Business Process Management (BPM)
Start here. BPM is the discipline of understanding, improving, running and monitoring the end-to-end work an organisation does, so that customers get what they need reliably and at reasonable cost. This hub explains the field, maps every note in the cluster and gives a reading path for a business analyst.
What BPM is, and what it is not
| Term | What it is | Note |
|---|---|---|
| BPM | A management discipline covering the whole life of processes: define, measure, improve, govern | [[./bpm-lifecycle |
| Workflow automation | Software that routes tasks and data along a defined flow | bpm-suites-and-workflow-engines, [[../../../KB-AI/ai-automation/index |
| BPMS | A software suite (modelling, engine, forms, monitoring) that supports BPM | bpm-suites-and-workflow-engines |
| Process mining | Analysis of event logs to see how processes really run | [[./process-mining |
| RPA | Software robots operating other applications through their user interface | [[./rpa |
| Hyperautomation | Combining several of the above in one automation programme | [[./hyperautomation-and-intelligent-automation |
BPM is the management layer; the others are techniques or tools that serve it. It is not just drawing diagrams, and it is not automation for its own sake: automating a poor process only makes it fail faster.
Short history
- Early 1900s: Frederick Taylor’s scientific management studies work as a process.
- Mid-20th century: quality movement (Deming, Juran) and the Toyota Production System (taiichi-ohno), later total-quality-management, lean and kaizen.
- 1986: Six Sigma introduced at Motorola (six-sigma-and-dmaic).
- 1990–1993: Business Process Reengineering (michael-hammer, Champy, thomas-davenport); business-process-reengineering.
- 2000s: BPM as a continuing discipline; BPMN 1.0 (2007) and BPMN 2.0.2 (2014) from omg (bpmn-2-dot-0); BPM textbooks (marlon-dumas).
- 2011 onward: process mining matures (van der Aalst; celonis founded 2011).
- 2023 onward: large language models and agents enter process work (ai-and-bpm).
Map of the cluster
Lifecycle and bodies of knowledge — bpm-lifecycle · bpm-cbok · process-architecture-and-governance · bpm-maturity-models
Modelling notations — bpmn-2-dot-0 · dmn-and-cmmn · epc-and-aris · archimate · value-chain-and-value-stream-mapping · process-diagram-types (SIPOC, swimlane, flowchart, UML)
Improvement methods — lean · six-sigma-and-dmaic · kaizen · business-process-reengineering · theory-of-constraints · total-quality-management
Process mining — process-mining · process-mining-tools · celonis
Reference frameworks — process-reference-frameworks (ITIL, APQC PCF, SCOR, eTOM) · apqc · peoplecert
Automation and BPMS — bpm-suites-and-workflow-engines · camunda · flowable · bonita · bizagi · appian · pega · sap-signavio · rpa (uipath) · hyperautomation-and-intelligent-automation · ai-and-bpm
Practice — bpm-modelling-tools · bpm-certifications · bpm-roles · worked-example-order-to-cash-redesign
Organisations and people — omg · abpmp · apqc · peoplecert · celonis · van der Aalst · michael-hammer · thomas-davenport · marlon-dumas · taiichi-ohno
Where to start (business analyst path)
- bpm-lifecycle — the loop you will work inside.
- process-diagram-types — pick the lightest diagram; start with SIPOC and a swimlane.
- bpmn-2-dot-0 — learn the descriptive subset.
- worked-example-order-to-cash-redesign — see the whole cycle on a small case.
- lean and six-sigma-and-dmaic — choose an improvement method; theory-of-constraints for bottlenecks.
- dmn-and-cmmn — move rules out of diagrams.
- process-mining — measure instead of guess.
- bpm-suites-and-workflow-engines, rpa, ai-and-bpm — implementation options.
- bpm-roles, bpm-certifications — career and organisation.
Glossary
| Term | Meaning |
|---|---|
| As-is / to-be | Current process / redesigned process |
| Case | One execution of a process (an order, a claim) |
| Event log | Table of events: case ID, activity, timestamp |
| Gateway | BPMN element that splits or joins the flow |
| KPI | Key performance indicator for a process |
| Lead time / cycle time | Time from request to result / time actually worked |
| Process architecture | Structured map of all processes |
| Process instance | Running copy of a process model |
| Process owner | Person accountable for an end-to-end process |
| Sub-process | A process nested inside another |
| SIPOC | Suppliers-inputs-process-outputs-customers overview |
| Straight-through processing | Cases that finish with no human touch |
| Swimlane | Lane showing who performs a step |
| Value stream | All steps from customer request to delivery |
| WIP | Work in progress |
Related notes elsewhere in the vault
- Software and systems methods: rational-unified-process, job-to-be-done, about-systems-thinking, first-principles
- ERP and business systems: enterprise-resource-planning, sap-company
- Quality: quality-4.0
- Agent orchestration: agent-orchestration-overview
Open items
- Taylor’s 1911 date and a few history points come from general knowledge, not from a cited source here.
- A possible future page on how BOB uses BPMN value chains is deliberately not included.
Sources
- Dumas, La Rosa, Mendling, Reijers, Fundamentals of Business Process Management, 2nd ed., Springer, 2018: https://fundamentals-of-bpm.org/
- OMG standards: https://www.omg.org/spec/BPMN/ , https://www.omg.org/spec/DMN/ , https://www.omg.org/spec/CMMN/
- ABPMP: https://www.abpmp.org/
- van der Aalst, Process Mining: Data Science in Action, Springer, 2016
- Each linked note lists its own sources.