.
- New book receives extensive praise for its pragmatic, fast-paced introduction to Business Process Management
- Written by three Software AG executives, book argues that BPM is both a management discipline and technology strategy
- Complementary copies of BPM Basics For Dummies available at www.SoftwareAG.com/...
CeBIT 2008 - Software AG, a global leader in business infrastructure software, in conjunction with Wiley Publishing, today announced the publication of BPM Basics For Dummies®: Software AG Special Edition. Written by three Software AG executives, the book offers a pragmatic and fast-paced introduction to Business Process Management (BPM), which they define as "a process-centric approach for improving performance that combines information technologies with process methodologies." The book is designed to provide both business and IT stakeholders with a common understanding of BPM s significant potential as a means for enabling more fruitful collaboration and better alignment between business objectives and IT resources. Complementary copies of BPM Basics For Dummies are available at www.SoftwareAG.com/....
Early praise for BPM Basics For Dummies includes:
"Every business manager needs to know about BPM. BPM Basics For Dummies manages to explain BPM, a complex topic which is hard to explain in a concise manner, in a language that a business manager can understand, in just 72 pages! If you want a quick overview of what BPM can do for your business, this is the place to start!" - Paul Harmon, Executive Editor, www.BPTrends.com.
"The well respected authors of this book have managed to cover the vast territory of the multidimensional and otherwise complex topic of BPM in a very concise package. If you are looking to quickly discover how all of the pieces fit together - from BPM concepts to technologies to enterprise strategy to daily operations - then this effort is on target. If you wish to gain a comprehensive understanding of how BPM may apply to you, then this text is required reading." - Roger T. Burlton, founder of the Process Renewal Group and author of the widely-read book Business Process Management: Profiting from Process.
"BPM Basics For Dummies surveys the current landscape of BPM at a level that should be understandable to most business managers; filling a void between the hyperbole of pundit pitches and the technical minutiae of implementation, while using a consistent voice and vocabulary. Much needed and long overdue, this is recommended reading whenever you need to bring prospective process owners and end users up to speed on the why's and what's of a BPMbacked process initiative." - Richard J. Welke, Director of the Center for Process Innovation and Professor of Computer Information Systems at Georgia State University s J. Mack Robinson College of Business.
"The field of business process management is so broad and deep that it really helps to have a top level view and a roadmap to navigate the key concepts. This book provides that. It's brief and to the point, but not trivial, and points to further resources to chart your process future." - Peter Fingar, author of Business Process Management (BPM): The Third Wave and Extreme Competition: Innovation And the Great 21st Century Business Reformation.
BPM Basics For Dummies: At-a-Glance BPM Basics For Dummies was written by Kiran Garimella, Michael Lees and Bruce Williams of Software AG. Dr. Garimella is currently the company s vice president for BPM Solutions and previously served as a CIO and enterprise architect with several GE companies. He is also the author of The Power of Process: Unlocking the Source of Competitive Advantage, a business novel on BPM. Lees is the company s Director of BPM Product Marketing. He was previously the founder and CEO of Cerebra, Inc., an innovative developer of market-leading semantic metadata technologies. Williams is a senior vice president and General Manager of Software AG s BPM Solutions Group. He is also the co-author of Six Sigma For Dummies, The Six Sigma Workbook For Dummies, and Lean For Dummies, all from Wiley.
"Forward-looking companies recognize the need to continually improve their processes and more clearly differentiate their businesses. While this has been a top-line focus for the past twenty years or more, the increasing pace of global competition is driving the need to make these efforts more sustainable, scalable and adaptive," said Williams. "As a framework encompassing both management best practices and enabling technologies, BPM empowers the business with greater levels of control and visibility into operations than ever before possible. It is distinguished by its closed loop approach - measure, model and improve - which can be adapted to nearly all management disciplines and enterprise-specific scenarios. In doing so, it provides the direct linkage between strategy and execution that is sorely missing in many organizations today."
According to the authors, improved process performance, enhanced operational visibility and transparency, and greater business agility are the three key benefits that BPM delivers. In terms of performance, the efficiency and effectiveness of business processes can be improved by automation, better coordination of process workers and enhanced command & control capabilities, and through the optimization enabled by process simulation and testing, performance monitoring and real-time remediation. By offering a single design environment supporting a model-driven approach, BPM technology facilitates a "what you model is what you run (WYMIWYR)" approach to defining and implementing new processes, with BPM s monitoring capabilities enabling real-time, end-to-end process visibility and analysis against key metrics.Finally, BPM improves the agility of the entire business through better collaboration, improved reuse and faster development of new process applications, and the use of personal workspaces to further empower knowledge workers and decision-makers.
