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Scaling Up Your Process Management

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Any new business faces questions: have we found the right product/market fit? Does the business model work? Have we got enough money to keep the doors open? Typically, new businesses are focused on staying afloat, meaning anything that isn’t immediately relevant to that goal is left until later—whenever that might be!   

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Machen Sie mehr aus Ihrem Prozessmanagement

However, most businesses soon realize that staying afloat means finding the most efficient way to deliver their products or services to customers. As a result, the way a business functions starts to move into focus, with managers and staff looking to achieve the same outcome, in the same way, over and over. The quickest route to this? Establishing efficient processes. 

Once a business has clarified the responsibilities of all staff, and identified their business process framework, they are better able to minimize waste and errors, avoid misunderstandings, reduce the number of questions asked during the day-to-day business, and generally operate more smoothly and at a greater pace.

Expanding your business with process management

Of course, no new business wants to remain new for long—becoming firmly established is the immediate goal, with a focus on expansion to follow, leading to new markets, new customers, and increased profitability. Effectively outlining processes takes on even more importance when companies seek to expand. Take recruitment and onboarding, for example. 

Ad hoc employment processes may work for a start-up, but a small business looking to take the next step needs to introduce new staff members frequently and ensure they have the right information to get started immediately. The solution is a documented, scalable, and repeatable process that can be carried out as many times as needed, no matter the location or the role being filled. 

When new staff are employed, they’ll need to know how their new workplace actually functions. Once again, a clear process framework means all the daily processes needed are accessible to all staff, no matter where the employee is based. As the business grows, more and more people will come on board, each with their own skills, and very likely their own ideas and suggestions about how the business could be improved… 

Collaborative process management

Capturing the wisdom of the crowd is also a crucial factor in a successful business—ensuring all employees have a chance to contribute to improving the way the company operates. In a business with an effective process modeling framework, this means providing all staff with the capability to design and model processes themselves. 

Traditionally, business process modeling is a task for the management or particular experts, but this is an increasingly outdated view. Nobody wants to pass up the valuable knowledge of individuals; after all, the more knowledge there is available about a process, the more efficiently the processes can be modeled and optimized. Using a single source of process truth for the entire organization means companies can promote collaborative and transparent working environments, leading to happier staff, more efficient work, and better overall outcomes for the business. 

Collaborative process management helps to grow organizations avoid cumbersome, time-consuming email chains, or sifting through folders for the latest version of documents, as well as any number of other hand brakes on growth. 

Instead, process content can be created and shared by anyone, any time, helping drive a company’s digital and cloud strategies, enhance investigations and process optimization efforts, and support next-gen business transformation initiatives. In short, this radical transparency can serve as the jumping-off point for the next stage of a company’s growth. 

Want to find out more about professional process management? Read our White Paper 7-Step Guide to Effective Business Transformation!

Ariaa Reeds

Data Science Certifications to Excel in Your Career: A Holistic Approach

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Personal and professional growth for an individual depends on the investment one puts in continued education. Continued education is necessary for leadership positions and industries such as human resources, manufacturing, marketing, operations, information technology, etc. Staying updated with the relevant profession is essential to move up the career ladder, and in certain cases, it is essential to save the job. 

It showcases your knowledge, education, and relevant skills necessary to perform the job for the current and future employers. ‘Career growth’ is not defined by the higher salaries but the effort made to earn those ‘higher salaries.’ Higher salaries do not mean the appreciable yearly increment in a well-established firm but earning the competent salaries by staying with the trend. We will discuss the learning opportunities for the most in-demand data science professionals here. 

 

Data Science certifications for the Newbies

When you understand the basic principles of data science, it would help you use the tools productively. If you are looking to develop data analytic skills, then you can opt for certain free online courses. It helps you learn the basics of data science at your own pace and get acquainted with the field knowledge.  

Most of the data science certification program or courses mentioned below are available free online. Though, a few may charge for gaining the certification once you finish the course. Whatever the case may be, you get destined to gain knowledge in the field which would be a good kick start for your career. 

To mention a few, they are:

  • Coursera – Data Science Specialization
  • Edx – Data Science Essentials
  • Udacity – Introduction to Machine Learning
  • IBM – Data Science Fundamentals
  • Data Quest – Become a Data Scientist
  • Kdnuggets – Data Mining Course

Most of these courses are available free online and are self-paced. You can get the basic hold of the subject and afterward, you may go for premium courses to advance learning or earn certifications.  

 

Data Science Certifications for Professionals

To stay competitive in the industry, you should get certified from industry-renowned global certification bodies. Mention not to say, there is a lot of difference between courses and certifications. Though a course gives you the relevant subject knowledge or skill, a certification program is vendor-neutral and increases your employability factor. It equips you with the latest tools and techniques and assures your prospective recruiter that you are their shot to hire. 

To mention a few of the best data science certifications, they are:

  • SAS Academy for Data Science – SAS Certified Data Scientist
  • Data Science Council of America (DASCA) – Senior Data Scientist 
  • Google- Google Certified Professional Data Engineer
  • Dell EMC Education Services– Data Science Associate v2 (DCS-DS) certification and the Data Science Specialist (DCS-DS) certification

These certifications equip you with the latest tools and techniques and assure your prospective recruiter that you are their shot to hire. 

