Business process management, or BPM, is one extremely hot area for vendors and IT consultants. This far-reaching and complex concept is a combination of IT governance, business-activity monitoring, architecture and application integration, workflow management and process modeling techniques.

Done right, BPM allows organizations to define, execute and refine processes that involve human interaction (such as placing orders)—working with and among multiple business applications—and manage dynamic process rules and changes)—not just simple, static flows, states CIO's BPM overview.

Many CIOs and businesses, however, are struggling with BPM initiatives today, according to BPM analysts and research. A September 2007 Aberdeen Group report titled "BPM Convergence" states that getting business integration and workflow software products to work together has long been a challenge for companies. "The results have been islands of BPM functionality scattered throughout the organization, each serving a discrete function," states the report.

That's not the only problem; it is just plain difficult to make BPM work, according to another industry survey. The recent survey of 125 product and service companies that looked at how the companies are using BPM to drive innovation found that they "lack the best practices, vision and executive sponsorship necessary to realize the full benefits of their BPM investments." The survey was funded by BPM IT services provider Virtusa and management consultant PRTM.

Even so, a sampling of the survey findings reveals why there's so much BPM hype. More than half of the companies participating in the survey said they use or plan to use BPM. Companies responding to the survey said they are using BPM initiatives to target product and service platform management, CRM and internal operations.

In addition, 47 percent of respondents were interested in deploying BPM for innovative product development, which is a new area for BPM applications that has lots of buzz and vendor activity.

BPM Is a People Problem

But the gap between companies' BPM aspirations and what they have actually been able to accomplish so far looks more like a massive gulf than a gap.

First, it's critical that companies understand the underlying barriers to making BPM not just work, but work well. According to the results of the Aberdeen Group BPM survey of more than 160 IT and business executives and managers, the key challenges for companies deploying a BPM system have less to do with technology and more to do with people and processes.

"Part of the [BPM] solution is technical, but another part is organizational, and this is where many companies stumble," states the Aberdeen report. "It takes highly capable BPM products, a willingness to take a hard look at business processes to succeed, and organizational maturity."