Gartner, Inc. even issued a “First Take” research note with its opinion on the new applications – the conclusion being that Metastorm has raised the bar for Social BPM environments and surpassed its existing competition.

Our ability to raise the bar was not by sheer luck.  In developing these new applications, Metastorm invested a great deal of time and energy in working with our customers and industry experts (as well as assimilating user feedback on the flaws in other vendor offerings) to understand market needs and focus on the key criteria that would deliver the most business value.  Such feedback included:

• A true Cloud platform – not just SaaS
• Collaboration and social networking tools that business users will embrace
• A rich user experience that mimics desktop applications, but runs in the Cloud
• Role-based personalization that is configurable at the individual user level
• Automatic capture of collaboration sessions – record, playback and audit
• Full integration of content and models with Metastorm’s enterprise architecture (EA), business process analysis (BPA) and business process management (BPM) software applications
• Not just workflow modeling

That last criteria is a critical distinction that many people overlook – any modeling and collaboration tool that is confined to just a workflow or process view is flawed by nature.  How can you truly capture and optimize a business process without fully understanding the bigger picture enterprise elements that contribute to process success?  

Metastorm has raised the bar on Social BPM by releasing a rich enterprise modeling environment on a true Cloud platform (Microsoft Windows Azure) with 11 different model types and 23 modeling objects, complemented by social collaboration tools that are inherent in the user environment.  Of course Metastorm M3 enables collaborative process discovery, but it also goes beyond process to enable collaboration on other enterprise assets, including people and organization models, business capabilities, goals, rules, requirements and systems, that factor into the true optimization of organizational performance.  Opening up insight and collaboration on a broad set of models, to a broad set of participants, on an unlimited scale, sets the stage for not only social interaction at the business level, but also increased accuracy of assumptions and faster realization of business improvements – improvements in processes and improvements in how your organization operates as a whole.

I encourage you to read the Gartner research note while it is available for public access through September – Metastorm Offerings Raise the Bar for Social BPM Environments.  Whether you are just starting to consider the value of Social BPM or you are unhappy with your current tool, now is the time to request a free trial of Metastorm M3 to take your efforts to whole new level.

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“Through ongoing product innovation and a focus on customer success Metastorm has established itself as a market leader and we are fortunate to have a strong network of partners such as iOctane to deliver the Metastorm suite of products and services around the world,” stated Robin Martin, executive vice president of international operations for Metastorm.

“We are delighted to be able to sign this agreement with the New Zealand Department of Internal Affairs.  It will allow government agencies to access the Metastorm process modeling, business architecture and process execution technology tools,” said Chris Symes, head of client engagement for iOctane.

Metastorm has a strong history of helping national and local governments increase efficiencies and improve citizen service through the use of business process management (BPM) software.  For example, the City of Norfolk, Virginia recently highlighted the results of its use of Metastorm BPM in an interview with CivSource. Additionally, in a customer video testimonial, the City of Richmond, Virginia discusses how they were able to successfully deploy Metastorm BPM solutions to structure and automate their business processes.  Metastorm BPM provides tools for users to design, develop, monitor, and change processes as their organization evolves.  

Government organizations worldwide have applied Metastorm BPM to business challenges such as compliance, operational efficiency, permit processing, citizen service, case management, grants management, logistics, defense, and disaster response. Many government organizations have turned to Metastorm BPM because it provides access to a wealth of information within organizations and has the ability to bridge silos across different agencies. These are just a few examples of how government agencies are leveraging Metastorm Enterprise software to develop optimal business processes.   Read more government success stories on BPM here.

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Metastorm Smart Business Workspace uses widgets and mashups to deliver a role-based user experience across the entire Metastorm Enterprise software platform as well as other applications.  This single, role-driven interface is designed to meet the needs all types of roles within an organization.  Metastorm Smart Business Workspace transforms the power of Metastorm’s enterprise software by adding a layer of highly personalized user experience, resulting in rapid information access and a more productive, agile work environment regardless of the user’s organizational role. Using Metastorm Smart Business Workspace allows individuals to develop their own personal space, catering to their unique needs.  The software takes into account the user’s job description, skill set, knowledge base, key responsibilities and personal preferences to go beyond traditional interfaces to support the preferences of the user in a single, actionable environment.   