"The lines between IT and the business will continue to blur until they become virtually indistinguishable. BPM is at the forefront of this trend, which is reducing in terms of cost and time the distance separating a business innovation from its actual implementation and execution," said Garimella. "In this context, BPM brings together business and IT to reduce costs while improving business performance. Coupled with the speed in which these results can be achieved - often in days - it presents a unique opportunity for CIOs, architects and business analysts to exert unprecedented leadership within their organizations. We ve designed BPM Basics For Dummies to serve as the battle cry for those executives that are leading this charge."
Drawing upon the authors real-world experience, BPM Basics For Dummies focuses significant attention on helping potential practitioners get started with BPM and includes step-by-step guidance on how to implement it successfully. Counseling against a big bang approach in most cases, they argue that users should capitalize on BPM s potential to deliver near-term return-oninvestment(ROI) by making an incremental case for adoption. Reflecting the book s practical and actionable focus, these efforts are punctuated by the use of top ten lists to illustrate BPM s best practices and Pitfalls to Avoid .
"The For Dummies approach has helped countless technologies and management disciplines reach a far wider audience of subsequent disciples. By using common, everyday language and clear examples, we hope to spur more widespread discussions across multiple silos to the leadership role that BPM can play within their organizations," said Lees. "What s clear from our research is that an increasing number of enterprises are using BPM to fuse their continuous process improvement strategies with a new generation of more adaptive business infrastructure software. By doing so, they re able to outpace their competition. This success positions BPM Basics For Dummies as must-reading for anyone needing to quickly come to grips with this phenomenon."
Published by Wiley Publishing, Inc., BPM Basics For Dummies: Software AG Special Edition is available exclusively from Software AG. The book is offered in traditional soft cover and convenient e-book formats. BPM Basics For Dummies is currently available in English with French, German and Spanish language print and electronic editions due Spring 2008. Additional information on requesting or downloading the book can be found at www.SoftwareAG.com/....
About For Dummies®
With near universal name recognition, more than 150 million books in print, and over 1,000 topics, For Dummies is the world's bestselling reference series. With loyal customers around the globe, For Dummies enriches people s lives by making knowledge accessible in a fun and easy way. Described by the N.Y. Times as "more than a publishing phenomenon, but a sign of the times,"
For Dummies span every section of the bookstore, covering everything from health to history, music to math, sports to self-help, technology to travel, and more. The Dummies brand franchise has expanded with an extensive licensed product line, including DVDs, software, consumer electronics, cooking, cleaning and automotive products, craft and hobby kits, games and more. For information, visit Dummies.com. For Dummies is a branded imprint of Wiley.
- New book receives extensive praise for its pragmatic, fast-paced introduction to Business Process Management
- Written by three Software AG executives, book argues that BPM is both a management discipline and technology strategy
- Complementary copies of BPM Basics For Dummies available at www.SoftwareAG.com/...
CeBIT 2008 - Software AG, a global leader in business infrastructure software, in conjunction with Wiley Publishing, today announced the publication of BPM Basics For Dummies®: Software AG Special Edition. Written by three Software AG executives, the book offers a pragmatic and fast-paced introduction to Business Process Management (BPM), which they define as "a process-centric approach for improving performance that combines information technologies with process methodologies." The book is designed to provide both business and IT stakeholders with a common understanding of BPM s significant potential as a means for enabling more fruitful collaboration and better alignment between business objectives and IT resources. Complementary copies of BPM Basics For Dummies are available at www.SoftwareAG.com/....
Early praise for BPM Basics For Dummies includes:
"Every business manager needs to know about BPM. BPM Basics For Dummies manages to explain BPM, a complex topic which is hard to explain in a concise manner, in a language that a business manager can understand, in just 72 pages! If you want a quick overview of what BPM can do for your business, this is the place to start!" - Paul Harmon, Executive Editor, www.BPTrends.com.
"The well respected authors of this book have managed to cover the vast territory of the multidimensional and otherwise complex topic of BPM in a very concise package. If you are looking to quickly discover how all of the pieces fit together - from BPM concepts to technologies to enterprise strategy to daily operations - then this effort is on target. If you wish to gain a comprehensive understanding of how BPM may apply to you, then this text is required reading." - Roger T. Burlton, founder of the Process Renewal Group and author of the widely-read book Business Process Management: Profiting from Process.
"BPM Basics For Dummies surveys the current landscape of BPM at a level that should be understandable to most business managers; filling a void between the hyperbole of pundit pitches and the technical minutiae of implementation, while using a consistent voice and vocabulary. Much needed and long overdue, this is recommended reading whenever you need to bring prospective process owners and end users up to speed on the why's and what's of a BPMbacked process initiative." - Richard J. Welke, Director of the Center for Process Innovation and Professor of Computer Information Systems at Georgia State University s J. Mack Robinson College of Business.
"The field of business process management is so broad and deep that it really helps to have a top level view and a roadmap to navigate the key concepts. This book provides that. It's brief and to the point, but not trivial, and points to further resources to chart your process future." - Peter Fingar, author of Business Process Management (BPM): The Third Wave and Extreme Competition: Innovation And the Great 21st Century Business Reformation.
