I presented this Thursday at the ABPMP Denver meeting on the topic of how to build support for BPM initiatives. My message was primarily that to get traction and support for these initiatives, internal and external services organizations need to create a compelling value story. "Stories" are how these initiatives communicate how they will solve …
The Value of Process Improvement
I will be presenting at the November ABPMP event in Denver this Thursday from 4:00p to 6:00p. The topic is Using Business Cases and ROI to Justify BPM. The content is based on my work with a BPM software vendor's sales team where we built an approach and model for them to deliver customized Business …
Growing Centers of Excellence
Continuing a series of posts addressing some of the lessons and take aways from recent experience in establishing Centers of Excellence. I believe different enterprises are at different levels of sophistication in their use of centers of excellence (CoEs) and view them at different levels of strategic importance. Organizational Maturity Models are a good approximation …
What is a Center of Excellence
Continuing a series of posts addressing some of the lessons and take aways from recent experience in establishing Centers of Excellence. I've never really liked the term. Sounds so haughty. I prefer 'Competency or Capability Center' or pick any another term you like. But, 'Center of Excellence' seems to be what has stuck in the …
Why Create Centers of Excellence
I've been focused on setting up centers of excellence recently. I will be sharing a series of posts addressing some of the lessons and take aways from that experience in a few upcoming Centers of Excellence posts. The first question many customers ask is why would I want a center of excellence? The best answer …
Value Driven Sales
I'm in Dallas today co-presenting at the global sales conference for a large BPM software provider. The topic, using return on investment to drive strategic sales, was well received by the audience. The CEO and VP of Marketing in the company were familiar with the case study I presented from previous work together. The CEO …
Testing for Agility
I endorse a post by Dean Leffingewell on evaluating enterprise agility. In it he explains three key test areas: Variable Scope. Fixed Quality Incremental Value Delivery Empowerment and Accountability I am going to get picky here, so read the rest at your own discretion... Perhaps, I'd rearrange the sub bullets under different main headings. For …
Agile Development is so Old Fashioned
The functioning principles of Agile (and process improvement more broadly) can be found in lean manufacturing and six sigma. These concepts date back to just after World War II and include error proofing, eliminating waste, creating flow, adding customer value, and empowering workers. If you are interested in deeper understanding I suggest reading the above links and: …
Agile Development on Wikipedia
The great thing about Wikipedia is that you can make it say anything you want (at least for awhile.) So, I did it. Their definition of Agile Development now matches mine. As I've commented before, given the reach of this page, the content on it was disappointing. I gave the page a pretty good scrub. …
Development Kanban
David Anderson thoughts on Kanban from Agile 2007 summarizes his approach in 4 bullet points for success: Focus on Quality (fourth law of development) Reduce or Limit Work in Progress (what's wrong with pushing) Balance Demand against Throughput (first law of development) Prioritize I think these simple statements help focus on how the principles of …
Horizon Line Group 