Metastorm Smart Business Workspace provides libraries of widgets related to Metastorm’s enterprise software for enterprise and business architecture, business process analysis, business process management and integration, giving users the ability to easily mash up and integrate data and applications.  The Metastorm Widget Designer enables non-technical users to quickly and easily design and create rich, entirely new and unique widgets and applications that include built-in transaction support, governance and advanced external integration capabilities. 

Metastorm Smart Business Workspace is designed to increase and promote social collaboration within the workplace, taking advantage of popular social networking capabilities to deliver meaningful business results.

“Metastorm Smart Business Workspace will open up a whole new world of insight and productivity for business users and give organizations the mechanism they need to finally leverage social collaboration technologies in a productive way within the enterprise,” said Kevin Haugh, vice president of product marketing and management at Metastorm.   “By delivering role-based, actionable workspaces that can be personalized by each user, Metastorm Smart Business Workspace will make it easier for users to leverage critical information and powerful features of the Metastorm Enterprise software suite – from enterprise modeling to business process analysis to daily process execution and participation – and to make better, faster business decisions.”

Interested in learning more about Metastorm Smart Business Workspace? Check out the social media version of the press release here, complete with screenshots and other related materials.

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It is an honor to be consistently recognized as an innovative, market leader in enterprise software.  At Metastorm, we strive to design and develop products that deliver the best enterprise effectiveness and business results.   Our main priority is our customers and partners, and we are focused on delivering the most optimal software and solutions for their business practices.  We are always pleased in not only our success, but how our products have empowered the business practices of our customers.

Our deep industry knowledge has positioned Metastorm as a leader in enterprise software for both on-premise and SaaS deployments, and we are excited to continue to build and uphold our progressive reputation.  I encourage you to stay tuned to see the exciting things Metastorm will be doing in the upcoming months.

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The concept of collaboration and the incorporation of social tools in BPM have prompted a significant amount of dialogue within the enterprise software industry (see related blog posts below).  Many critics are not convinced of the industry need for integrating social components into BPM in a meaningful way.  In many cases people view social BPM as hype – people are talking about the concept, but not demonstrating how it can be utilized to produce successful organizational models or significant results. 

Applying social networking tools to BPM allows the organization to access a wealth of untapped resources.  Though BPM is designed to yield the most optimal solutions, it has the tendency to ignore variance of opinions, ideas and work styles within the organization.  Each person in a given model has unique characteristics, knowledge and skills, which lead to their ability to perform tasks.  Recognizing that each person is inherently different, assigning everyone to completely identical series of processes hinders the organization’s ability to efficiently optimize their workflow capacity.  Social BPM alleviates this problem because it provides a platform for individuals to express their unique abilities in a very real-time and interactive way.  The future of social BPM lies in developing the best way to leverage social media tools to promote collaboration and coordination in the workplace – on an enterprise basis with a meaningful contribution to the business.

Social media tools give individuals the opportunity to work together in an open space to seamlessly design and shape their specific business models.  When people are given the option to develop their own process, they are far more likely to efficiently use the model and be motivated to find additional areas for improvement.  The idea behind it being – If you develop it, you will use it (rather than build it, and they will come).

Adding a social dimension to BPM transforms the way organizations identify, manage and resolve issues within their processes.  Through these tools, an unlimited number of users are able to contribute their suggestions to the modeling process, thus creating the most successful, efficient processes for each organization and then interact with each other during day-to-day process execution to leverage specific skill sets as needed to make the best decisions.  Social networking is then about sharing information and insights and doing business more effectively, rather than just socializing for personal gain.

Stay tuned for more on Metastorm’s upcoming announcements in the areas of enterprise collaboration and social BPM – we will soon be empowering business users in unprecedented new ways!    

