As a solution to the sourcing dilemma, business process management requires enterprises and their supply chains to define, streamline, reconfigure and re-integrate all processes that support the enterprise’s mission. In a public company, no business process can escape the scrutiny of senior managers, auditors and process managers.
Business process management starts with the definition of what processes comprise an integrated subprocess. To a large degree, the definition of constituent subprocesses resembles the creation of a software algorithm or the definition of an inventor’s claims in a patent application.
Indeed, under U.S. law, an entire business could, by appropriate technological and legal means, become a patentable process, protected from competition by its uniqueness. While complexity and openness prevent such an outcome, business process patenting and business process management software (defining the process, enabling changes in the process and process controls “on the fly”) enable new-found flexibility across organizations and their supply chain. BPM software also creates a new word in which software can now integrate legal requirements as part of a protected, non-alterable process (except by the process administrator in response to changes in the law), so that the flexibility is not abused and legal compliance duties are automatically performed by the software.
Business process transformation results from advancements in BPM. After transformation, business intelligence (“BI”), business activity measurement (“BAM”) and service level management (“SLM”) become possible. Such process management tools empower decisionmakers to focus on their competitive business activities and, selectively, outsource what does not reach the organization’s target financial hurdle rates for investment and operation. Thus, BPM is all about the bottom line and shareholder value.