The art of back seat driving

I enjoy blogging. It’s a great creative outlet.

It forces me to sit down and research BPM related subjects, write about them, and then follow up on the feedback – “the ultimate Petri dish for innovation and ideation”.

I guess like all bloggers, one of the targets is to influence.
So how much influence does a blog have? A bit? A lot? Nada?
I suddenly find myself “preaching” on what we should do, what we shouldn’t.
I guess it’s a bit of my frustration at the fact that BPM hasn’t taken off..

BPM is like a airplane on the runway, engines full speed, you can feel the thrust, the airplane is speeding down the runway.
It’s speeding, it’s speeding… it’s still speeding…
And you say to yourself – “Why doesn’t it take off?”. It’s running back and forth down the runway, but it never leaves the ground.

Nothing is wrong with BPM. It has potential, it has business value, but it just hasn’t taken off yet. It hasn’t become a must-have in organisations, it hasn’t become the centre of attention. We have been at the “tipping point” for years. We have been jumping over the “Trough of Disillusionment”
… but we have yet to see the promised land.

So, who is the Moses that will bring us to the promised land?

The Analysts
Now, I’m not going to criticize them. I’ll just say that that the influence of the big analyst firms in the industry has rapidly declined.
There are so many great BPM resources out there, and so many other references that customers can turn to these days, it makes their job harder, more competitive, more focused on marketing. They have stopped being industry leaders and just keep to the industry analysis part of their role, in order to survive.

Once, the analysts had great insights. Nowadays, most of their public publications are shallow. Most of their content are no more than marketing teasers intended to drive you to their paid content. They no longer lead the market, they just react to things that happen in it. It’s a pity, I had such high hopes that they could lead us to the promised land (or at least point us in the general direction..)

The people in the field
Like in every industry, the people we should be listening to – are the people in the field. The people that actually see what works, and what doesn’t. What the customer actually needs (which is usually different to what they say they want).
The problem is that these guys usually too busy fighting in the trenches.
As Sandy Kemsley once said: ”Anybody who works for a vendor and has something interesting to say is probably too busy doing other things, like building the product, to spend much time blogging”

People in the field (myself included) also see more of the trees and less of the woods. We see things through a narrow perspective. If you are technical – you often miss the sales point of view. If you are sales – you are focused on the short term perspective. If you are a vendor – you only see your wins and losses, and only of your typical customer-base…
No. The people in the field should be listened to, but they won’t bring us to the promised land either.

Consultancy Companies
I might be wrong, but I believe that the boost to the industry will come through the consultancy companies. Those people who advise organisations what needs to change, what can be added to the organisation.
Not just the BPM consultancy companies, but the ordinary consultancy companies.
They are already out there, already embedded in organisations, already have the trust of the CIOs and CEOs, already providing advice on IT.

I bet most of them don’t even know what BPM is.
If they knew, they could advise organisations to use it. And if they actually see it working successfully in one of their consultancy projects – I’m sure they would actively promote BPM in their customerbase.

It’s just like any sales cycle.
Selling software to a new customer is always harder, and requires more investment than selling additional software to an existing customer.
Consultancy companies are already out there, embedded in organisations. Surely convincing them (and let them convince their customers) is easier.

So I’ve got this urge, but I’m not sure what is the best way to proceed.
How do you target consultancy companies? How do you educate them on BPM?

Where is this promised land everyone’s talking about?…