforts in both technical and organizational ways to take advantage of the suites full capabilities. For example, they should look to use features such as simulation and roundtripping, business activity monitoring, business rules, and dashboards, to name a few.

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Figure 1 BPM Functionality usage Varies By Company Size

What type of BPM eorts are under way at the present time? Process monitoring Process automation Process optimization (continuous improvement) Process modeling Process reporting Process redesign 64% 61% 61% 63% 48% 44% 57% 45% 45% *Base: 56 IT architects Base: 84 IT architects Source: October 2007 US And UK Enterprise Architecture And Business Process Management Online Survey
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$1 billion or more in annual revenue* Less than $1 billion in annual revenue

57% 68%

59%

Figure 2 BPM Team Maturity Varies By Company Size

Has a team been created to provide BPM guidance? A BPM center of excellence has been created A BPM center of excellence is planned A team has been created to deal with BPM issues No formal team has been created

29% 19% 30% 30% 36% 40% 5% 11% $1 billion or more annual revenue* Less than $1 billion annual revenue

*Base: 56 IT architects at companies with $1 billion or more annual revenues Base: 84 IT architects at companies with less than $1 billion annual revenues
Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

Source: October 2007 US And UK Enterprise Architecture And Business Process Management Online Survey
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Figure 3 BPM results Versus Expectations

According to these metrics, did the BPM project deliver on your organizations expectations or goals after the initial implementation? Has a team been created to $1 billion or more in annual revenue* provide BPM guidance? Less than $1 billion in annual revenue It exceeded our goals signicantly 67% 14% 19% 0% Base: 21 IT architects 23% 32% 36% A BPM center of excellence has been created A BPM center of excellence is planned A team has been created to deal with BPM issues No formal team has been created

It met our goals It failed to meet our goals but was considered a success because of other delivered benets It signicantly failed to meet our goals 10% 30% 50% 70%

8% Base: 72 IT architects 14% 0% Base: 11 IT architects 0% 18% 14% 71%

9% Base: 7 IT architects

73%

*Base: 46 IT architects Base: 65 IT architects (percentages may not total 100 because of rounding) Source: October 2007 US And UK Enterprise Architecture And Business Process Management Online Survey
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MOvE BUSInESS PROCESS InITIATIvES UP THE MATURITY LADDER Whether your organization can attain higher levels of BPMS value depends on two factors: 1) your organizations maturity in the discipline of BPM and 2) your organizations access to technical support for process disciplines and methodologies through advanced BPM tooling. If your company lacks organizational maturity and uses products with limited BPM functionality, theres a limit to what you can achieve even through continuous improvement methodologies and BPMS implementations. In other words, the most advanced tools are useless to companies that arent mature enough in their practice of BPM, and the most mature companies miss out on value when they buy or use tools only for automation, ignoring process intelligence, process optimization, and even business transformation.

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The Forrester BPMS Maturity Model: From Process Knowledge To Business Optimization Forresters BPMS maturity model is based on raising the value of the realized benefits of a BPMS implementation, both to shareholders and in competitiveness as well as to increasingly higher stakeholders within the organization, culminating with the most senior executives within the organization (see Figure 4). Key phases of the BPMS maturity model and the overall value proposition for BPM suites are:

Process knowledge. Many organizations make their initial move into BPM (the discipline)

or BPMS (the technology) by focusing on process modeling. Often, the modeling tools these organizations select are standalone products that are not linked to an execution environment. A company may have many reasons for choosing a process modeling tool as its first step; for example, a company may want to use modeling for Six Sigma and Lean Six Sigma projects (that sometimes go on forever), as a way of better understanding and communicating about the business, or to capture knowledge from retiring employees. For example, one US Federal agency focused specifically on process modeling because it faced massive employee retirements within two years. But the problem is that in real life, processes change all the time; in fact, our interviews consistently show that processes never stop changing. As a result, it is very difficult, if not impossible, to keep process models up to date without linking them to an execution environment. While standalone process modeling has some value, it can be quite limiting and is fairly low on the BPMS maturity scale and in derived benefits.

Process efficiency. For many years, process efficiency has been the mantra for BPMS vendors

touting the benefits of BPMS; they say, Buy a BPMS and get increased productivity and reduced cycle time and drive efficiency through the roof. But a primary problem information and knowledge management professionals face is becoming overly enamored with the workflow and BPM tooling in content management technologies, particularly transactional content solutions. These practitioners often move from one enterprise content management workflow system to the next, using each subsequent automation to deliver business value. So wheres the problem? While this approach will deliver significant cost savings at first, it usually emphasizes back-office processes that arent differentiating, arent important to top executives, and dont ultimately create as much value to shareholders as do other areas of focus.

