Omar: The one that is really becoming quite relevant is reviewing decisions and tracking approvals on new product launches. This is relevant not only to consumer products, but also automotive and high tech, just to name a few industries. The reason why this is so applicable and where BPM can really add value is that within the new product launch process - or as some people might call it, the continuous product and service innovation process - there is a best practice called "phase gate management." Every time a product gets launched, key decisions regarding moving the project from one stage gate or phase gate to another phase gate requires budget and certain activities that need to take place.

Typically, these activities depend on whether the product is just new packaging for Valentine's Day, Christmas or Easter, for example, or if it is really a fundamental change in terms of the product: we're bringing out a brand new green tea shampoo and we need to test the market for that. That would require a lot more investment and market focus research, etc.

The activities that need to be performed between the phase gates are very varied and very fuzzy. Typically there are lots of emails that go between to make these happen, and lots of calls, lots of meetings, etc. This is where BPM can really add value; this is what we highlight. We have had this with customers, both in the US and in the UK and in Europe, really investing in this using BPM technology. And even though we have a solution on this for the back-end applications, we are still finding that BPM can add real value. Why we talk about BPM within the context of SAP applications is that it's not that BPM replaces the applications, but BPM is really extending the processes within the applications, making them more efficient, more productive and increasing the visibility. Does that help a little bit?

Reed: Definitely. Are other users able to potentially contribute, submit their own use cases and build on what you have? What kind of feedback are you getting so far?

Omar: The feedback we're getting so far is that, first, people weren't aware that these are the different varieties of use cases we're seeing. We're also seeing a lot of patents, for example, and master data management is also becoming another recurring theme. The process for master data governance has been on creating new customers or a new product that I need to seek approval for, and ensure the cleanness of the data as the single source of truth. This is really starting to resonate that it's not just necessarily just the master data governance problem, but it's also that BPM can be applied to the solution.

Really, this use case wiki is just a start, and I really encourage the community to look at it and give us feedback and help us improve the quality and, most importantly, drive the cases. The more cases we have, the better it is. I would like to see this be the go-to place where people can see if someone has done it before so they don't have to start from scratch, leveraging learning and going to market faster.

Reed: That's quite a lot of resources for folks to explore as we look ahead to the next quarter, are there more plans in BPM content that we should be looking out for?

Omar: We're going to be making a concerted effort focusing five key industries we've picked: utilities, retail, government, high tech and consumer products. So you can expect to see a lot more use cases around that; I just had a conversation with retail and found six more that I can add. We expect to see a lot more customer videos and business transformation studies, really showing the value, the quantifiable benefits.

We are also going to be launching a process template certification. As you see a lot of the time, if I have a process template, I would like to be able to leverage it and reuse it, and the ability to have something that's certified is certainly valuable.

Gravity is another thing that came out of research, the idea to bring that to the community. Also on the methodology side, there are plans to bring business add-ons for things such as process scanning. So we have BPM strategy, BPM governance - there is going to be a lot of material coming out on SDN in the next quarter.

Reed: As we wrap up our podcast today, are there any misconceptions or lingering confusion around BPM that you'd like to clear up now or perhaps a couple of key points you want to emphasize to our listeners?

Omar: The two misconceptions: SOA is still misunderstood in terms of being a requirement for BPM or not. I would say SOA is not a requirement for BPM; however, if I do SOA, then my BPM projects scale so much better as I decouple the underlying technical infrastructure from my process.

The second misconception is that people think they can do everything with BPM. BPM is certainly not there to replace traditional application tools and packages; however, I like to position BPM to enable organizations to focus on the process layer. It's about orchestrating the business logic within the existing applications and packages.

What I'd like to emphasize is the importance of the business process notation standard. This certainly will improve business in IT alignment and also reduce the chance of confusion in terms of nothing lost in translation because the process that business uses is the process that IT runs.

Another important thing around Business Process Management is the concept of rules: rules can create simpler, action-oriented and more flexible processes. If I don't have rules, what tends to happen is that within the BPM process you'll see a lot of decision points that really typically belong in a rule, and you start to get a lot more complicated processes. So if customers are seeing complicated processes, chances are that's an application for rules.

Another thing I'd like to highlight for those that are new to BPM is that BPM is based on a management discipline, and it's an IT-enabled management discipline, which is very important to understand.

Last but not least, I've talked a lot about technology, but it's not just about technology. It's also knowing when and how to use BPM. That's important, and that's exactly what a communities like SAP's are designed for: to support SAP customers, to share with their peers exactly what lessons are learned, how they are applying BPM and when to use it.

Reed: Ruks, thank you for giving us this inside look at BPM resources on SCN and how BPM is evolving at SAP, but also for all the contributions you're making to that community. I'm hearing some really good things, and being able to share customer stories and get customers involved in actual use cases are really exciting developments, so congratulations and thanks for your work on that.

Omar: Thank you, and don't forget to tell the community to participate because without them, we wouldn't be here.

Reed: Absolutely. Before we sign off, I do want to make sure that our listeners know how to access the BPM area on SCN. If you're logged into the BPX Community, you'll see the BPM section of the site in the left-hand navigation menu. If you're not yet registered with SAP's online communities, you can register with the SAP Developer Network, the Business Objects Community and the SAP/BPX Community all at the same time.

On that note, I'd like to thank our listeners for joining us today for this BPX Community podcast. This is Jon Reed of JonERP.com signing off. We'll see you online soon at bpx.sap.com.