A BPM journey into excellence
ONE is a Japanese container shipping line. It is the sixth-largest in the world, created in 2017 from a merger between three other container shipping lines. It now has more than 8,000 employees in 120 countries and a 224-vessel fleet, including 31 super-large ships.
ONE’s three-way merger created choppy seas for the business. In particular, each of the three pre-merger organizations had its own processes, so there was early conflict and confusion in process execution and some misaligned process maintenance. There was a small but significant distance between the business users and the process teams and a further gap between process and execution.
Luiz explained how ONE needed to bring the BPM team closer to the business and drive a shift from a reactive approach to processes to one that was more proactive and strategic. In other words, it was time for ONE to plot a new course, and determine how to use BPM to overcome post-merger challenges.
Doing so required a connected and joined-up team and a platform on which people could work and collaborate. This platform needed leading modeling capabilities (including easy integration with other systems) and to offer a single source of truth. ONE also required a BPM Center of Excellence (CoE), a collaborative and virtual team that could set the standards and procedures for all process activity.
How to use BPM to overcome post-merger challenges
Luiz shared with the audience some of his critical factors for success in BPM.
Secure senior management buy-in and get it early
Many companies don’t see process as a priority, so get senior support as early as possible. It’s also essential to involve the business side. Select two or three business functions for 'pilot collaborations' using Signavio to support process management.
Lock-in resources as early as possible
Luiz stressed repeatedly the importance of people in a BPM program and highlighted the need to engage with your business users in advance. Their input will be vital as your journey develops, but their time is precious, and you will need their availability.
Adopt a business-centric approach
Never forget that processes are there to drive business outcomes. This should always inform your thinking and can be helped by integrating your BPM rollout with ongoing projects. At ONE, for example, digital transformation is focused on the customer journey, so content generation focused on that.
Utilize all training options
There is nothing worse than people not engaging with a platform because it is not intuitive to use. Ensure everyone has the required training.
Look outside your own industry for direction
ONE applied best practices from multiple industries to find the best way forward for them. Each BPM rollout is different, but some success factors can be applied across any industry
Agile CoE
The ONE CoE included scrum meetings, sprint cycles, and content released every three weeks to showcase process progress. This frequent delivery helped build momentum and created predictability on the team's delivery, according to Luiz.
Business outcomes and next steps
Using Signavio, the ONE BPM journey focused on 21 core processes around the customer journey. The first wave saw the creation of 450+ unique process models, all focused on customer journey processes and linked to business priorities.
This covered 23 countries in the ONE network, the ones with the highest operational volume, while Luiz’s project team effectively became the CoE, with 28 members from all BPM teams. Being the central point of expertise also enabled the team to spread the word of how to use BPM to overcome post-merger challenges across the business quickly and effectively.
ONE was also able to begin process improvement via its ‘Solution Talks’ in Latin America that focused on continuous opportunity identification. Expanding this element of the program will be a priority for future activity: ONE plans to expand those improvement initiatives to other regions worldwide and explore BPI to identify further opportunities.
To learn more about how Signavio can help you navigate mergers and other transformative events, visit the dedicated Signavio BPI Tour 2021 landing page today.