Guide: How to Perform a Business Process Analysis?

Business process analysis deals in evaluating a process and eyeing methods for improvement. In the absence of a thorough process analysis, you may waste your valuable time and money on processes that are unproductive. 

It is not easy for any business to manage its processes and operations and emerge victorious. With silos and intertwined departments, finding the loopholes becomes overwhelming and introduces more room for errors. This is why using business process analysis software is so crucial for them. The software not only yields the best results but can be scaled to fit the business requirements and other aspects of the processes in the best manner.

Professional analytical companies like PRIME BPM use the highest quality software to run different analytical processes and extract valuable information. To help you understand the process and the steps to conduct a meaningful and result-yielding analysis, we have prepared a comprehensive guide in the below section.

What is business process analysis?

Business process analysis is a method where different processes are analysed in detail based on various parameters to understand the performance, loopholes, areas that might lead to problems in the future, and so on. Usually, the analytical results help the business executives and stakeholders make a well-informed decision backed by numbers and not assumptions. It is objective, meaning no emotion, sentiment, demographic, or other factors can influence the results.

Why do businesses require business process analysis?

Before you start working with business process analysis software, will knowing the benefits of analysing the processes be more fruitful? After all, when you aren't aware of the perks, you won’t take the matter seriously, which might put your business at stake.

To help you out, we have described some of the top benefits of running a business process analysis.

·         Understanding deviations

Often, when you continue to run the business operations based on the same process, there can be deviations from the original orchestrated workflow. For instance, when you adopt a new technology, it creates a deviation in the work process. Similarly, recruiting employees with special skills can cause deviation in your asset management processes. You will only be able to run the business efficiently if you find the bottleneck areas of deviation in a particular process. This is why business process analysis software is crucial for organisations.

·         Improving communication

Communication is the critical factor for the longevity and smooth operation of the organisation. If there are gaps in the communication or flow of instructions and knowledge, it can lead to complete failure. In worst-case scenarios, the organisation might face legal and financial challenges. But with the help of business process analysis software, one can quickly improve the communication channels and resolve internal conflicts.

·         Alignment with KPIs

The business processes must be aligned with the preset KPIs or the key performance indicators. However, you will often find that the current process needs to be more in sync with the KPIs. As a result, KPA analysis fails to yield fruitful results. But with business process analysis, you can find which KPIs need to be met for a particular process and devise strategies for the same.

·         Transparency from data

With the help of business process analysis, big data can be utilised to the fullest. This will give the organization leverage in extracting more valuable information and establishing transparency within and outside the organization. If there is no data transparency, there might be severe issues as you won’t be able to know the areas that might lead to the downfall.

·         Improved compliance

Every business needs to be compliant with some industry standards and regulations. Also, the individual processes of the silos should be compliant with the company policies, terms, and conditions. Improving compliance is only possible when you know more about the outcomes, root causes of issues, and future impacts through the business process analysis software.

·         Enhanced customer relationship

According to several studies from top companies like PRIME BPM, it is proven that business process analysis can help improve the relationship with the customers. No business can function properly without the customers, let alone grow and make profits. You may retain your existing customers if the processes are modified and the redundancies are removed.

·         Reduces failures and downfall

Also, business process analysis will help you identify the points in a particular operation or process that can soon lead to failure. Based on the results, you can make appropriate strategies and future-proof your business from its downfall.

·         Powers improvement and innovation

Undoubtedly, the information obtained from the business process software will pave more ways for business improvement and innovation. Businesses must adopt innovative approaches to ensure there is room for further improvement. After a couple of years, the business process will become redundant and obsolete, leading to the organization's downfall. But with the help of the analytical results, it will become easier for the businesses to innovate the processes and remove any redundancy existing or about to thrive.

·         Data-based decision

Another critical use of business process analysis software is in decision-making. In other words, the data from the reports can help stakeholders and business owners make critical decisions based on quantifiable results, not assumptions.

