A closed loop approach leads to better-informed decisions and enables Intelligent Business Operations

1. BPM the way we see it
Aligning Business Process
Management and Business
Intelligence to Achieve Business
Process Excellence
A closed loop approach leads to better-informed
decisions and enables Intelligent Business
Operations
Today’s economic climate means performance management, where
businesses need to be as effective metrics are compared with business
and efficient as possible, and objectives and the results fed back
to make the smartest possible to improve processes and decisions.
decisions. The way to achieve Client experience confirms that
this is by integrating Business BI and BPM are far more powerful
Intelligence (BI) and Business when integrated together than
BPM Trends Series Process Management (BPM) – a individually.
This paper is one of a series, Capgemini combination that is a prerequisite
BPM Trends, which shares insights into of Intelligent Business Operations.
how to resolve today’s most pressing BPM on its own is not enough
business challenges using the latest because you can’t see the dynamic
Business Process Management tools and context of processes. By adding
methodologies. BI you can achieve closed loop

2. Gaining competitive advantage get is just a giveaway that comes
through better processes and with your product, shortages can
decisions undermine your whole proposition.
Given the economic and institutional „„By definition, agility can necessitate
crises in our globalized economy, some inefficiencies. You need more
the way to compete is to run your than minimal stock levels to keep
business with maximum efficiency a manufacturing conveyor belt
and effectiveness, and to make the running; similarly, economic growth
smartest possible decisions. arguably requires some level of
frictional unemployment.
To do so, you need what has been „„A call center representative may
called “the integrated business
be confronted with a demanding
processes and capabilities that
customer, and be forced to decide
together serve customers in ways that
whether to prioritize overall
are differentiated from competitors
efficiency or service to this one
and that create the organization’s
customer. Does the agent mark
formula for business success”1.
the customer as a lead, get off
the phone, and move on to the
Capgemini believes that can best be
next customer, or continue the
achieved through the alignment of
conversation with this customer
Business Process Management (BPM)
and let others wait? An optimized
and Business Intelligence (BI). This
process won’t help the agent decide,
combination is often referred to as
unless the process also provides
Operational Intelligence, and is an
information about the individual
essential component of Gartner’s
customer’s value to the business.
concept of Intelligent Business
Drill-out Operations (IBO)2. All these cases show the importance
of looking at processes in their
Drill-down is usually based on just The limits of BPM wider context, and seeing how the
one dimension, or on something like BPM on its own will deliver changing dynamics of this context
a KPI tree. For example, you can efficiency, agility and customer affect customer experience or business
drill down through sales by region, value.
intimacy. But is it the right kind
by margin, by salesperson. Drill-out
is something completely new, and is
of efficiency? Does the balance
between efficiency and agility Combining BPM and BI
based on a different representation of
the business, such as a process model, meet business needs? Is the level The dynamics of the context can be
resource model, or value chain. With of intimacy appropriate for every understood by complementing BPM
it, you can jump from one dimension customer? with the analytic mechanisms of BI.
to a completely different one. Equally, to harvest the full potential
Let’s look at some examples: value of BI you need a business model
Let’s say sales of a low-margin „„A customer delivery process can and a business process perspective.
standardized product are lower be very efficient (for example, Only by using BPM and BI together
in one region than in another. following a Lean program) – in fact, do you get access to sophisticated
Drilling down might not tell you the capabilities like the one Capgemini
it may not contain any idle time
reason, but drilling out could. For
at all. But efficiency is not always calls “drill-out” (see panel).
example, exploring the sales figures
in conjunction with the business matched with effectiveness. For
model might reveal that processes example, it may be that because However, simply integrating BPM,
are different in the lower-performing of marketing campaigns in some BI and some business applications
region: perhaps greater customization regions, there are configuration into a customer initiative will
of products is lengthening delivery problems and stock breakdowns. not yield the desired competitive
times because of the switchover time Even if the item that you can’t advantage. What is required is
needed to make the standard product.
1 Thomas H. Davenport, Jeanne G. Harris, Competing on Analytics, (Harvard Business School
Press, 2007), p. 187
2 Gartner Says Intelligent Business Operations Is the Next Step for BPM Programs, press release,
March 7, 2012. http://www.gartner.com/it/page.jsp?id=1943514
2