In the meantime, you can read up on the subject by perusing some of these recent blog posts on Social BPM:

Fast Forward Blog – Joe McKendrick

Forrester Research – Clay Richardson

Column 2.0 – Sandy Kemsley

Thoughts on Collaborative Planning – Keith Swenson

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One lesser known but fast growing approach to quality is to leverage business process management (BPM) technology to help drive process improvement.  BPM is particularly effective because it helps organizations identify opportunities for improvement, analyze process changes, and then actually implement and monitor the improvements to realize desired gains.

In a recorded audio podcast with Six Sigma IQ, a Quality executive at a major global Insurance group (a Metastorm customer) recently shared his insights on the value of BPM for delivering quality improvements.  Listen to the podcast which covers the following:

• An overview of the company’s process improvement program
• How BPM fit in with this reengineering effort
• The decision making process in selecting a BPM solution
• How the BPM solution was deployed against targeted processes  
• Implementation challenges
• Results and benefits of BPM and Quality efforts
• BPM deployment tips and recommendations

I always get energized when I hear end user organizations talk about the value they are getting from business process management and business architecture initiatives.  Read more of these success stories or listen to more BPM-related podcasts.

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Many Process Analysts see themselves as “Process Engineers,” and they take the designation quite literally.  They like to staff the project with like-minded people, not those pesky line workers who say, “But that’s not how we do it.”  Shortly after project kick-off, the Analysts dive into as much process detail as possible, as rapidly as possible.  They generate thick notebooks of swimlane diagrams, waving them around as if they were Holy Writ. These Engineers preside over process work sessions which are jaw-droppingly boring, mistaking the nodding heads of dozing participants for some kind of agreement on issues.  They are invariably shocked and dismayed to find that their final output -say, a Requirements Definition document – is panned by project team and sponsor alike.

So, what are they doing wrong?

Frequently, they are not attending to the “People Stuff”.  Now, a thorough discussion of the People Stuff would take a good deal of time, and should really be the subject of its own training course.  I will just touch on a few key pieces of advice here:

1. Start working on the People Stuff during your very first discussion with the Project Sponsor.  That person has an agenda of his/her own (no, really!), you need to determine what it is, and whether it will be a barrier to success.  One of my best projects, years ago, was one that never even got started.  I determined in my initial meeting with the Sponsor that he was demanding a lot of time and money for automation which would be of minimal benefit to the organization.  I made the case for tabling the project (and I had to make the case multiple times, because he was politically influential).  I count it one of my great successes, because I actively promoted the good of the company over the pet project of one person.
2. Determine the stakeholders – ALL of them.  Any stakeholder whom you ignore will show up at the worst possible time in your project, count on it. And, a stakeholder who has been ignored can be a powerful antagonist to the success of the initiative.  A good way to identify the stakeholder is to use the ProVision Business Interaction Model. This modeler helps you to push your team through the task of identifying touch points and it provides a really useful visual for your scope-setting conference with the Sponsor.
3. Ask every stakeholder: “What does success look like to you?” Ask them to pretend that the new process has been implemented successfully, and has been operating perfectly for six months: “What are you seeing? What are the things you love about this new process?” These discussions will surface some objectives which no one has talked about yet.  If undiscovered, these desires would have been voiced only at the time of project ”go-live,” when it would be too late to address them. 
4. Push both the Sponsor and management to get some workers of all levels on the project team.  You really need the day-to-day experience of all levels in order to get clarity on what the process SHOULD do for them.  Managers will tend to define the process according to the documented policy, line workers will tell you how often they have to violate that policy just to meet the goals set by management. Your job is to surface the real process; identify the broken parts, and help your clients to design a better way of doing things. Bleasdale’s Third Axiom of Process Management:  Honor the REAL process. If it’s broken, fix it; but don’t pretend it’s working when it’s not.
5. Plan to do a lot of crowd control in your work sessions.  There is no free lunch for the Process Analyst:  you must prepare for the work session with forethought; spend a lot of time developing visuals which will elicit maximum understanding and engagement, generate a good agenda, and keep to it. Provide descriptive meeting notes and lists of “takeaways” for the team to work on for the next session.  Without these tools, your meeting will degenerate into a “venting session.”  All this preparation is very difficult, very time-consuming – and a big part of the “magic” which makes a project successful.  Incidentally, I strongly advise tag-teaming the work sessions, with at least two people working on facilitation and scribing.  It is virtually impossible for one person to facilitate AND take notes.  When the facilitator stops to document issues or questions, that lull in the action sucks all the energy out of the session.
6. Find out what individual team members like, and provide it.  If possible, get a small budget for refreshments. Keep in mind that the people staffing these projects are doing ‘extra’ work. Yes, they really have full-time jobs; and they must add these meetings, and your wearisome take-away assignments, to their already-crammed workload. This causes them to feel a bit entitled to a treat, now and then; and it is only fair for you to provide it.  If money is tight at my company, I pay for candy myself (customer service is my thing.). My clients are very appreciative of the fact that I care enough to learn their preferences, and the sugar keeps the energy level up for those long afternoon work sessions.
7. Perhaps the most important advice on the people stuff—Plan to work harder than the rest of the team. If you are running the process analysis portion of a project (or the whole initiative), you are the one who sets the tone for diligence, precision, and thoroughness. Your audience will care only as much as you do. So, you must be willing to set the standard for others to follow. And, from a pragmatic standpoint, you will not be able to hold other team members accountable unless you have demonstrated that you have gone above and beyond. 