Checklist for performing business process analysis

Before starting the analytical process, you need to keep certain things in handy so that the results from the software are as accurate as possible. Besides, you can perform the analysis if you already have the checklist prepared. To help you out, we have given specific tips for what you should have before process analysis can commence.

Appropriate tool or software

The first and foremost thing you will need is business process analysis software. You can run an analytical study with it, which will further cause problems. If you don't choose the right software, the results will be inaccurate, and relying on them might jeopardise you.

To do so, the following are some features the business process analysis software should have.

a. Model drawing and representation to help you sketch the entire process model based on the previously designed workflows.

b. An evaluation algorithm based on AI will ensure the inputs are evaluated with maximum accuracy and precision.

c. The tool's performance should be optimal, and the features can be scaled according to the input datasets and business requirements.

d. Also, you need to ensure that the chosen business process analysis software has integrations to connect with several other software applications being used at the enterprise level.

e. The user interface should be intuitive, clean, and easy to understand. If the professionals spend half of the time understanding the UI components, there will be a crunch in the allocated time for analysis.

f. Also, the concerned business process analysis software should be responsive. It means anyone can run the software from different machines and browsers without downloading a specific package or collection of jar files.

Sorted and cleaned datasets

It would be best to have datasets sorted with cleaning done beforehand. The raw datasets collected from different business endpoints should be sorted and arranged correctly. In addition, duplicate records, meaningless datasets, and other such flaws should be removed. This will ensure the outputs from the analytical software are accurate and precise.

Analytical parameter list

Another thing you need to have before using the business process analysis software is the parameter list based on which you will run the analysis. For instance, if you want to know more about the sales process and its performance, you should have datasets based on sales, revenues, profits and losses, investments, and many more.

Process mapping/documentation

You will also need a document of process mapping. It can be extracted from the BPM or business process management software. Once you get the original workflow orchestrated for that particular process, it will become easier to run the analysis and compare the results with the pre-built model. Also, you won’t have to train the analytical team from scratch about the concerned process because everything will be documented in product maps.

How to do business process analysis: a step-by-step guide

Since we know the benefits of running the business process analysis and the checklist to fulfil, it's finally time to have the showdown- knowing the analytical steps in chronological order. With this, you will have maximum clarity about how the work is conducted at the professional level to maximise the outcomes and make the most out of the business process analysis software.

Determining the process to be analysed

The first step in business process analysis is finding the process that needs to be analysed soon. Since there are so many different processes, you might need to clarify and investigate a process that could have been delayed without suffering from any negative impact.

So, list down the primary process silos of the business and mark them on a priority scale depending on the need for analysis. For instance, if the sales channels are performing differently than usual or the website traffic has declined significantly in the last couple of months, you need to analyse the sales or marketing process first and then move on to something else.

Mapping the analytical process

Once done, you need to map the process with the help of business process analysis software. This will help you to keep a document of how the analysis was done, the datasets given at the input, the attributes chosen for running the evaluation, and the expected outcomes had it been an ideal process. Once you are done with the mapping, it will become much easier for you to proceed further with the analysis and make no mistakes.

Using the software for evaluation

You must integrate the business process analysis software with the other enterprise applications used frequently. This way, you can easily extract datasets from those sources and use them as input for further evaluation. You must use the best software that won't have any glitches.

Inferring the analytical results

Last but not least, you need to infer information from the analytical results. You can either do so by yourself or take help from a third-party company like PRIME BPM. They will help you gather valuable information from the analytical results and give you a reality check on the business processes.

Conclusion

Every business has to deal with numerous processes on a day-to-day basis. Therefore, once and unless you run a proper analysis on them, it will be easy to know where the process is lacking, leading to a sharp decline in performance and productivity. You can easily use business process analysis software to ensure accurate and precise results. If you have any further questions about the process analysis method or want to understand the software's working, you can connect with the experts at PRIME BPM. They will help you gain complete knowledge of the software and make the best out of it.