There’s a dark underbelly to process management that no one wants to talk about, but it’s time to speak out:
There are bad process management systems out there. Not just bad – these are some really nasty characters who will destroy your carefully built business from the inside out.
We have to keep this between you and me, though, because I’m not supposed to be saying any of it. Process management is a dangerous world, folks. You don’t even know. It seems all efficient and useful, increasing productivity and reducing errors – great stuff all around – but when was the last time you checked in on your innovation?
Been a while, right? Now you’re starting to put it together.
Come here, quick. I’ll run through what I know:
- Process management: What it was meant to be
- The secret truths of process management systems
- BPM adoption: Fighting the good fight
- Rosemann’s 5 stages of process management adoption
- The Process Street process management playbook
This never happened, okay?
Process management: What it was meant to be
In the beginning, process management was just as wide-eyed and optimistic as any new system on its first implementation. In partnership with workflow management, the two were tasked with balancing efficiency, monitoring performance, and coordinating different systems. In fact, they work so well together, that it can be difficult to tell them apart.
The core difference is that:
- Workflow management is about getting multiple people to perform individual tasks the right way at the right time
- Process management is focused on improving an organization’s processes to be more efficient
Process management also works outside the hierarchical organization model, involving multiple departments, as well as internal and external stakeholders, to implement whatever changes are needed.
And this is where process management gets led astray.
Process management, with too narrow a focus, can actually prevent redesigned processes from functioning correctly.
Can you believe it? Process management is the saboteur. That betrayal is deep.
According to David Garvin (former Harvard Business School professor), by focusing too much on improving processes, you run the risk of neglecting the ongoing management of existing processes.
For example, if an organization prioritizes improving its work processes but overlooks its administrative processes, that opens the floodgates for errors, inconsistencies, and potentially disastrous (and expensive) consequences.
For a process-centric organization, this could easily be the point of no return.
