I’m behind the time for my traditional New Year article where I share my insights into the latest trends, happenings and expectations of the coming year. The delay comes from the challenge of conveying what I believe is the most important message I have ever delivered – and I needed to get it right!

So what’s in store for us in 2008? The most important thing is for you to know that with BPM you have a choice…

Let’s look at an analogy to help make the connection to the choice that we have and that analogy is the building of a house.

If you were one of the workers on site building a house you would experience something very important. You would be directly involved in the outcome of the “house building” process, you would see how each bit of work contributed to the desired outcome (the house), see the house take shape during the process, and see how your personal contributions made a difference. You would also see how process deviations, mistakes, improper materials, poor timing, late deliveries, etc. negatively affected the outcome of the process and you would have to think about the “affect” of these things, you would know exactly what the impact was that occurred each and every time.

If you were a worker in a lumber yard that provides supplies for house building your world would revolve around the lumber yard, the cutting of rafters perhaps, the pulling of stock, the assembling of materials and the loading of trucks.

If you were a worker in a lumber it is highly likely that you would judged (measured) on the amount of rafters you precut, the amount of stock you pulled, the amount of orders you pulled or the amount of material you loaded.

If you worked for a company that made carpentry tools you would perhaps design tools, machine parts, put together assemblies, test finished tools, pick and place in the warehouse and so on. Your likely measures would be counts by time, quality, attendance, safety, etc.

Now, here is where things get interesting. If we choose to think about things differently (and it is a choice) then we could make some observations on this example:

1) The on site workers are directly connected to the Customer Outcome

2) The lumber yard workers provide an essential service to the Customer Outcome, but they are once removed from the actual outcome and their measures are aligned around the lumber yard.

3) The carpentry tools company provides essential tools to the Customer Outcome but their connection is indirect and for many businesses the connection is only implied, while their measures are aligned around making tools.

That is the structure that is in place for most organizations, the way organizations have grown to organize and management themselves.

So what is the lumber yard represented internal processes and the tools company represented software? Isn’t this the way we tend to organize ourselves now?

But we do have a choice. There is nothing stopping us from aligning with the Customer Outcome, in which case the “lumber yard” has transparency into the “house building” process and is aligned, managed and measured on its ability to have the right thing at the right place at the right time – all of the time. The lumber yard can and should be direct participants in the house building process.

For software (IT), why couldn’t the tools company be aligned to having the right tools, at the right time, at the right cost that directly and explicitly makes the on site workers lives simpler, easier and more successful? Why can’t the tools company be aligned, managed and measured on its ability to help on site workers get the work done in the simplest and best way possible? The tools company can and should be direct participants in the house building process.

Let’s take it a bit further. What is the process was an SCO process, crafted to deliver on the needs and wants of the Customer? Why couldn’t the people on site, the people in the lumber yard and the tools company align themselves to the SCO? The answer is that they can, it’s a choice.

But there’s more to this story folks. Which do you think is more personally motivating, more gratifying, more invigorating? Aligning around disconnected counts by time, around the house building process as an active participant in it, or around the SCO – the Customer that is having their new home built!

How quickly do you think you would challenge the “dumb stuff” and eliminate it if it was getting in the way of completing the house the way you KNEW it should be completed?

This is our choice, and it is a choice. But ask yourself one more question before you decide how important this choice is…

What will happen to your company if your competitors make the choice to align around Customer Outcomes and Successful Customer Outcomes and you don’t? Which company do YOU want building YOUR house?

So while I tell you that we have a choice in how we organize and align around process I must also tell you that choosing to stay in the Inside-Out flatlands will be the death (as in Out of Business) of more companies in the 21st Century than every other business “threat” combined.

Customers vote with their business and companies organized and aligned around SCOs are the ones winning the election by a landslide.

I hope you make the right choice in 2008.

Terry Schurter
Director - International Process and Performance Institute
www.ipapi.org