The unrelenting emphasis on back-office processes may put too much corporate energy and budget into efficiency and productivity when the company actually needs to focus on innovation, new products, or greater customer satisfaction. For example, Rich Phillips, former COO of Maritz Travel and current President of Maritz Loyalty Marketing, recently observed: Back-office productivity is interesting and sounds like an appropriate goal. But the risk is that an organization might end up improving a process that should be eliminated. It is also possible to reduce organizational agility through such an initiative, ultimately hurting competitiveness. Finally, the diversion of resources from higher-value opportunities further undercuts the value of back-office initiatives by adding opportunity cost.2

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IT agility. About two or three years ago, many enterprise architects and application developers

discovered the link between service-oriented architecture (SOA) and BPM. IT professionals who had been having a difficult time explaining the benefits of SOA to businesspeople realized that BPM was a perfect vehicle for selling SOA projects to the business. More importantly, CIOs and vice presidents of enterprise architecture began to see how much BPM suites benefited not only the business but also the IT organizations internal efforts. Based on our interviews, BPMS tools often cut in half both the time needed to develop new applications and the maintenance backlog. Although IT agility isnt a direct business benefit, its a huge benefit to the IT organization, which ultimately helps the business by freeing up IT resources. Realizing the benefits of BPMS within an IT organization is another notch up the BPM maturity model.

Process consistency and compliance. Some of the most advanced BPM practitioners we talked

with were focused on moving to more consistent processes within the organization. For example, one global financial services company had call centers in 50 locations around the world, and each of those call centers handled customer calls differently. While this wasnt a problem for a specific call center, it meant that the company did not have consistent processes (which could lead to internal or external compliance issues), and the cost of doing business was higher than it would be if all call center processes were standardized. In another example, an insurance company realized it was not as competitive as other insurers because its rates were higher. When line of business (LOB) executives started investigating why, they learned that, though the LOBs had basically the same or very similar processes, each LOB executed them differently. By moving to an organizationwide consistent process, the company was able to lower its rates. However, most companies do not reach this maturity level until they have gone through the process efficiency stage, usually for one or a handful of processes.

Process insight. Advanced BPMS products from vendors including Appian, Global 360,

Lombardi, Pegasystems, and Savvion now offer process monitoring components that allow managers and business analysts/architects to gain insight from historical business intelligence (BI) reports or from dashboards that show process monitoring results as processes execute.3 When bottlenecks occur, business managers can take action for example, they might reroute work to another location, add resources on a temporary basis, or even triage process instances so that the most valued customers are taken care of first. Many organizations implementing BPMS tools for the first time do not take advantage of these capabilities because they are focused on automating a single process. But ultimately, process insight is where all BPMS implementations should end up, and its important when selecting a BPMS tool to make sure that its process insight features will be up to the task when the organization is mature enough to use them.

Business transformation. BPMS deployments coupled with business model agility,

workforce retooling, new ventures, customer/supplier value chain integration . . . business value, and alignment with competitive strategies can ultimately bring the organization to business transformation.4 Only a very tiny percentage of companies have reached this stage

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in the maturity model, but more organizations, such as Ford Motor Company, are moving in this direction. Business transformation at this level is based on many factors, but process optimization is certainly one of them. If your enterprise wants to move beyond mere efficiency and productivity improvements for back-office processes and seeks to optimize (and even transform) the business, look to the convergence of BPMS, business rules, and business intelligence to serve as the foundation of this progress.5 Many barriers still exist to fully realizing this level of the BPMS maturity model, including: 1) most enterprises still embed processes, rules, and reporting in applications; 2) many organizations build monolithic and inflexible analytical environments; 3) organizational barriers divide process, rules, and data professionals; 4) suites are not yet adequate for many organizations; 5) custom integration of best-of-breed products remains possible but is too difficult; 6) metrics that span data and processes dont yet exist; and 7) standards that span the three Bs (BPM, business rules, and BI) are not yet in sight.
Figure 4 The BPM Capability Maturity Model
Lower Higher Transformation Business insight Compliance and Value to consistency shareholders and competitiveness IT agility Eciency Knowledge Process modeling Workers, supervisors, and managers CIO Customers and partners Stakeholders
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BPM adoption maturity

Higher Process optimization

Process monitoring Process execution

SOA

Lower

CFO

CXO

CEO

Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

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Drive BPM Initiatives To Higher Business Value

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How To Get Started On The BPM Journey Information managers who want to maximize BPM value and move up the maturity model should, in order of execution:

Start with modeling or automation. Companies we have surveyed typically start in one of

these two places. Many jump right into automation, getting quick business value from cost savings and increased productivity. Automation tools that replace paper-based processing with electronic processing improve productivity by reducing the time it takes for work to move around the organization and by allowing parallel processing by humans. Other organizations model processes (to levels of detail that range from basic to excruciating). Capturing the information required to store a business process in a graphical model can significantly enhance understanding of the process and its potential problems.