BPM Basics For Dummies: At-a-Glance BPM Basics For Dummies was written by Kiran Garimella, Michael Lees and Bruce Williams of Software AG. Dr. Garimella is currently the company s vice president for BPM Solutions and previously served as a CIO and enterprise architect with several GE companies. He is also the author of The Power of Process: Unlocking the Source of Competitive Advantage, a business novel on BPM. Lees is the company s Director of BPM Product Marketing. He was previously the founder and CEO of Cerebra, Inc., an innovative developer of market-leading semantic metadata technologies. Williams is a senior vice president and General Manager of Software AG s BPM Solutions Group. He is also the co-author of Six Sigma For Dummies, The Six Sigma Workbook For Dummies, and Lean For Dummies, all from Wiley.
"Forward-looking companies recognize the need to continually improve their processes and more clearly differentiate their businesses. While this has been a top-line focus for the past twenty years or more, the increasing pace of global competition is driving the need to make these efforts more sustainable, scalable and adaptive," said Williams. "As a framework encompassing both management best practices and enabling technologies, BPM empowers the business with greater levels of control and visibility into operations than ever before possible. It is distinguished by its closed loop approach - measure, model and improve - which can be adapted to nearly all management disciplines and enterprise-specific scenarios. In doing so, it provides the direct linkage between strategy and execution that is sorely missing in many organizations today."
According to the authors, improved process performance, enhanced operational visibility and transparency, and greater business agility are the three key benefits that BPM delivers. In terms of performance, the efficiency and effectiveness of business processes can be improved by automation, better coordination of process workers and enhanced command & control capabilities, and through the optimization enabled by process simulation and testing, performance monitoring and real-time remediation. By offering a single design environment supporting a model-driven approach, BPM technology facilitates a "what you model is what you run (WYMIWYR)" approach to defining and implementing new processes, with BPM s monitoring capabilities enabling real-time, end-to-end process visibility and analysis against key metrics.Finally, BPM improves the agility of the entire business through better collaboration, improved reuse and faster development of new process applications, and the use of personal workspaces to further empower knowledge workers and decision-makers.
"The lines between IT and the business will continue to blur until they become virtually indistinguishable. BPM is at the forefront of this trend, which is reducing in terms of cost and time the distance separating a business innovation from its actual implementation and execution," said Garimella. "In this context, BPM brings together business and IT to reduce costs while improving business performance. Coupled with the speed in which these results can be achieved - often in days - it presents a unique opportunity for CIOs, architects and business analysts to exert unprecedented leadership within their organizations. We ve designed BPM Basics For Dummies to serve as the battle cry for those executives that are leading this charge."
Drawing upon the authors real-world experience, BPM Basics For Dummies focuses significant attention on helping potential practitioners get started with BPM and includes step-by-step guidance on how to implement it successfully. Counseling against a big bang approach in most cases, they argue that users should capitalize on BPM s potential to deliver near-term return-oninvestment(ROI) by making an incremental case for adoption. Reflecting the book s practical and actionable focus, these efforts are punctuated by the use of top ten lists to illustrate BPM s best practices and Pitfalls to Avoid .
"The For Dummies approach has helped countless technologies and management disciplines reach a far wider audience of subsequent disciples. By using common, everyday language and clear examples, we hope to spur more widespread discussions across multiple silos to the leadership role that BPM can play within their organizations," said Lees. "What s clear from our research is that an increasing number of enterprises are using BPM to fuse their continuous process improvement strategies with a new generation of more adaptive business infrastructure software. By doing so, they re able to outpace their competition. This success positions BPM Basics For Dummies as must-reading for anyone needing to quickly come to grips with this phenomenon."
Published by Wiley Publishing, Inc., BPM Basics For Dummies: Software AG Special Edition is available exclusively from Software AG. The book is offered in traditional soft cover and convenient e-book formats. BPM Basics For Dummies is currently available in English with French, German and Spanish language print and electronic editions due Spring 2008. Additional information on requesting or downloading the book can be found at www.SoftwareAG.com/....
About For Dummies®
With near universal name recognition, more than 150 million books in print, and over 1,000 topics, For Dummies is the world's bestselling reference series. With loyal customers around the globe, For Dummies enriches people s lives by making knowledge accessible in a fun and easy way. Described by the N.Y. Times as "more than a publishing phenomenon, but a sign of the times,"
For Dummies span every section of the bookstore, covering everything from health to history, music to math, sports to self-help, technology to travel, and more. The Dummies brand franchise has expanded with an extensive licensed product line, including DVDs, software, consumer electronics, cooking, cleaning and automotive products, craft and hobby kits, games and more. For information, visit Dummies.com. For Dummies is a branded imprint of Wiley.
