Big “P” Processes

Understanding Strategy as a Key Business Analysis Tool: It’s Not Business Process!

by Ronald G. Ross on May 8, 2012

John Matthias recently wrote this about our new book, Building Business Solutions: Business Analysis with Business Rules[1]:
“I especially liked the discussion about the mission and goals. I still see business process analysis in organizations I visit where the goals are not articulated well, and the results are not useful. (I’ve done it myself.) It’s [...]

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To-Do Items, Checklists and Out-of-Tolerance Business Events … Business Process Problems?

by Ronald G. Ross on May 3, 2012

Does a to-do item constitute a business process? No. Does a checklist constitute a business process? No. Does an out-of tolerance event constitute a business process? No. Analysis of the following case study illustrates.
The take-away: “Process” shouldn’t be force-fit to every aspect of business operations. That kind of ‘Big-P process’ perspective as I frequently [...]

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How Many Different Ways Can Your Organization Be ‘Silo-ed’? Why You Need to Address Every ‘Silo-ing’

by Ronald G. Ross on April 10, 2012

‘Silo’ is so common as an industry buzzword we mostly just take it for granted. The usual sense is ‘functional’ silo or ‘organizational silo’.
I recently heard ‘no man stands alone’ (‘alone’ = ‘silo-ed’) as a common-sense justification for Big-P process. (See http://goo.gl/Cuk3s) That logic is simply flawed. Here are other ways your business can be [...]

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The Debate Continues … Business Rules in Zachman 3.0 … and the Upcoming Business Architecture Summit at BBC2011

by Ronald G. Ross on October 20, 2011

At the Business Architecture Summit in Ft. Lauderdale (BBC2011 – Oct 31 – Nov 4) I will be joining John Zachman and Roger Burlton for one of our rabble-raising 3Amigo sessions. The session is only an hour long, so I’m sure there will be some fast talking(!).
One of the first questions I want John [...]

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Where are Your Business Rules … In a Big-P Process Dead Zone?

by Ronald G. Ross on September 6, 2011

On an EA LinkedIn group last week, Nick Malik wrote the following about business rules in Zachman Framework 3.0:
“I’ll bite. If the ‘enterprise ontology’ is similar to the periodic table of elements, then business rules are molecules. They are compositions of elements with specific implications, embedded in event handling logic. Why would you expect to [...]

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