 

Industry-specific Certifications

Industry-specific certifications, as the name itself indicates, these are specific to the industries. These certifications provide you specific training with use cases in the industry you are interested in or working. It helps you solve industrial problems at a faster rate with deep insight.  

To mention a few:

  • Agriculture Industry- Certificate in Agricultural Data Science
  • Fintech industry- Certification course for financial professions
  • Business Analytics – Harvard Business School’s Certification Program 

The data collected by an education department is entirely different from the e-commerce industry. These certifications give you a clear-cut idea about data mining and deriving insights by using the right and specific tools as required.

 

Cross-functional Certifications

A data science job is an end-to-end job. Data insights are used to improve business productivity, marketing strategy, and business value. So, it is good to know other fields also like business analytics, marketing, manufacturing. Though these certifications do not directly deal with the subject, it structures your knowledge base in the industry. It gives a holistic approach to your work and widens your organizational value. 

To mention a few, they are:

  • Project Management Institute- Project Management Professional Certification
  • Springboard – Certified UX Designer
  • Business Analyst Professional Program – Institute of Business Analyst Training

These certifications give you complete knowledge of the system and help you derive data with a holistic approach and gain business benefits. 

 

Wrapping Up:

In addition to certifications, it is necessary to complete a few independent projects to showcase your skills. It increases practical knowledge and provides hand-on-experience in technology. Ultimately, the knowledge we impart for the organization that can increase value matters. 

So, rather than choosing certifications or learnings merely for job or salary purposes, it is recommended to choose for learning purposes. When you develop interest and dedication for the subject, it helps you go a long way in the career path. 

Be strategic in your learnings and increase the knowledge base.

 

 

Signavio

Seeing the Big Picture: Combining Enterprise Architecture with Process Management

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Ever tried watching a 3D movie without those cool glasses people like to take home? Two hours of blurred flashing images is no-one’s idea of fun. But with the right equipment, you get an immersive experience, with realistic, clear, and focused images popping out of the screen. In the same way, the right enterprise architecture brings the complex structure of an organization into focus.

We know that IT environments in today’s modern businesses consist of a growing number of highly complex, interconnected, and often difficult-to-manage IT systems. Balancing customer service and efficiency imperatives associated with social, mobile, cloud, and big data technologies, along with effective day-to-day IT functions and support, can often feel like an insurmountable challenge.

Enterprise architecture can help organizations achieve this balance, all while managing risk, optimizing costs, and implementing innovations. Its main aim is to support reform and transformation programs. To do this, enterprise architecture relies on the accuracy of an enterprise’s complex data systems, and takes into account changing standards, regulations, and strategic business demands.

Components of effective enterprise architecture

In general, most widely accepted enterprise architecture frameworks consist of four interdependent domains:

  • Business Architecture

A blueprint of the enterprise that provides a common understanding of the organization, and used to align strategic objectives and tactical demands. An example would be representing business processes using business process management notation.

  • Data Architecture

The domain that shows the dependencies and connections between an organization’s data, rules, models, and standards.

  • Applications Architecture

The layer that shows a company’s complete set of software solutions and their relationships with each other.

  • Infrastructure Architecture

Positioned at the lowest level, this component shows the relationships and connections of an organization’s existing hardware solutions.

Effective EA implementation means employees within a business can build a clear understanding of the way their company’s IT systems execute their specific work processes, as well as how they interact and relate to each other. It allows users to identify and analyze application and business performance, with the goal of enabling underperforming IT systems to be promptly and efficiently managed.

In short, EA helps businesses answer questions like:

  • Which IT systems are in use, and where, and by whom?
  • Which business processes relate to which IT systems?
  • Who is responsible for which IT systems?
  • How well are privacy protection requirements upheld?
  • Which server is each application run on?

The same questions, shifted slightly to refer to business processes rather than IT systems, are what drive enterprise-level business process management as well. Is it any wonder the two disciplines go together like popcorn and a good movie?

Combining enterprise architecture with process management

Successful business/IT alignment involves effectively leveraging an organization’s IT to achieve company goals and requirements. Standardized language and images (like flow charts and graphs) are often helpful in fostering mutual understanding between highly technical IT services and the business side of an organization.

In the same way, combining EA with collaborative business process management establishes a common language throughout a company. Once this common ground is established, misunderstandings can be avoided, and the business then has the freedom to pursue organizational or technical transformation goals effectively.

At this point, strengthened links between management, IT specialists, and a process-aware workforce mean more informed decisions become the norm. A successful pairing of process management, enterprise architecture, and IT gives insight into how changes in any one area impact the others, ultimately resulting in a clearer understanding of how the organization actually functions. This translates into an easier path to optimized business processes, and therefore a corresponding improvement in customer satisfaction.

Effective enterprise architecture provides greater transparency inside IT teams, and allows for efficient management of IT systems and their respective interfaces. Along with planning continual IT landscape development, EA supports strategic development of an organization’s structure, just as process management does.

Combining the two leads to a quantum leap in the efficiency and effectiveness of IT systems and business processes, and locks them into a mutually-reinforcing cycle of optimization, meaning improvements will continue over time. Both user communities can contribute to creating a better understanding using a common tool, and the synergy created from joining EA and business process management adds immediate value by driving positive changes company-wide.

Want to find out more? Put on your 3D glasses, and test your EA initiatives with Signavio! Sign up for your free 30-day trial of the Signavio Business Transformation Suite today.