Link modeling and automation. Both modeling and automation are fine starting places,

but wherever you start, quickly expand efforts into the other. Adding modeling to existing automation efforts can bring important process knowledge and identify areas for improvement; adding automation to existing models brings major productivity gains and helps ensure that models stay current because changing the automated process requires a change to the model. This also enhances an organizations ability to use gathered process information in other sections of the process life cycle, such as the monitoring and optimization phases.

Ensure that a solid, agile foundation exists for future process efforts. Most technology

vendors will market service-oriented architecture (SOA) and BPM together, and the combination makes obvious sense.6 But they are not joined at the hip in the way that some vendors suggest. In fact, miring your initial BPM efforts in SOA can kill them with burdensome infrastructure costs and delays while you set up registries, repositories, services, and centers of excellence. But while initial BPM efforts may proceed independent of SOA efforts, as both expand to have enterprisewide impact, they should increasingly coexist and converge. An SOA foundation for process means automated business processes are much easier to change and helps create a business that can more agilely respond to new challenges by creating new processes.

The integration-centric BPMS (IC-BPMS) vendors such as IBM, Oracle, Software AG, and Sun Microsystems already offer core SOA capabilities with their BPM products. In contrast, most human-centric BPMS (HC-BPMS) products do not provide SOA components but instead integrate with many products that do, including IC-BPMS products or enterprise service buses (ESBs). Alternatively, some HC-BPMS vendors partner with SOA vendors; for example, Lombardi Software has a relationship with Progress Software, and W4 partners with Magic Software.

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Establish rigorous metrics and begin actively monitoring and managing the process.

Depending on the environment for example, a call center this may be an intrinsic part of automation, but in many processes, monitoring is saved for later. But dont put it off indefinitely, as BPM practitioners will have a tough time optimizing a process with no metrics and no data about its performance. Plus, its essential to establish key performance indicators (KPIs), thresholds, notifications, and alarms to provide management with greater insight into the business as the process executes. In a rush to get started, some organizations try to begin their BPM efforts with monitoring, but usually that approach is not the way to go. To maximize the effect of the business process, you need to understand how the process works, which requires modeling at the outset. Once you establish the model, you can use BPM tools to create and monitor the appropriate KPIs. Be leery of recommendations to monitor the as is process up front, as there are normally too many unknowns to make this a practical exercise, meaning that this effort ends up just diverting resources from more effective starting efforts. An exception to this recommendation is if the process is very chaotic or unknown: In this case, monitoring may be a backdoor way to get to a process model.

Use simulation features to manage change and predict process results. Some people familiar

with BPM suites may be surprised to see simulation this far down the list. However, our interviews with practitioners have consistently shown that simulation is not especially useful at the modeling stage. Conversely, it can be an extremely powerful tool for optimizing processes once rich data about the process is available for use as a baseline input to the simulator.

Move from process improvement to true process and business optimization. This will

mean pulling data into the process from external business intelligence and business activity monitoring (BAM) tools to optimize the process at runtime. It also includes incorporating advanced business rules technology into process decisions to properly manage the process and using reports and simulation tools after the fact to make structural process changes.

WIDEn THE SCOPE OF WHAT BPM MEAnS TO YOU Until now, BPMS vendors and their users have focused on structured processes, whether the actors in those processes are mostly people or mostly systems. But many real-world, peopleintensive processes are so rife with exceptions that its impossible to model all the permutations in a traditional process modeling tool. These ad hoc, chaotic processes are difficult to support even using todays BPMS tools.7 As an example, consider a sales process where senior account managers handle the large accounts and make very individualized discounting and packaging decisions. The outcome of a discounting decision may be captured in the BPMS by integrating or embedding a business rules engine, but the way the decision was made the reason for the discount is often recorded in an obscure email thread, if at all.