 In trying to think of a way to synthesize it all, I remembered a conversation with a potential client a few years ago.  He wanted me to work with a group comprised of IT and Marketing folks, very cantankerous and opinionated.  He was concerned about the “volatility factor” on the team, and wanted reassurance that I could manage the personalities. He asked me, “Would you mind telling me your management style?”  I hadn’t had THAT discussion in years, and the question took me by surprise.  So I answered from the gut, but tentatively, “…I guess you’d call it:  “Mother Hen…” 

 Even as the words slipped out, I thought, “Oh, brother, this is a deal-killer for sure.”  But before I had even finished the thought, he blurted, “That’s eXACTly what we need!!!!”   

 That was an “Aha!” moment for me, as I came face-to-face with my own philosophy about The People Stuff, something I had never articulated before.  And, if you think about it, it’s really not a bad paradigm.  The mother hen clearly cares about her wayward charges, but she’s not going to be a pushover.  She constantly watches their progress, intervening when necessary to keep order.  She bothers them, and bothers them some more, until she achieves the desired result. She doesn’t harm them, but she doesn’t let them deviate from the chosen path either.

So, if you are your project’s Mother Hen, look at it this way: You may bruise ‘em a little bit – but you’ll keep ‘em all alive; you’ll all get where you are going; and you won’t inflict any lasting damage.  Not bad, as management styles go.

===========================

Pat Bleasdale is an AVP with Wilmington Trust, a financial services company in Delaware.  She is a veteran Business Process and IT professional, with extensive experience in management consulting.  She has been actively involved in process analysis and business transformation since the 1990s.  Her background spans multiple industries, in sectors as diverse as Financial Services and Manufacturing; and her clients have included Fortune 100 firms, as well as small and mid-sized companies.  In 2006, Pat joined Wilmington Trust as the Company’s Business Process Specialist, charged with developing and deploying a BPM framework, a process engineering methodology, and best practices throughout the organization. 

 Pat holds B.S., M.A., and PhD degrees.  In the 1980s, she coined what has become Bleasdale’s First Axiom of Process Management:  ‘Never automate a mess.’

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Neal makes an interesting parallel between financial regulations, such as Sarbanes-Oxley, with healthcare compliance, noting that only the processes that touch financial matters need to be included in the governance reporting strategy. For healthcare compliance, Neal says the same targeted approach used for financial regulatory requirements can be used for the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPPA). In the article Neal states, “BPM software allows customers to track and control who has access to the information flow and how that occurs, which is essential for HIPAA compliance.”

