By
way of example Welke cites the transformation of the airline ticket
purchase and check-in experience: “Not that long ago customers booked a
flight with a travel agent, brought a hard ticket to the airport, then
stood in a long line to secure a boarding pass, which was a
labor-intensive and inefficient series of steps.”
Today, of
course, the complete transaction is one of customer selfservice,
conducted electronically. The customer buys the ticket online, selects
his or her seat, prints out a boarding pass, and presents it at the
gate. Below the surface remain a set of large and complex processes
that must be carefully managed, but the customer is no longer exposed
to them. Not only does BPM improve the customer experience, it also
provides management with real-time visibility into what is happening as
well as with the ability to intervene before the customer knows there
is a problem, should one develop.
Whether tracking the
progress of a shipment or inquiring about the status of an insurance
claim, every external customer interface is supported internally by an
underlying, often multistep, process. The advent of BPM has made
improving or changing such steps “relatively simple,” Welke says,
adding that its use helps firms avoid the sort of radical reengineering
that used to trigger “‘big bang’ change management issues.”
BPM
also is a bright spot in a tough job market. Because it is a fairly new
field that has not yet been widely adopted, the demand for business
process analysts and eventually for chief process officers is
considerable and will continue to grow.
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