Following up on my post last week on what goes into the making of a BPM project, let’s talk a little more about Proof of Concepts (POCs). To truly gain traction from Discovery to Automation and to zero in on the right BPM software, a POC showing your vendor’s competency on a number of issues is essential. It’s simple really – Don’t Invest till you Test!
When it comes to evaluating a POC,
there are the usual suspects
- - Time to delivery
from start to finish
- - Sustainability
(does the vendor have the bandwidth and skill to support optimization over a
long time period)
- - Human reaction to
change
- - Ability of the
product to react to change
But apart from these the most critical
test of concept is the scope of the
POC. A scope bound POC which is a sub set of the actual BPM project offers enormous
clarity to the process owner. More
importantly, as a BPM customer you should be cognizant of your exact BPM
requirement before evaluating vendors ... the idea is to map the software to
your needs rather than spend time and money on a POC to reinforce its inherent
strengths.
A BPM customer should drive the
outcome of a POC and test for compatibility with existing IT environments among
other things. Introduce scenarios that test vendor agility and response to
process change – indication of a strong services team means that you gain from
the vendor’s BPM project experience when it comes to building a new application
around the product. For a BPM vendor of
course, a well defined POC directly translates to cost efficiencies and in
depth understanding of the client’s requirement.
Invest more technical resources in rolling out a POC and you have yourself a sustainable BPM customer who views you more as a BPM partner and less as a software vendor.
Invest more technical resources in rolling out a POC and you have yourself a sustainable BPM customer who views you more as a BPM partner and less as a software vendor.
Very True.
ReplyDeletePOCs let organizations see what needs to be done, what is realistic, and the intricacies involved. When evaluating more than one solution, this helps limit the choices and provides greater insights into the differentiations between solution offerings.
POCs help provide the greatest window into which solution will best meet the needs of the organization.
Here is some food for thought : http://adamdeane.wordpress.com/2011/06/03/bpm-proof-of-concept/