Metastorm has worked with several hospitals to implement BPM solutions that automate specific processes that are essential for compliance, regulatory requirements and the overall efficiency of their organization. A 238-bed osteopathic teaching hospital located in Grand Rapids, MI for example used BPM to improve the efficiency of key functions in the hospital. And, a 442-bed North Carolina not-for-profit hospital also used BPM to facilitate administrative functions including incident reporting, financial planning, job posting, and employee new hire and termination processes.

By putting the right technology in place, these healthcare providers will be able to meet HIPAA requirements and others while at the same time reduce overall costs.

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The article goes on to describe in some specific detail how BPM has helped Norfolk, VA maintain, and often enhance, service levels, meeting increased citizen expecations despite budget cuts.

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Mr. Webber designs, creates and performs startling effects for film, theater and television productions – including notable work on Forrest Gump, Casino and Oceans 13 – his discussion was equally as impressive as his background! The overall message was that in thinking outside of the box, or taking a different perspective, you can achieve things that you never thought possible.

Next I attended an introduction to Business Transformation Institute’s new Metastorm BPM® iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch application – Nymbul BPM – which puts the capabilities of business process management into the palm of your hand! This ap is very cool, and its potential for innovation is great. I would definitely recommend that you go give it a try in the partner pavilion.

So what’s next? We’re just about to unveil our exciting new product innovations, which we are very excited to share with you all! Later I will be attending Forrester analyst Clay Richardson’s discussion – How Capability Maps Can Bridge the Gap Between EA & BPM – Disciplines and Technology.

Be sure to stay tuned, because there are still many more exciting sessions and events coming up!

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And earlier this week, BPTrends published an interesting case study on Metastorm customer the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain (RPSGB) – a professional body for pharmacists and the regulatory body for pharmacists and pharmacy technicians in England, Scotland and Wales.

The organization chose Metastorm ProVision® to model and improve the as-is management processes that the Secretariat undertakes, and the procedure for dealing with the ever-growing number of customer complaints and the paperwork associated with them. It also chose Metastorm BPM® to subsequently automate the new and improved processes.

Check out the case study to learn how RPSGB accomplished its goals of having at least 80% of the investigated cases passed to the Investigating Committee within 3 months of the completed investigation, and how the application has significantly reduced the number of investigations that remained incomplete after six months.

And don’t forget, the 2010 Metastorm Global User Conference, which will be held May 18-19 at the Baltimore Marriott Waterfront, is only 12 days away. We’re gearing up for an awesome time filled with interaction, insight, ideas and inspiration! Have you registered yet?!

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The lives of many organizations have similar, humble beginnings.

But in order to survive and thrive in their environments both the caterpillar and the business have to grow – and for both parties, growing is essentially an input, output scenario.

For the business to grow, it needs to collect resources – people, materials, technology, infrastructure, etc. in order to produce its deliverables or provide its services, which will ultimately enable it to generate profits and expand.

The caterpillar on the other hand, needs to consume food to provide its body with energy - this enables the caterpillar to utilize food resources to increase its size.

Undoubtedly both the caterpillar and the business need resources to grow. But just like the caterpillar in a much beloved and well known children’s book, a business can become fat as it consumes more resources than necessary – or even the wrong resources altogether. Imagine your organization eating through 5 million sheets of paper, 40 thousand dollars in fines from a compliance violation, 150 hours of employee productivity because of duplication of effort, and so on.

Luckily for the caterpillar, it instinctively builds a cocoon that transforms it into a beautiful butterfly – eliminating its excess bulk, and allowing it to soar to new levels of prosperity.

But what’s a business to do? For businesses, overconsumption and poor management is a major problem that can lead to significant losses. Being too fat can be fatal to an enterprise – causing it to waste the profits that it needs to survive and thrive, and to become so sluggish that it is unable to effectively compete in the marketplace.

Unfortunately, no organization can wrap itself up in a cocoon and triumphantly emerge months later as a new and improved version of its former self. But if it were possible, I think it’s a safe bet that many would retract for a brief period and allow such a change to happen.

