Business processes and information systems are pieces of the same puzzle in my work experience. One needs have both pieces to reach the business goal or end state successfully. To understand the relationship and make it successful, one needs to understand what business processes are and how information systems can be used to support or manage them. In this paper, I will address these topics as they pertain to my own work environment.
Business processes are a series of logically related activities or tasks performed together to produce a defined set of results (Business Dictionary, 2010). In my organization, the business process is a complex set of related and very structured tasks performed by staff using information support tools. The goal or end state is to provide a high quality and useful service or physical product to customers.
Providing a quality product is not enough in today’s rapidly changing world. In government agencies, it is common to have the challenge of inadequate resources to do work and that affects the products turned out. This could be a result of insufficient manning or funds, need for more equipment, need to replace outdated technology or not using current resources to the best advantage. We can meet these challenges by using information technology to manage and improve our business processes. This approach is known as Business Process Management (BPM) (Ko, 2009).
Our Process Strengths and Weaknesses My organization has been in a state of rapid information technology (IT) change over the last year. This change started evolving because the information tools and equipment being used to manage data and processes were becoming rapidly outdated. Our workflow management application was adequate; it met all of our current needs. The application was easy to use, flexible, and managed many parts of our workflow. The weaknesses were reliability issues with older computers and network