At the start of 2017 small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) account for 99.9% of all UK businesses, contribute 51% of all private sector turnover and makeup 60% of all private sector employment in the UK. As such a vital part of the UK economy, it is important that they achieve their goals to grow and…
Whereas standard business process management concentrates on automating and improving pre-existing work activities, goal-oriented BPM takes a wider, more holistic perspective. It’s a philosophy that puts business goals at the centre, with processes being seen as a means to an end, rather than the main focus. A goal-oriented approach seeks to present a comprehensive, overall…
The success of any business hinges on making the right decisions at the right time. Judgements on products and services, working methods, hiring and corporate policy can determine whether a company thrives or fails, especially when the impact of these choices aggregates over time. Decisions can be made a by a centralised team of managers,…
Organisations often find themselves using disparate and contradictory methods to remind employees of upcoming obligations. While paper notes, diaries and calendars have increasingly given way to more sophisticated software equivalents, limitations remain. Most major email providers such as Gmail and Outlook incorporate a calendar function, and a plethora of reminder apps have entered the commercial…
The term “Intelligent BPM” raises an obvious question; what makes it “intelligent” in contrast to traditional BPM? The terminology may seem vague, but an attempt can be made to pin down a more exact definition. Companies are increasingly looking to optimise their business process management by combining analytic tools, real-time data collection and mobile UX…
Growing your business is one thing, but maintaining that growth over time is another matter. Identifying what led to your success in the first place and building on that, without running into cash-flow problems is a real challenge. In economic terms, a sustainable growth rate (SGR) is is the maximum growth rate in sales a…
Amazon’s new grocery store, Amazon Go, recently to the public in Seattle, the United States after five years in development and 14 months of testing by Amazon employees. Amazon Go isn’t just an ordinary grocery store, what sets it apart is that it doesn’t have any cashiers or checkout lines. Instead, Amazon automatically bills customers…
Most modern organisations have set processes in place to approve actions in areas such as project management, expenses, annual leave, pricing, and hiring. These decisions need to be assigned to either a person or group with the expertise and authority necessary to carry them out. Unfortunately, this process is often hampered by a lack of…
Manually checking through a system for problems, or information such as which tasks are closest to a deadline can be time-consuming and prone to error. Actions like running reports, executing database queries and using a search function are a partial solution, but not ideal. There is a better alternative which reduces both the time taken…
Businesses often depend on information provided by a third-party to enhance or authenticate their products and reports. The other party usually being an expert in that field, supplying the data at a cost. This information will need to be integrated into a workflow with end products, whether manually, using technology, or a combination of both….