Tesco Bank - Why embark upon a BPM journey? And making it sustainable.
Peter McClean of Tesco Bank describes the early stages of their process journey, their plans for the future and how they went about choosing a tool to support the transformation.
Tesco Bank was launched as joint venture with RBS in 1997, becoming wholly owned by Tesco in 2008 and starting to trade as Tesco Bank last year. It is a big concern with over 6 million customers.
The journey started in 2008 with the modelling of the business's processes, but progress really began during 2009 with the mobilisation of transformation programmes, and the creation of a process methodology and dedicated team.
Tesco Bank set itself a number of short term goals that included:
- improving the basic level of quality through consistent design and get 100% of the business mapped
- sharing learning and knowledge through dedicated communication forums and a central storage and publishing solution
- finding owners and 'maintainers' of business process post-project delivery
- putting Tesco Bank in a strong position to re-engineer
Tesco Bank did not see this as a BPM approach; it was the foundations for delivering and maintaining better processes during and post-transformation. Among the steps taken to achieve these goals were the creation of the Enterprise Business Design Team (EBDT), with clear performance measures, implementation of a standard process methodology, and selecting ARIS as the process management tool.
It is still early in the process journey but EBDT is making itself felt with its work across programmes on process design and full implementation of ARIS. The team is already making the change process more efficient and increasing capacity. In the medium term, plans include conversion of all existing Visio content, training of a core team, engaging with the business on the content and use of the process information, and developing a full business process roadmap.
In the longer term benefits will be delivered against many core business performance targets including compliance and risk management, business and IT alignment, and improved customer and product processes.
The selection of ARIS has been a crucial part of the progress that has been made to date, but the tool didn't start as the favourite option. There was a belief that it was too big for Tesco Bank and that the best would be the most expensive. When the original short list failed to deliver fully against requirements, ARIS was added to the process, and a combination of comprehensive capability, a site visit by the team, and the presence of industry knowledge and experience made the decision an easy one.
ARIS and IDS Scheer are reassuring partners because the more the relationship deepens and the demands on the product increase, the more there is on offer. As Tesco Bank's requirements grow, there's a lot of confidence that ARIS will continue to deliver.
Vodafone - Taking ARIS to the Masses
Frits Wiegel of Vodafone gives an overview of the large-scale EVO programme, giving an honest view of some of the problems faced and how ARIS has played its part in the success of the work so far.
Business transformation and change management are of a critical importance for a successful implementation of Vodafone's new Core Business Model (CBM). This session provided insights into how ARIS is being used to bring the CBM out of the project organization into all the company's markets.
Vodafone is the world's leading mobile communications group with around 280 million customers worldwide and some 80,000 people in group operations and national Operating Companies (OpCos) in more than 20 countries. It is evolving its current multi-country business model into a single uniform way of running the business, supported by SAP. The programme is called EVO, and it is one of Vodafone's largest transformation programmes.
EVO has a number of key drivers including simplified efficient business operations, the best commercial solutions for global purchasing, IT system consolidation and a foundation for future organisational change, and it will deliver significant annual cash savings when it's fully implemented.
In 2008 EVO faced challenges in the usability and suitability of the processes being developed: there was a lack of management overviews, outputs were very SAP-focused and weren't suitable for training, and the real process and ARIS knowledge sat outside the company. A detailed review looked at the fundamental purpose of the CBM and how best to resource the work. A new approach was adopted and ARIS Business Publisher became the primary tool for effective process-related communication.
Using ARIS Business Publisher meant processes could be documented and communicated in a more self-explanatory way, carrying more management information without losing their operational accuracy. Via a business process portal on the company intranet, users are now able to drill down through processes and reach the detail they need, as well as navigate between processes at the same level. It's estimated that there are 5,000-8,000 users of this portal across the organisation.
As well as the detailed views, ARIS Business Publisher enabled an holistic view of the Vodafone Business Model, bringing the different facets together in one place. Vodafone did not adopt a single model (such as ETOM or ITIL). There are so many that are well-known in individual parts of the business that an amalgam was adopted, with key components of relevant models used as appropriate.
Other changes included reworking all of the processes in conjunction with the business, an update to modelling standards and some staff retraining, and buying and optimising e-learning modules for some ARIS modules. Translation of processes was considered but was seen as expensive and a source of unhelpful deviation in process understanding between countries.
The CBM also supports Vodafone's SAP transformation agenda, integrating the automated parts of processes including key reports and links to technical documentation. Users are able to navigate from process maps through to detailed library process models. It's interesting that processes are not documented down to activity level - Vodafone staff are on above average pay and are expected not to need that level of direction
The objective of the Core Business Model work now is to drive out benefits by:
- Enhancing KPIs that will push the business on to world class performance
- Establishing a senior governance body for CBM
- Reviewing and strengthening the role of global process owners
Diageo - Enabling Value from Global Process Standardisation
Steve Edney of Diageo talks through the story so far of Diageo's business process excellence work, the benefits they are seeing and the platform they are building for their strategic business ambitions with the help of ARIS.