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Auditable, controllable tools for supporting this kind of work are already available in content management systems and enterprise collaboration suites. But enterprise content management (ECM) vendors havent caught up with the best of the pure plays for BPM functionality, and collaboration tools typically lack any kind of awareness of the users role, the process he or she is working on, and what information is needed (unless these factors are manually configured, as in a project-specific site on SharePoint). To support these real-life human processes, BPM suites need:

Integrated group collaboration tools. Threaded discussions, document libraries, and even

emails mustnt stand alone; they must be created and audited as needed along with each process instance.

Presence awareness and strong organizational management. While the flexibility of ad hoc

processes is a benefit in that it helps work get done the right way, often the appropriate actors arent available when needed. BPM suites should be able to find the right person for the job (or at least present a list of possibilities), taking employees presence into account when doing so.

Business intelligence and enterprise search integration for runtime. Workers need different

kinds of information at each point in the process; the smart work environment will use contextual awareness and search tools to discover and present useful information. Each step in a process will be like a miniature Information Workplace that automatically makes available information such as reports, documentation, and eLearning objects when users need it.8

PROJECTS ARE GOOD, EnTERPRISE BPM IS BETTER Many companies get into BPM because a particular project calls for it a merger means two disparate enterprise application systems must be combined, or customer service problems require an overhaul of externally facing processes. Theres nothing wrong with starting down the BPM road with a single project in mind, and its not necessary to get bogged down in centers of excellence and service-oriented architectures with that first project. Even so, project leaders should look to the future when assigning staff and choosing technology for the first project. Its critically important to make sure that the BPMS provider you select has the functionality, the product road map, and the vision (plus customer references) to carry you through whatever level of the maturity model your organization aspires to reach. Also, as the previously discussed data shows, an established center of excellence is closely linked with BPM project success no matter what the level of BPMS maturity. It doesnt make sense to hold up initial BPM efforts until a center of excellence can be established after all, it will be hard to get a mandate for such an investment without proven successes.9 However, the staffers on the first BPM project are likely to be future COE members, so choose them carefully.10 And, as having a COE is widely acclaimed as a critical success factor for continued success in BPM and BPMS, plan to implement one as soon as you can.

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r E C O M M E n D aT I O n S

UnDERSTAnD WHERE YOU ARE HEADED OvER THE LOnG HAUL, FROM THE BEGInnInG Advanced BPMS technology is essentially useless at organizations that arent ready for it. Process and knowledge management professionals should:

Stick to the tools that are useful. a lot of BPM suite components are nifty, but companies
that arent ready shouldnt bother with them. For example, without well-defined business metrics for a process, simulation tools are mostly a waste of time.

Plan for the future when buying. while organizations may not be ready for more advanced
process tools, Forresters research has shown that tightly integrated BPM suites are much more powerful. Features such as data-driven simulation and optimization are very difficult to use when disparate products perform the modeling, execution, and data-gathering activities. Standards are slow to emerge, so be sure that your BPM suite vendor supports your end state for process maturity.

Avoid modeling without linking models to an execution environment. while modeling

can certainly provide process knowledge insights, models quickly become outdated because processes constantly change (even when the organization doesnt realize they are changing). whenever possible, make sure that your process models can be imported into an execution environment to keep them in sync with the real world as it changes.

Plan for a center of excellence. The evidence is clear; theres a close correlation between clear,
measurable, identifiable benefits from BPMS and the creation of a COE. Most organizations now realize this; the challenge is how to build and staff a COE. Most COEs do not need to be big in fact, usually, staffing it with four to six members is sufficient. The usual composition is one or more enterprise architects, an application developer, a business analyst, and a process architect. The COE should also directly link to the BPM governance committee.
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START SMALL BUT IMPROvE QUICKLY

BPM practitioners usually get drawn into the area by an immediate need a process that needs fixing or a system that needs integrating. But anyone who stops at using BPM methods and technologies for improving productivity is doing the organization a disservice. It is in some ways unusual that BPM vendors have consistently been so far out in front of their customers. For years, they have sold the benefits of process simulation tools, advanced monitoring software, and inflight process changes to prospects they know will never use them. But as companies move from simple process improvement to real business optimization and as BPM reaches mainstream status in the market, businesses will need to start using more advanced BPM features to gain an edge over the competition.