3. BPM the way we see it
structured interoperability across the e-mails, or experience to determine
organization’s entire BPM, BI and the best decision in the current
application environments. context. In situations with a wide and
This interoperability must be changing variety of options, this lack
business-driven, which means that the of support for decision-making leads
initiative needs to start from a broader to disastrous inconsistency.
context than the processes themselves:
that of the business architecture, Adding BI analytics into the process
business model, and value chain. improves and accelerates decisions,
enabling better outcomes (Figure 1).
The alignment of BPM and BI can be
seen from two main perspectives: Business rules are often used to
„„Injecting BI into business processes inject BI into BPM and hence provide
to improve decision-making – i.e. decision support. This is a valid
taking an inside-out view of the of approach that makes processes more
the decision flexible, offers additional analytic
„„Closed loop performance capabilities, and hides much of the
management – i.e. taking an complexity that is typical of BI.
outside-in view of the decision
Defining the rules is a complex
We will discuss each of these process that involves balancing
perspectives separately, but it should conflicting priorities in different parts
be understood that they are two ways of an organization. Rules engines
of looking at the same issue: that of can help by providing scalability,
linking the process information and traceability, and accuracy.
process results available through BPM
with the decision support capabilities However, rules engines alone are
of BI. not enough. They cannot cope with
the typical scenario of proliferating
Injecting BI into business processes business models, products, services,
to improve decision-making channels, customer segments, and
Many business processes require users value expectations from different
to make a decision, such as approval stakeholders. Nor do they provide the
of a purchase request. Often, the vital ability to understand changing
decision has not been modeled as environments and respond to that
part of the process, leaving the user understanding.
to rely on spreadsheets, phone calls,
Figure 1. Analytics that feed into business processes – contact vendor activity
lytics
Ana
Policies and procedures (control) Request for quotation (output)
Analytics
Contacting a
vendor
Approved purchase request (input) Applications
Resources
Source: Capgemini
3

4. For example, by implementing Other examples where BI can usefully
rules, you could make an airport’s be injected into BPM include:
operations efficient from a perspective „„choosing the best shipping vendors
of ground and air traffic control. But for a shipping firm
your rules probably wouldn’t take „„ defining skill requirements to
into account the most valuable aspect perform a task
of the operations from an airport
perspective – that is, the shopping
„„ allocating field service teams to
area. (Heathrow Terminal 5 has been interventions
described as “a huge shopping mall „„ employee appraisal
with a parking lot for airplanes”.) „„ approving website content
„„ choosing which marketing
Add BI, and you could get more
campaigns to fund
accurate intelligence on where the
plane is, and on how long it will take
to refuel, complete maintenance etc. Closed loop performance
That way, passengers can be given management
more time to shop before being asked Most BPM initiatives capture metrics
to go to the departure gate. Then to assess the efficiency of a process.
there should be more revenue for A few initiatives have shown,
retail outlets and less frustration for though, that more can be done
customers, since they no longer have by setting process metrics in the
to wait idly by the gate for the aircraft broader context of a value chain or
to become available. a business model. It then becomes
possible to understand the impact
By combining BI with the rule- of a given process on the overall
based approach associated with performance of the business: either
BPM, you can monitor the on its overall strategic objectives or
decision-making process from an a specific business campaign. That
analytical perspective. Errors in understanding can lead to better
business rules will be detected decision-making at an organizational
sooner, and rules can be changed level (Figure 2).
as necessary, either automatically
or manually. The results of performance monitoring
become even more valuable if they
Figure 2. Analytics about business processes – procurement process
ytics
Anal
Policies and procedures (control) Approved invoice (output)
Produktie TV
Ter plaatse
opgenomen
Type?
Uitzendklaar
item TV
Team ter plaatse
Vervoer en Vervoer en
opstellen inpakken
materiaal materiaal
Analytics
Journalist
Visioneren
Montageteam
Selectie maken Doorstralen
Opnameteam
Opname maken
Grafische afwerking
In-en uitleiding
Purchase request (input) Applications
Resources
Source: Capgemini
4

