Over the years, Business Process Management (BPM) has undergone significant developments since its initial introduction. There are success stories galore where organisations have demonstrated improved efficiency, productivity, profitability, cost savings, customer service, and all the good things we want to achieve in the business.
That said, only some are able to achieve the benefits with BPM they had set out to achieve. So, what do successful organisations do differently? One thing most organisations have learnt the hard way is that mere installation of software and instructing employees to use it does not guarantee success. Dedicated focus and efforts are required to sustain these BPM initiatives. This is where a Centre of Excellence (CoE) plays a key role.
Industry research shows the importance of CoE in ensuring BPM success as it found that from the companies that failed with BPM, a mere 4% have a CoE.
The Role of CoE in BPM Success
A BPM Center of Excellence takes control of organisation-wide initiatives by ensuring a consistent and centralised roll-out of BPM initiatives. Often, CoE is viewed as an additional expenditure. However, when established correctly, it helps businesses maximise BPM ROI.
The core responsibilities of a CoE include:
- Establishing BPM methodologies and best practices
- Providing reusable tools and templates
- Ensuring consistency of BPM projects with defined standards and rules
- Providing expertise in the use of the selected tools
- Monitoring and tracking the performance of all BPM Projects
- Maintaining skills for BPM initiatives
- Delivering BPM Training and Education
6 steps to Establishing a BPM Center of Excellence
- Set the CoE’s scope and success criteria:
Like with any other project, establishing its clear scope and objective is the first step towards setting up a CoE. Define the desired outcomes and the metrics that will be used to measure success. It’s crucial to identify realistic short-term and long-term goals and objectives to be achieved with the CoE. Also, ensure these goals align with the overall organisational goals. - Gather a team with the right skills and expertise
Depending on the size and complexity of the organisation, a team with a broad range of skills and expertise must be put together. Broadly, it should include key stakeholders from across different disciplines, including IT, finance, operations, etc. Key roles to be added in the CoE include a process analyst, change manager, project manager and process modeller. The CoE team should also have strong leadership and communication skills to effectively engage with the stakeholders. - Establish standards and guidelines
A key responsibility of the CoE team is to establish common standards and guidelines for process design, implementation, and monitoring. This will ensure consistency in process improvement, making it easier for all stakeholders to get involved and contribute. The CoE team must also choose the right-fit toolset by analysing the tool functionalities and capabilities and evaluating them with their organisational requirements. Furthermore, the CoE team needs to define best practices and pitfalls to be avoided. - Define a process improvement methodology
A robust process improvement methodology is essential for a sustainable process improvement initiative. The methodology should include a process for mapping current processes, analysing processes, identifying improvement opportunities, designing and implementing new processes, and monitoring and continuously improving processes over time. - Prioritise Processes
It’s important for the CoE to understand which processes align with strategic objectives and will yield the highest return on improvement. Prioritising improving these processes will deliver the most significant rewards in the shortest possible time and build a strong case for future improvement projects. High-frequency, high-customer-touch, and highly manual processes with multiple handover points are a perfect candidate to showcase BPM success results and get everyone in the organisation along on the improvement journey. - Establish a Culture of Continuous Improvement
BPM is not a destination; it is a journey. Hence, establishing a culture of continuous improvement is the key to success for a BPM CoE. This involves promoting a mindset of continuous learning and improvement across the organisation, encouraging collaboration and knowledge sharing, and recognising and rewarding individuals and teams for their contributions to process improvement initiatives. The CoE should also establish a process for capturing and sharing best practices and lessons learned across the organisation.
Maximising BPM Success
A critical responsibility of CoE is to choose the appropriate toolset that meets the organisational requirements. Selecting a tool with in-built quality management principles and methodology helps organisations ensure the consistency of their BPM projects.
PRIME BPM is one such software with an inbuilt methodology combining the power of disciplines—Lean, Six Sigma and BPM. It helps you quickly and easily map, analyse, improve and monitor your business processes.
PRIME BPM allows stakeholders to collaborate and suggest improvement directly against the processes, driving sustainable and combined process improvement efforts. The software also has features, such as BPMN 2.0 for standardised documentation, process prioritisation within a click, and automated analytics on process time, cost, value and efficiency.
PRIME BPM has helped many leading organisations on their process improvement journey. Check out some success stories.
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