Diageo is a global company operating in around 180 markets, with over 20,000 employees and offices in around 80 countries. It is the world's leading premium drinks business.
In 2009 Diageo recognised the strategic value in delivering global business process excellence across all its operations, and commissioned the netbiz project to develop and deliver the Diageo approach to global process design and governance. The starting point was a business with localised ways of working and fragmented systems. A standardisation initiative, including a common process framework and the alignment of systems, led to:
- improved compliance through better controls
- reduced cost through more reuse and simplified systems
- reduced cycle times (with up to 500% productivity improvements) leading to greater speed to market
- improved customer satisfaction based on less variation and error
Diageo run a 7 level process framework:
- Enterprise view
- Process area: A process network with aggregated common performance measures
- Process group: Processes delivering outcomes within one area of line management
- Process view: A repeatable series of activities to deliver an outcome
- Activity view: The activities executed by individuals
- Task view: The steps within an activity
- Sub-task: For further decomposition as required
Within this framework, process design follows a structured approach: Define, Evaluate, Scope, Integrate, Generate, Name. Diageo's process portal plays a key part in ensuring that the framework is understand and applied consistently across the organisation, and this is supported by a clear three layer governance structure covering Process Framework management processes (such as Strategy Definition), Core Processes (such as Design and Build), and Support Processes (such as ARIS User Management and Content Publication).
ARIS has underpinned Diageo's approach to standardisation through strategic design, providing the global process repository, tools and governance that such an approach needs. Within Diageo Business Services, operational processes were modelled using ARIS Business Designer to provide a standard graphical format. ARIS Process Performance Manager interfaced with SAP (and other IS systems) to provide detailed data and underlying performance analysis. ARIS Performance Dashboard was used to provide the management reporting layer, and ARIS Business Publisher provides information to people around the Diageo organisation.
As an example of the impact that ARIS implementation has had, the piloting by Diageo Business Services of Process Performance Management across Accounts Payable resulted in near real time visibility of performance and Day 1 management reporting of cycle times, ageing profiles and quality.
Although it's still in its early stages, the netbiz initiative has already generated a range of benefits, among them:
- much improved clarity of business case benefits, and increased contribution to cost reduction
- maturing process ownership responsibilities, and clear accountability for the process improvement agenda
- enterprise-wide process knowledge, with a focus on integration and new business opportunities
Diageo's Process Owner Board also allows the business to work across silos on critical outcomes, making business cases easier to put together.
The enabling phase of netbiz has taken 6 months to deliver. Looking ahead, the Process Framework will become mandatory from July this year and at the same time the enhanced change process goes live. In a further 12 months, functionality will be improved and content fully migrated.
As far as the use of ARIS is concerned, next steps include defining and managing the Diageo enterprise architecture, simulation modelling and user testing, and implementing comprehensive governance of business process design.
Although there is still work to do, it's clear that standardisation supports Diageo's strategic ambitions and ARIS is a key part of that effort.
CSC - Implementing and Running the SAP New World
Paul Baines of CSC, the global leader in IT and business services, describes the immense value that ARIS can bring to a business using SAP.
In recent year SAP has been changing. From being a technical solution, SAP has taken a business-centric approach with the Solution Manager product whose implementation and operation is based on business process. The SAP world that now exists is a sophisticated one and presents quite a complex picture of how a business operates. That picture is also changing rapidly with new processes and products being created every minute around the world.
Despite the complexity of business and the picture that SAP presents, it is only part of what is going on. SAP is limited to 3 levels of process and presents text-based summaries. Often it will only include a proportion of the activity that comprises a single business flow. Getting a complete view of business process, in a really usable form, means using ARIS.
Even in a process as simple as making tea, the limitations of SAP's 3 level hierarchy are clear. Boil the kettle and fill the cup with whichever ingredients you choose and you're left with unanswered questions: where did the teabags come from? Is the milk still fresh? What kind of sugar? ARIS on the other hand will represent the process comprehensively.
ARIS will handle unlimited levels of process, capturing SAP and non-SAP systems, manual steps and documentation. It integrates with Solution Manager, and its graphics-based presentation is extremely valuable for getting business engagement and buy-in. Put the standard Solution Manager view in front of business people and their eyes glaze over at the lines of text. The equivalent ARIS view presents processes and their component steps in business language and a logical flow. People ask questions, suggest changes; they are engaged.
In summary, using ARIS
- alongside Solution Manager gives the business a pictorial view of process and incorporates information not contained in SAP
- speeds up documentation for SAP Enterprise Support
- involves and equips the business for continuous improvement and process enhancement.