But there are technologies that can act like a cocoon to facilitate business transformation – and, even better than a cocoon, these technologies enable organizations to realize real, measurable improvements without ever requiring them to pull away from the marketplace. This means organizations can serve their customers and drive results while transforming to be Leaner, more agile and competitive than ever before.

For example, with Metastorm Enterprise, Metastorm’s integrated software suite of Business Process Management (BPM), Business Process Analysis (BPA) and Enterprise Architecture (EA), organizations can achieve business transformation in 3 easy steps:

Step 1: SEE the breadth of the enterprise including goals, resources and key process relationships with Metastorm ProVision®.

Step 2: THINK through and analyze possible organizational changes and process improvements with Metastorm ProVision for BPA – ensuring that the right changes are made.

Step 3: DO the right things with Metastorm BPM® – and quickly and cost effectively realize desired changes and results.

With Metastorm’s “See. Think. Do” capabilities, organizations can identify time and resource wasters, test and implement improvements, and then execute new processes to metamorphose from fat and sluggish to harmonious, well-balanced and resource efficient – enabling them to soar above the competition and achieve unprecedented levels of success.

With Metastorm Enterprise, business transformation truly is elementary – after all, it’s as easy as counting to 3!

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Why do clients care about their processes in the first place?  They certainly aren’t interested in the intellectual exercise of ‘decomposition,’ for its own sake (If you are, you might consider another line of work.  Business people need someone who is focused on getting in, executing a useful project, and getting out).  They care about process because they’re trying to get something done:  slash waste, outsource, automate manual work, take on more business without adding staff.  The big barrier to accomplishing any of these objectives is that business areas have a really hard time expressing and detailing what they actually do – and without that understanding, try inking an outsourcing deal!   You’ll lose your shirt on all those ‘extra charges’ for the services you didn’t specify in the contract.  Why didn’t you specify them?  Because you didn’t know your people did those things in the first place.

 Well, how do we peel that onion?  How do we determine exactly what’s going on in our business?  The Process Model is quite a nice little onion-peeler.  I explain to my Business Unit clients that we are merely uncovering the ‘building blocks’ of their work.   I start at a fairly high level, for two reasons: 

1)       Everyone can agree on what we do at a pretty generic level, so I can get some consensus-building started right away;  and

2)      Working from a bird’s-eye view, I can show people how interconnected they are to many different components of the business.  This keeps them from being shell-shocked later, when we begin to show that their process spans multiple organizational units.

As I work through the components of the process, building out the model, I continually refer to it as a jigsaw puzzle; we are simply working together to fill in all those little gray areas, creating a complete picture of What We Do.  “That’s all it is,” I explain; “It’s simply the picture of our work.  It’s not technology, it’s not systems – it’s just What We Do.  And each of you is an expert in what you do.  So each of you has some pieces to contribute to the puzzle.”

For each activity in the Process Model, I prompt the audience for key descriptors:  Why are we doing this activity?  What’s its trigger?  What comes into it?  From whom/where?  What controlling influences dictate how it gets done?  Any governmental regulations, for example?  What does the activity produce?  Where does that deliverable go?  What kind of mechanisms are used to create the deliverables?  I stress the fact that, when we have completed the Process Model, we will understand the ‘story’ of the process, and will be able to explain its value in a logical, cohesive way.

The Process Model is particularly helpful because it is turf-neutral.  That is, it does not reflect roles at all.  It simply specifies ‘work.’  So, when people begin to jockey to take – or refuse – responsibility for specific activities, it’s useful to get them back on track by explaining, “This model does not address anything at all about who does what.  That is a topic for some other day.  This picture is simply of the work that gets done.  Let’s focus on that.”

My experience is that a thorough Process Model provides the foundation for discussions ranging all the way from the strategic intent of a particular business area to the specifics of automation projects.  The ability to facilitate Process Modeling work sessions  is an important skill for any BPM professional.   And, for business and IT people charged with defining an automation project, the Process Model can be a life-saver.  Why?  Well, as Bleasdale’s Second Axiom of Process Management states:  “Without an understanding of the business process, your business requirements are just guesswork.”

