Today I read a fantastic interview with Irene Greif on The Psychology of Collaboration. I highly recommend that you read this article and draw from it your own conclusions, but I am particularly drawn to the following statement:
For the past few years, I've been helping teams implement Managed Business Processes using the Lombardi BPM suite that was acquired by IBM last year (Fortunately, IBM acquired me too). My primary job has been to enable the new owners of our BPM suite to take full advantage of their purchase - and to do that I coach small teams through the implementation of their first managed business process.
When IBM announced that it would acquire Lombardi in late 2009, Lombardi's suite was described as a Departmental BPM Suite. Some folks were upset about that, but it didn't bother me at all. I've found that the best way for a company to benefit from BPM is to start small, achieve an "early win", and then build on that success. Starting with a "Departmental BPM Suite" sounds like a great idea to me.
The great thing about working with a team on a departmental BPM solution is the spirit of ownership. The folks on the implementation team are almost all very passionate about the process we're working on. They live and breathe with the process, so they are tremendously motivated to get the solution built and to get the solution deployed - very quickly.
These experiences with "Departmental BPM" are what make Irene's recollections of Notes' Databases resonate so strongly with me. The ability for a small team to develop and deploy a focussed solution is a very powerful thing... and immensely valuable for the business. It's a fantastic "group experience".
But just like Notes' Databases, there comes a time when the ability for "anyone" to develop and deploy a managed business process begins to raise "red flags" for those who have to manage the enterprise as a whole. As BPM spreads through the enterprise, the natural tendency to want to control that spread takes hold.
I've experienced this first hand... Early successes with BPM, run as small agile projects, attract the attention of enterprise level architects and program managers, who react with horror at the anarchy and call a halt until control can be re-imposed.
I am not at all suggesting that the concerns of the enterprise-level folks are invalid - In fact they're quite valid - it's just sad that these legitimate efforts to regain control sometimes end up stifling adoption. The result is often the same as Irene describes with Notes - the true power of BPM and Notes is never realized due to the inability of those systems to be resilient in the face of the controls that management must place on the software.
Anarchy is not a good thing... but empowering the masses to build their own solutions is a great thing. That's where I think Irene is really on to something when she says she's seeking out software that is "resilient against controls"... I don't for a moment think she's suggesting that controls are bad. I think she's saying that we have to figure out how to write software that preserves the user's freedoms in the face of the controls that management has to impose.
Very difficult challenge... but the people are worth it: Power to the People - to Program!
"I think it is not about the technology per se, but more about finding technologies that are resilient against controls [by management]. When I first came to Lotus, I was excited [that] anybody could create a Notes database on a server and set up access control in a very intuitive way. Anyone, not a database administrator, could create a place to meet. Slowly, over time, [IT managers demanded more control]. You would have to submit a request to create a database; you would have to submit a request to change access control. As a result, a lot of places [that use Notes] don't have the "group experience" in Notes, and they just use it for e-mail."Software that had been intended for the masses was slowly subverted by the managers... to the point where what had been organically adopted became institutionally worthless. I'd be stunned, but unfortunately the story is all too familiar.
For the past few years, I've been helping teams implement Managed Business Processes using the Lombardi BPM suite that was acquired by IBM last year (Fortunately, IBM acquired me too). My primary job has been to enable the new owners of our BPM suite to take full advantage of their purchase - and to do that I coach small teams through the implementation of their first managed business process.
When IBM announced that it would acquire Lombardi in late 2009, Lombardi's suite was described as a Departmental BPM Suite. Some folks were upset about that, but it didn't bother me at all. I've found that the best way for a company to benefit from BPM is to start small, achieve an "early win", and then build on that success. Starting with a "Departmental BPM Suite" sounds like a great idea to me.
The great thing about working with a team on a departmental BPM solution is the spirit of ownership. The folks on the implementation team are almost all very passionate about the process we're working on. They live and breathe with the process, so they are tremendously motivated to get the solution built and to get the solution deployed - very quickly.
These experiences with "Departmental BPM" are what make Irene's recollections of Notes' Databases resonate so strongly with me. The ability for a small team to develop and deploy a focussed solution is a very powerful thing... and immensely valuable for the business. It's a fantastic "group experience".
But just like Notes' Databases, there comes a time when the ability for "anyone" to develop and deploy a managed business process begins to raise "red flags" for those who have to manage the enterprise as a whole. As BPM spreads through the enterprise, the natural tendency to want to control that spread takes hold.
I've experienced this first hand... Early successes with BPM, run as small agile projects, attract the attention of enterprise level architects and program managers, who react with horror at the anarchy and call a halt until control can be re-imposed.
I am not at all suggesting that the concerns of the enterprise-level folks are invalid - In fact they're quite valid - it's just sad that these legitimate efforts to regain control sometimes end up stifling adoption. The result is often the same as Irene describes with Notes - the true power of BPM and Notes is never realized due to the inability of those systems to be resilient in the face of the controls that management must place on the software.
Anarchy is not a good thing... but empowering the masses to build their own solutions is a great thing. That's where I think Irene is really on to something when she says she's seeking out software that is "resilient against controls"... I don't for a moment think she's suggesting that controls are bad. I think she's saying that we have to figure out how to write software that preserves the user's freedoms in the face of the controls that management has to impose.
Very difficult challenge... but the people are worth it: Power to the People - to Program!
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