Choosing a BPM company to work with can be a daunting decision. From the moment you decide you need a business process management company, to the moment you are confident you hired the right one might take a year. Choosing the wrong one can set your BPM plans back six months or more.
Are you prepared for that? Most companies are not.
When it comes to making the right decision for your company, here are five things to think through before you take the plunge with a BPM company.
What Kind of BPM Do They Practice?
Isn’t there just one kind? Not exactly.
One distinction is between human-centric BPM and system-centric BPM. Human-centric BPM looks at workflows that primarily involve humans. If you have a process that has many sets of approvals on the same data that never needs to move, this is a human-centric process.
System-centric BPM have much less human involvement and primarily focuses on how different software and databases share and transfer information in a predefined pattern.
When thinking about what business process management company to select, you need to know what kind they specialize in. If you have a lot of data to move around to many different systems, you don’t want to work with a BPM company that’s mostly built for handling approvals.
Do They Have Their Own Product?
Some BPM companies have their own proprietary software they use for implementations. Others will recommend a different BPM tool based on your requirements. You’d think that having their own product makes them biased to a certain solution, and it does. But it’s important to realize that every BPM company is biased, since most of them work on a revenue sharing model. So, just because a company doesn’t have their own software doesn’t mean you might not get pushed into something that’s really not a good fit.
Have a firm understanding of your needs before approaching a business process management company to find the right product for you.
How Hands-on Do You Want Them to Be?
Some BPM companies are going to want to spend a long time doing needs analyses, walk you through the decision making process, and then see you through the entire implementation. Others will be more hands-off and simply offer you the options they have and let you make your own decision.
When it comes to choosing your BPM company, you need to know how involved you want them to be. If you feel like you’re getting into a world you are completely blind in, you’ll need to find someone who will guide you through everything. If you really just need help on the implementation side, then you can make that clear in your initial discussions.
What Kind of Experience Do They Have?
It’s not just about how many years a BPM company has been in existence. It’s also about what kind of companies they’ve worked with in the past. Have they worked with anyone from your industry before? From your region? Business process management companies tend to specialize in certain fields, but may not reveal if your area is new for them.
Ask about their current and former clients and ask how those projects have gone. Which ones have gone well and which ones are struggling? What have they learned through the process? What makes a bad client for them? If they have trouble answering these questions, then you may need to look for a different BPM company.
How Much Do You Want to Pay?
Most BPM companies aren’t cheap to work with. If you don’t have a sizeable budget, you may be surprised at the cost of the consulting, licensing the tool, and the additional implementation. For large organizations with highly complex processes, the cost can be worth it. But if you are looking for something simpler, it may be difficult to find a good option.
If you’re a company that knows exactly what it needs from a BPM tool and is looking for something you can control on your own, then sometimes bypassing a BPM company all together and using a self-service tool like kissflow can be the right option. kissflow is strong enough to be used across even large enterprises, but simple enough such that nearly anyone in your organization can use it without the need for a software developer or consultant.
Make the Choice
A commitment to a BPM company is a big thing that you should consider carefully. Slow down and make the right choice so that you don’t lose a lot of time in making a bad decision. If you think you know what you need, and just need a few tips here and there, drop the need for an expensive business process management company and try Kissflow Process for yourself!
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