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EnDnOTES
1

In October 2007, Forrester interviewed 164 IT architects in the US and the UK. See the February 19, 2008, The EA View: BPM Has Become Mainstream report. Rich Phillips also noted that companies need to understand that first, to win big, its all about business transformation, not software implementation. Substantial value can be delivered by inflecting competitive strategy, cultural behavior, leadership performance, and product differentiation. Also, go wide first, before going deep. Mapping the businesss value chain (wide) followed by waves of mapping business subprocesses (deep) prepares the organization for systemic change and highlights key leverage points for maximizing BPM impact. See the August 21, 2007, The New IT Imperative: Design For People, Build For Change report. For a deep dive into BPM products in different market segments, interested readers should look into the many Forrester Waves evaluations on BPM suites. See the August 2, 2007, The Forrester Wave: HumanCentric BPM For Java Platforms, Q3 2007 report, see the December 19, 2007, The Forrester Wave: Human-Centric BPM for Microsoft Platforms, Q4 2007 report, see the July 9, 2007, The Forrester Wave: Business Process Management For Document Processes, Q3 2007 report, and see the December 20, 2006, The Forrester Wave: Integration-Centric Business Process Management Suites, Q4 2006 report. Rich Phillips shared lessons learned from the BPM initiatives at Maritz Travel. See the August 21, 2007, The New IT Imperative: Design For People, Build For Change report. With change endemic, business flexibility paramount, and the lines between strategic, tactical, and operational decision-making blurring, information and knowledge management (I&KM) pros must find new application architectures for a new generation of requirements. Business process management, business intelligence, and business rules engine (BRE) software offer the architectural foundations to meet the challenge of continual business optimization, but too many I&KM pros approach these technologies largely in isolation. In fact, these three Bs have significantly greater business impact when used together than when used separately. If your enterprise wants to move beyond mere efficiency and productivity improvements for back-office processes and seeks instead to optimize (and even transform) the business, look to the convergence of the three Bs to serve as the foundation. See the May 14, 2008, How The Convergence Of Business Rules, BPM, And BI Will Drive Business Optimization report. Organizations are increasingly relying on business process management suite products to support their process improvement efforts, and this is driving an annual growth rate of 20% and up in this market. BPMS and service-oriented architecture implementations frequently occur together, and this is no fluke, as these two technologies complement each other very well, resulting in a more powerful solution than either could provide on its own. In particular, advances in key standards such as business process management notation (BPMN), business process execution language (BPEL), and XML Process Definition Language (XPDL) are making it possible for BPMS products to support a model-driven approach to process improvements that can be significantly more agile than earlier methods. At the same time, improvements in SOA-based repository technology are facilitating the storage of important business metadata in a common location, where it is easier to share, reuse, and modify without affecting business applications. These advances

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enable IT organizations to respond more quickly to new requirements while providing business units with more visibility and control over their key business processes. See the March 10, 2006, Business Process Management Suites And SOA report.
7

While most BPM vendors have been working to add collaboration and content management tools to processes, one startup vendor has gone the other way, adding process tools to Web 2.0-style collaboration capabilities. See the April 11, 2008, Vendor Snapshot: Itensil Brings Process To Web 2.0 Collaboration report. When Forrester first described the Information Workplace in 2005, we positioned it as the next-generation platform that delivered collaboration, content, portals, and office productivity plus a plethora of new capabilities bursting on the scene, such as unified communications and expertise location. But the Information Workplace (IW) has never been about the piece parts. Instead, what makes the Information Workplace transformational is how the piece parts are built into a seamless whole that supports people in the way they want to work. Specifically, we described the IW as role-based, contextual, seamless, visual, and multimodal. Now enterprise Web 2.0 is rapidly advancing, bringing even greater design for people concepts into the IW. For example, through the power of social networking and mashups, which allow people to have it their way, the IW can go beyond role based to even become individualized. With enterprise Web 2.0, the IW also gains two new facets: social and quick. With all these characteristics, the IW will better support a design for people world and allow people to work in a much more natural way. See the November 26, 2007, The Seven Tenets Of The Information Workplace report. Forrester receives many inquiries from I&KM professionals within enterprises implementing BPM COEs. Many questions concern COE goals, key roles, and organizational structure. Other questions relate to specific work tasks, tools, and standards required for an effective BPM COE. These I&KM pros also want to know what business processes they should focus on for transformation. Forrester has synthesized the top five questions and provided answers based on industry best practices. See the June 20, 2008, The BPM COE Is Here: Now What? report. Businesses across all industries are looking to BPM to help them gain new efficiencies, create a more consistent customer experience, and provide better data insights. Yet many firms have multiple implementations of the same type of BPM tools, or their siloed departments dont leverage work done in other divisions when improving processes. Forrester spoke with a variety of large firms adopting an emerging trend: developing COEs for BPM. We uncovered best practices in five areas: 1) executive sponsorship; 2) process methodology and governance; 3) staffing skill sets; 4) vendor alignment; and 5) KPIs. See the March 26, 2008, Best Practices: Centers Of Excellence For BPM report.

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