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Taking a Closer Look at Mobile BPM

Taking a Closer Look at Mobile BPM

Taking a Closer Look at Mobile BPM

We live in a world where to stay connected and updated in real-time is crucial for making important business decisions. Smart devices such as phones, tablets and digital assets have redefined the corporate landscape which is creating an increasing dependence on cloud connectivity in order to complete business tasks anywhere, anytime. This is where enterprise mobility comes into play.

Like any digital transformation or shifting business trends, organizations that are open to change and are willing to adapt quickly, can counter the competition long-term. With that being said, organizations need to keep an open mind and be reminded of the fact that the real leverage comes from connecting systems, business processes, people, and things of the organization so that they can all operate in sync, in the right context to deliver good results.

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Business Process Management (BPM) is an operations management discipline through which organizations analyze, model, measure, improve, automate and optimize business processes. The ultimate goal is to improve overall operational efficiency – through standardization of best practices and automation – and the resulting abilities to quickly scale, eliminate errors, improve compliance and reduce costs.

Stacy Leidwinger, VP of Product for Nuance Document Imaging, defines mobile BPM as a practice that focuses on analyzing mobile business processes in aggregate across the enterprise, so best practices can be identified and implemented across multiple cross-functional areas. In this light, we spoke with Leidwinger about the benefits mobile BPM can bring to organizations and how it differs from mobile workflow management.

What are the benefits of a mobile BPM tool?

A mobile BPM tool can serve as a “Center of Excellence,” helping organizations better identify and understand those mobile workflows that have produced the most success within individual departments. And it can be extended across multiple departments as a tool to standardize and automate best practices.

How does a mobile workflow management system differ from a BPM system?

Mobile workflow management and mobile BPM share the same primary goal – improving operational efficiency through optimized business processes. Both emphasize automation – for instance, automating security features so workers can work more quickly without compromising security. The most significant difference between the two is that while mobile BPM emphasizes standardization, mobile workflow management emphasizes the ability to deviate from the standard when necessary. In other words, mobile workflow management recognizes that one size does not necessarily fit all, and while identifying and leveraging best practices across an enterprise is beneficial, ultimately mobile workflows still need to support the unique needs of individuals and departments.

Also, mobile workflow is more focused on getting content into a system in order to execute a workflow – capturing a data input (through mobile capture) that can often be missed if not collected at the immediate point of impact – whether it is a packing slip to confirm receipt, a bill for an expense report or a web form being completed on a field service call.

How can large enterprises and SMBs take advantage of mobile BPM?

One of the biggest advantages of mobile BPM is that organizations don’t necessarily have to reinvent the wheel every time they want to optimize a particular mobile business process. They can harness the past and current experiences of other departments to solve similar workflow challenges, which helps them grow stronger as an organization while ensuring a more uniform, consistent level of mobile workflow excellence.

In your opinion, which works better – mobile workflow management or mobile BPM?

We see mobile BPM or mobile workflow management as truly complementary and organizations have a lot to gain by leveraging the unique strengths of both. This means, mobile BPM can help identify and apply best practices across multiple departments leveraging mobile devices; mobile workflow (and mobile capture technologies) can be used to kick off business processes. You can’t have process without the data to trigger the process.


Looking for more? Download our Business Process Management Buyer’s Guide for free to compare the top-24 products available on the market with full page vendor profiles. The guide includes four key capabilities to look for in a BPM platform, plus questions to ask before purchasing. It’s truly the perfect resource for anyone looking to find the right BPM for their business/organization, or those looking to replace an existing one.

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