Want to learn more about the value of a process model? Don’t miss Pat’s discussion at the 2010 Metastorm Global User Conference, “Drowning in Swim Lanes? A Process Model Can Help.”

==========================

Pat Bleasdale is an AVP with Wilmington Trust, a financial services company in Delaware.  She is a veteran Business Process and IT professional, with extensive experience in management consulting.  She has been actively involved in process analysis and business transformation since the 1990s.  Her background spans multiple industries, in sectors as diverse as Financial Services and Manufacturing; and her clients have included Fortune 100 firms, as well as small and mid-sized companies.  In 2006, Pat joined Wilmington Trust as the Company’s Business Process Specialist, charged with developing and deploying a BPM framework, a process engineering methodology, and best practices throughout the organization. 

 Pat holds B.S., M.A., and PhD degrees.  In the 1980s, she coined what has become Bleasdale’s First Axiom of Process Management:  ‘Never automate a mess.’

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In Ovum’s report, “Decision Matrix: Selecting a Business Process Management Vendor (Competitor Focus),” Metastorm is placed in the elite, “shortlist” category – “the vanguard of the BPM market” – because it “combine[s] excellence in core technologies with a clear articulated approach to BPM.”

Metastorm also receives accolades for its user satisfaction rating. The report states that “the best indicator” of Metastorm’s success “is its excellent performance in the end-user sentiment survey. Metastorm has achieved the highest overall user sentiment assessment score.” These results are similar to the findings of another recent report – industry analyst firm Gartner’s “Magic Quadrant for Business Process Analysis Tools,” in which Metastorm receives one of the highest rankings in overall customer satisfaction.

In Ovum’s report, Metastorm is also featured among the market leaders in nearly all other assessment categories, has one of the highest overall technology assessment scores, and receives a nod for its “proven process integration layer” that serves customers “regardless of their technology landscape.”

According to the report, “the results of this study clearly demonstrate that Metastorm has the ability to compete at the very top-end of the BPM market.”

Our other recent credentials – being placed in the “Leaders” quadrant in Gartner’s “Magic Quadrant for Business Process Analysis Tools” report, as well as being named to KMWorld’s 100 Companies that Matter in Knowledge Management and eWeek’s Products to Watch, March, 2010 lists – have also strengthened Metastorm’s position as a top tier BPMS vendor, and a top competitor in the BPM market.

Still, the greatest testament to the power of Metastorm’s best-of-breed technology offering, and holistic approach to end-to-end process improvement is the overwhelming success of our customers. Ovum’s report comments that, “Clearly, [the] over 150 customer success stories published by Metastorm are ringing true.”

We’d like to second that. With these and countless other customers realizing significant ROI each day, Metastorm delivers real, measurable results to organizations all over the world. And that’s the most important credential of them all.

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The podcast, “The USAF, Six Sigma, and BPM,” discusses how the US Air Force utilized Metastorm ProVision® and Metastorm BPM® to achieve a 200% increase in automation to gain more efficiency, productivity, and control.

According to Chaney, the project began when the Department of Defense (DoD) mandated that, in order for DoD organizations to continue receiving funding, their IT investments had to include an Enterprise Architecture (EA) tool.

As part of its new EA initiative, the US Air Force wanted to identify how its IT infrastructure was supporting its business processes, and how well the processes were performing in the supported environments. To meet the goals of an existing initiative, Air Force Smart Operations for the 21st Century (AFSO21), which aims to streamline processes and optimize resource consumption – the US Air Force also wanted to “Lean out” its business processes to do more with less.

Listen to this podcast and read this customer success story to learn how the team used Metastorm ProVision to see and analyze its processes, and to identify time wasters and other areas of inefficiency, how it subsequently used Metastorm BPM to execute the Leaner, more agile processes across the entire enterprise, and how it utilized the power of the Metastorm Enterprise software suite to realize greater efficiency, and meet the goals of AFSO21.

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