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With modern-day businesses constantly looking for ways to cut costs while improving customer service, Business Process Management (BPM) is becoming more important than ever. BPM allows decision-makers to identify areas for improvement to be competitive and gain agility and achieve their business goals.
While every organisation benefits from BPM, its success depends on choosing the appropriate BPM software. However, selecting the right BPM software is not easy. With so many self-proclaimed ‘best’ Business Process Management software in the market, it might be quite challenging for organisations to cut through the marketing hype and shorten the evaluation period for fast and wise decision-making.
In this blog, we discuss how you can identify the right-fit BPM software for your organisation.
1. There is no one-size-fits-all BPM software
Firstly, just like with any software platform, no BPM software is perfect for every organisation. Selecting the right software is a business-critical decision that needs a careful analysis of your organisation’s requirements and software capabilities.
For instance, an organisation with a primary focus on compliance will require different capabilities than one focusing on customer service improvement.
Thus, your first step towards selecting the right-fit BPM software is identifying your organisation’s business goals.
2. Understand your organisation’s business goals
Before getting to the point of selecting the BPM software, you need to ask the question, ‘Why are you doing BPM? What is the purpose?’. Answer these questions:
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- Which processes are your primary focus?
- Which areas of the processes require improvement?
- What alterations could enhance those specific aspects of the processes?
- What are the desired outcomes of those processes?
Once you have a clear answer to these questions, you can understand which aspect of BPM software would be beneficial to zero in on the software.
3. Factors to consider for selecting BPM Software
Different organisations have different BPM needs, but below are some basic factors to consider for selecting the right-fit software:
a. Low-code, no-code environment: An ideal BPM suite must simplify the task of process management to a level, where anybody associated with a process can find it easy to execute and accomplish. There should be no requirement for any special expertise as long as the person is aware of the details of the process itself. A low-code BPM tool is thus critical as it brings business users and process experts together and helps them work collaboratively. This also ensures that your business improvement journey aligns with your corporate goals.
Look for an intuitive tool with drag-and-drop functionalities and built-in templates to enable even business users to participate in process mapping and improvement projects.
b. In-built methodology: BPM software with inbuilt methodology guides you to drive process improvement from start to finish. From process design to analysis to improvement and collaboration, with built-in methodology, you easily navigate from one state to another. Choose a BPM tool that combines the power of best practice disciplines, such as Six Sigma, Lean and Value Stream Mapping.
c. In-built analytics engine: Business Process Analysis is at the centre of driving your improvement initiative as it gives insights into potential improvement opportunities and guides your team to direct their time and efforts in the right direction. Without business process analysis, you will be shooting in the dark and wasting time addressing the wrong problems. Hence, BPM software with a built-in analytics engine proves valuable in accessing actionable insights, such as process time, value, cost, efficiency and performance. A tool that gives these insights with a click will help you improve the outcome.
d. Feature-rich and Usable: A combination of an easy-to-use and feature-rich tool will empower you to scale up the results with your process improvement. Some features to consider are:
- Process Prioritisation: Identifying priority processes that promise the highest ROI upon improvement.
- Simulation: Ability to run what-if scenarios for ‘to-be’ processes to select the best possible iteration.
- Process Performance Monitoring: Real-time process tracking with pre-set KPIs, integration of KPIs with actual data and notifications upon failure to meet KPIs.
- Impact Analysis: The ability to understand who or what will be impacted by the process change, from people, activities or business documents.
e. Scalability: The BPM software should be able to scale with your organisation’s growth. Look for a tool that can easily accommodate new users, workflows and processes as your organisation expands. A cloud-based platform makes a viable option as it not only provides flexibility and scalability but is also easier on the budget. Look for software with strong security and access control features.
f. Customer Support: Without a strong support team, even the best software is no good. Prompt customer support ensures that your questions and concerns during your improvement journey are readily answered. Check if the support team has BPM experts who are well-versed in the methodology and techniques. An expert with experience in vast BPM implementations across industries can be of great help to navigate all the curveballs along your improvement journey.
g. Training: Even with the most user-friendly BPM software, tool training is essential to get the entire team up to speed. A software provider focusing on training pays off in the long run for sustainable process improvement. On-demand training sessions with anytime, anywhere access especially prove effective in gaining a holistic view of the software.
4. Gather Customer Reviews and Pricing Details
After evaluating BPM needs and identifying must-have software functionalities, gathering customer reviews and testimonials is crucial before you seal the deal. Customer success stories give a fair idea about the software’s usability and support team.
Another key deciding factor is pricing. You can ensure a low-cost BPM investment with a simple and flexible licensing structure based on monthly/quarterly/yearly subscriptions. You should also look for attributes that can be tailored to the needs of the company. These include payment for required modules only, minimal initial investment, zero software maintenance, no additional costs involved, and so on.
PRIME BPM Advantage
PRIME BPM is a powerful cloud-based, low-code, no-code Business Process Management software that empowers businesses to map, analyse, improve and monitor their business processes from a single platform.
Many leading organisations have been using the best-in-class functionalities of PRIME BPM software, including Pfizer, Queensland Police, New South Wales Health, Queensland Treasury, Department of Agriculture and Fisheries, University of New South Wales, MYOB, Tabcorp, Blue Mountains City Council and more.
Check out some success stories.
Interested in trying out the full capabilities of PRIME BPM software at zero cost? Get a Free License to PRIME BPM Premium.
