Implementation of Process Offices in organizations

One of the most common approaches to manage organization's operational activities along with project-based approach (Project Portfolio Management) is a process-based approach to management (Business Process Management).

A process-based approach to management implies the continuous management cycle in the organization (Fig. 1).

Figure 1. Business process management (BPM) lifecycle

The implementation of the management cycle requires companies to perform the following actions:

• to determine main, providing, management processes and create a top-level process map;
• to assign responsibilities and authorities to the company’s management and employees for process management and improvement;
• to monitor the company's processes and analysis of the received data regularly;
• to implement corrective and preventive actions to eliminate identified deviations and inconsistencies, implement measures to improve (optimize) key processes of the organization;
• to involve the management and employees of the organization with direct participation in process management activities.

The implementation of the business process management cycle in the company requires the creation of a competence centre – a Business Process Management Office, that performs the following tasks:

• to implement and develop a business process management methodology through creation and management of corporate standards and procedures;
• to create and develop business process management tools and technologies in the field of business architecture development (business process modeling), business process analysis and control (business process mining), their improvement and implementation of improvements;
• to create a process repository, manage the relevance of a knowledge base on key aspects of the organization's activities, ensure the effective use of this information in the organization's activities;
• to ensure the involvement of the company's management and employees in the key business processes management and improvement, increase the competence of staff in the process management field;
• to conduct an objective control of the effectiveness and efficiency of the company's processes, assess a level of maturity of business process management, conduct internal benchmarking and certification of the company's processes;
• to coordinate activities to improve (optimize) the company's processes, including process regulation, automation, and implementation of business analysis systems.

To implement a Process Office in the organization, our consultants recommend to perform the following set of works:

• conducting strategic seminars/workshops in the company as part of the creation of the Process Office, defining the goals of its creation and development, possible areas of activity, KPIs, and elaborating a development plan for the Process Office;
• development of the Process Office Regulation, defining its place in the corporate management system, functions, organizational and role structure, structure of interaction with business units (services provided by Process Office);
• deployment of a tool infrastructure for modeling the organization's activities;
• development of a methodology for describing the organization's activities and managing the lifecycle of models;
• development (updating) of corporate standards regulating the stages of the process management cycle and key functional areas of the Process Office;
• training of Process Office employees and other company's staff in the business process management field.

Performing all mentioned works will allow your organization to create all the normative, methodological, instrumental and resource conditions for the successful functioning of the Process Office in the company.

If your company has an operating Process Office, an independent audit can be conducted – an analysis of the process architecture of your company, an assessment of the competencies of the employees of the Process Office, an audit of the execution of work plans to optimize business processes, an analysis of regulatory documentation on business process management, etc.

Implementation of Process Offices in organizations has the following benefits according to our evaluations:

• the direct financial benefit from the Process Office is estimated to be 5-8% of the cost of each optimization, automation, digitalization process project. The Process Office allows companies to accelerate the implementation of business process automation projects significantly by 1.5-2 times by speeding up information gathering and analysis, preparation of business requirements.
• if the company has an effective change management system in business processes, supported by the Process Office, there is an increase in employee engagement in changes by 2-3 times, as the number of initiatives submitted by employees for improvements in business processes enhances.
• ROI (Return on Investment) for optimization, automation, and digitalization projects is 5 times higher in companies with Process Office than in companies without it.

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