BPM Analytics
Unveiling transformation through the dimension of process mining
Imagine you are at the helm of a bustling factory. It's your job to ensure that every cog in the machinery is turning smoothly, and any inefficiencies are swiftly identified and rectified. With rapid process digitisation and continuous innovation in Automation and Artificial Intelligence (AI) solutions, this task poses a monumental challenge. Today’s modern organisations are run by humans and intelligent machines. While human information can be harnessed through traditional methods, machine information is only available in the form of data. This has made the business environment more dynamic than ever before, leading to increased complexity in decision-making and process transformation. Another outcome is a significant gap between the process understanding by people in an organisation and the parallel process created by a digital twin, through data generated by machines.
The future will see a further widening of this gap. Process mining, which follows the digital twin while mapping it to the human-desired process flow, is an essential tool to plug this gap. Let us delve into the transformational realm, exploring how the process-people-technology mix is reshaping our understanding of business processes and creating a new dimension of people-process-technology-data.
The data deluge
A key challenge to effectively managing transformation programs is the overwhelming volume of data generated daily by modern businesses. Process mining thrives in this data-rich environment, offering organisations a lifeline to navigate through the data deluge.
Through real-time data analysis and historical data mining, it creates a dynamic process digital twin. This dynamic digital twin not only represents the current state of your operations but also evolves with time. It adapts to changing circumstances and, in doing so, creates a new dimension of people-process-technology-data. No transformation program can be impactful unless it considers both – humans driving a process and its digital twin.
The quest for efficiency and effectiveness in business processes
In the not-so-distant past, improving business processes often involved time-consuming manual efforts, countless spreadsheets, and substantial guesswork. While this approach has worked in the past, businesses desperately need a more data-driven approach now to uncover hidden bottlenecks and optimise their operations owing to the data deluge conundrum. This is where process mining has entered the scene as a beacon of hope, leveraging large data sets from various sources to provide a visual representation of transaction flows in processes, offering a magnifying glass into operations' intricacies and augmenting transformation initiatives by driving synchronised efforts between domain-led, automation and AI solutions This portrayal is extremely critical for companies to reevaluate their systems to ensure superior cost control and cash flow movement, deliver best-in-class services, and sustain themselves against competition in a highly volatile market.
Process mining's analytics facet delves deep into organisational data, uncovering patterns, assessing performance metrics, and predicting future trends. Beyond surface-level visualisation, it conducts root cause analysis, aids in compliance management, and integrates data from various sources. This comprehensive analysis facilitates continuous improvement, allowing organisations to optimise workflows, resources, and processes iteratively.
The transformation approach has evolved into a process-people-technology-data mix
The key elements making or breaking the success of transformation indisputably have been process, people, and technology. Now, data is no longer just a component of the process, but is a separate added element altogether. A thorough analysis of these key factors is an essential performance indicator for any organisation, allowing them to focus on the salient priority areas. Let us see how Process mining influences all these elements.
- Process: At the heart of process mining lies the understanding of your business processes. By analysing event logs and transactional data, process mining tools can generate process maps that show how tasks are executed, where bottlenecks occur, and how long each step takes. It is the equivalent of creating a digital twin of your operations.
- People: The human element in process management is irreplaceable. Process mining recognises this by not only highlighting the processes but also shedding light on how employees interact with these processes. It helps identify process variations and deviations caused by human decisions and actions, enabling organisations to train, support, and optimise their workforce better.
- Technology: The backbone of process mining is its technological prowess. Advanced algorithms and Machine Learning (ML) techniques allow it to handle large volumes of continuously evolving data. This data can come from myriad sources – ERP systems, CRM software, IoT devices, and more. Process mining seamlessly integrates and analyses this data, providing actionable insights.
- Data: Enabling people-process-technology is no longer possible without understanding the underlying data and its flow across processes, systems, and impact on people. The data deluge discussed earlier takes the form of structured data flowing through systems as well as unstructured data found in documents, images, videos, etc. While core process mining capability uses AI and ML algorithms to understand this information, process mining is further evolving and integrating with Generative AI technology to effectively handle unstructured data, combining it with structured data, and enhancing the outcome for business functions. The synergy between process mining and these advancements enhances analytical capabilities and enables the prediction of issues and the creation of optimisation strategies. This tandem not only ensures streamlined processes but also propels organisations into a future where the intricate dance of people, processes, technology, and data is orchestrated with unparalleled efficiency.
A new dimension
Business processes can be considered as a living entity – responsive, evolving, and interconnected. Process mining, with its analytical capabilities, identifies process bottlenecks, predicts future issues, and suggests optimisation strategies. Automation and AI technology are then employed to streamline and enhance these processes further. For instance, consider an e-commerce company using process mining to monitor its order fulfilment process. By analysing data, it identifies delays in the shipping department. Automation is then implemented to route orders more efficiently, reducing delivery times. AI technologies such as Generative AI are used to combine industry insights with process understanding to enhance the capability to make strategic decisions and augment the outcome of automation. This isn't just about optimising processes; it's about transforming them into agile, adaptive entities.
In the grand scheme of things, the increased incorporation of the latest technological innovations in process mining has given us a remarkable perspective on business operations. It's like having a crystal ball for process improvement, enabling organisations to embrace change, enhance productivity, and thrive in an ever-evolving marketplace. Just as at the beginning of our journey, where we imagined overseeing a bustling factory, process mining has allowed us to not only oversee but also reshape these factories of our digital age. It's a realm where process, people, technology, and data coalesce into a harmonious symphony of efficiency. As we look ahead, it's evident that this transformative power will only continue to grow, reshaping the way we do business and the way we understand the evolving ecosystem of people, processes, technology, and data.