5. BPM the way we see it
are used to adjust business processes Conclusion dimensions. As a result, management
and objectives. This closed loop Today, many organizations are and staff can make better and more
performance management often implementing Business Process timely decisions and the organization
involves human intervention to Management and Business Intelligence becomes more efficient and effective.
improve the way decisions are made initiatives as separate programs. They This is a crucial step for any
– for example, the call center agent are flooded with indicators – mostly enterprise with its sights set on
might be instructed to look at a process performance indicators and Intelligent Business Operations.
metric of the customer’s value to the key performance indicators – but
company before deciding how long performance monitoring is carried
to spend on the call. The feedback out at too local a level, in too isolated
and insights gained may also lead a way, and with too much focus
the business to automate business on lagging indicators. Usually it is
processes and event handling further. hard to see how the various factors
measured contribute to different
From a technology point of aspects of business value.
view, closed loop performance
management solutions require at least Combining BPM and BI to achieve
a combination of BPM and BI, and closed loop performance management
sometimes Complex Event Processing makes it possible to relate all these
technology as well. indicators to one another. It then
becomes possible to analyze cause-
and-effect relationships over different
Client case study: bank adds BI to a BPM-powered solution
Management issue supported by a new Business Process There was a wide gap between the
„„
The COO of a large international Competency Centre (BPCC), was documented process models and
bank’s retail arm set up a business launched to improve operational what teams actually did
campaign to define guaranteed business processes.
service levels for customer Capgemini’s solution
categories showing a low Net This initiative resulted in leaner In four months, we helped the
Promoter Score (i.e. the customers operations and well-documented bank to introduce BI analytics
were less likely than average to processes, but essential elements were based on a business model and a
promote the bank to relatives and still missing. For example: value management methodology.
friends). The service guarantee „„The impact of the change on Our approach made it possible
stated that if the bank failed to business results or business value to explore process performance
handle customer transactions was not clear information along with intelligence
within specified time limits, 0.05% „„There was a lack of information on customers, channels, operational
would be added to the customer’s to support senior management
savings accounts. decisions, and the impact of those
decisions on operational execution
BI about business operations was hard to establish Now I really have a
was essential to keep service „„There was not enough information
grip on what is going
level breaches to a minimum, about current processes for the
on in my organization;
particularly as the bank wanted to COO to know whether a proposed
launch multiple campaigns of this action, such as this campaign, was this will be the ‘Single
type. viable in a particular region Point of Truth’ for the
„„Performance at each level of the whole bank.
Initial approach management hierarchy (COO, value COO of retail bank
A good deal of relevant chain owner, process owner, team
transactional and process owner) was measured, but it was
information was already available, not possible to see how one level
and a large BPM project, impacted another
5

6. teams, and financial objectives work together to achieve corporate Next steps
and risks. We also introduced a objectives The bank now intends to apply
feature called “action management”, „„A range of information to support the same Operational Intelligence
which provides flexible tracking of business campaigns is now available approach to other value chains
performance improvements across a – it is easy to assess whether they (savings, mortgages, payments,
range of initiatives. are viable, and then measure their and cards), other business units
impact (corporate banking, private banking)
Results „„Through appropriate use of and banking operations in other
„„All management levels, from COO performance feedback, the bank has countries. There will also be
to operational team leaders, now closed the loop between initiating continuous improvement of the area
have performance information actions, monitoring performance described below.
about processes, customers, and taking new actions
finance and capabilities to support „„The bank regards this project as
their decisions the first time it has achieved true
„„The impact of performance at one Operational Intelligence
level on another level can be seen,
and there is a daily “performance
dialogue” between all hierarchical
levels. This makes it possible to
Figure 3. Process manager cockpit
Source: Capgemini, based on cooperation with VisionWaves®, ©2012 VisionWaves B.V. All rights reserved
6

7. BPM the way we see it
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This article has been written jointly by Marc Kerremans and Nicholas Kitson.
Marc Kerremans works as an independent market analyst and management
consultant in different industries covering areas such as Business Process
Management (BPM), Performance Management, Organizational Transformation
and Strategic Orientation. Follow Marc on Twitter.
Nicholas Kitson is Head of BPM of Capgemini’s Financial Services Global
Business Unit. He helps organizations to achieve competitive advantage and
best-in-class performance through process improvements, including innovative
technology for BPM and business rules. Discuss BPM with Nicholas via Expert
Connect.
Find out more about our approach to Business Process
Management and about the BPM Trends Series
visit:
www.capgemini.com/bpm
www.capgemini.com/bpm-trends
or email:
BPM@capgemini.com
Copyright© 2012. All rights reserved by Capgemini.

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