3 Questions to…Stefan Hessenbruch, Director of Customer Success at iGrafx, About Why BPM and RPA are a Strong Team

Stefan Hessenbruch, Director of Customer Success at iGrafx, recently discussed how you can benefit from a combination of BPM and RPA, and why RPA requires a well-founded process management. At iGrafx, Stefan takes care of all our customers’ needs – from support and training to high-level consulting, as well as ongoing customer support. Below are his answers to 3 key questions around BPM and RPA.

1) BPM or RPA or preferably both?

In short, preferably both. BPM and RPA can and should even co-exist because they solve two different problems. While RPA automates individual tasks and even entire business processes normally performed by humans through software or bots, BPM is more likely to analyze, model, and optimize business processes. Business Process Management (BPM) is essential to RPA because the better a business process is documented and modeled, the more successful and effective its automation is. Automating, managing, and ultimately achieving the best result end-to-end can be achieved in only two ways – BPM and RPA.

2) What are the advantages of combining RPA with BPM?

The main advantage of RPA is clear: repeatable processes or tasks can be easily and automatically processed. If you combine RPA with other technologies such as BPM, there are many other possible uses for the bots. With BPM, productive processes can be flexibly designed, implemented, optimized and automated for the entire company, thus aligning business functions with customer needs. A detailed modeling of all processes, their stringent execution, simulation, automation and monitoring as well as continuous improvement, form the core elements of BPM. Before processes are automated using RPA, they should be integrated into a BPM system in order to be able to prioritize the projects that are suitable for the RPA. Through RPA, a sophisticated BPM approach can help organizations gain more business value through change and innovation. Only a holistic solution enables companies to identify, evaluate, prioritize, execute, and ultimately control suitable projects for an RPA.

3) What other trends are currently in the field of BPM?

Anyone who deals with the topics of process management or business optimization today cannot ignore the term “process mining”. In process mining, business processes are analyzed and reconstructed using digital traces in IT systems. The individual process steps are combined, and the process is visualized and evaluated. Process Mining is thus a methodology of process management. It supports companies in modeling process knowledge and gaining real insight into their own processes.

Another big topic is customer experience. So-called “customer journey maps” help to identify where the customer is in contact with the company, whether these points trigger positive or negative feelings and how such interactions can be improved. With Business Process Management, it is possible to model this customer journey as well as the systems, processes and risks required to strengthen customer focus and improve the customer experience. Of course, such a journey can also be depicted for employees, products, partners, suppliers and more.