Happy New Year to All

I can only hope that the new year brings you all the wishes and dreams that you imagine while respecting the souls that share this planet with you. You may be wishing for deeper relationships with significant others, family and friends. You may be wishing for continued or better health. You may have a bigger picture in mind, therefore you are wishing for peace on earth. You may be looking for opportunities to serve and bless others. You may want to make yourself a better person with the help of God and close peeps. It matters not, but I pray your wishes come true in 2016.


   HAPPY NEW YEAR:  A TOAST to 2016 & YOU !!!!!

Tibco as a Digital Business Platform

Recently I published two blogs about digital business and digital platform. The firstdefined digital business, and the second described the components of a digital business platform. Now, it is time to investigate TIBCO and the digital business platform (DBP). This post will not be an inventory of all of the technologies provided by TIBCO, but a list of strengths to consider in creating your organization’s digital business platform. This is my first DBP vendor rating and I decided to focus on core strengths rather than detailed capabilities. If you are curious about other vendors please see the linked post here. If you want to hear about other vendors in the future, please contact me through my blog. Here is my take on Tibco as a DBP

Traditionally, TIBCO was known for its strong integration capabilities. However, over time, TIBCO has either built or bought significant technology assets that can be used stand alone or in combination with other technologies. Recently, TIBCO has embarked on integrating some of its technology assets and expanding base capabilities to provide for the complete Digital Business Platform (DBP).

Happy Holidays

I would like to wish my readers the best of the holiday season as I ponder the "good news" of my saviors birth. Sherry, Maggie Mae and I wish you a blessed and peaceful holiday season and particularly good health for 2016. I can count my blessings for 2015 and am thankful for the ability to communicate with many readers out there. I expect another exciting year for those that are dealing with the transformation to digital, so let's enjoy the time to rest and hang with our loved ones plus friends. I also hope and pray for more peace in a turbulent world. 

Blog Activity for 4Q 2015

I thought you might find it interesting what folks are interested in reading about process related topics on my blog. The hot topics were business rules, fast data, digital business, build digital transformation plans and predictions for 2016,  but that might have been influenced by the fact that I did a series on each topic I'm now on my way to 250,000 hits to date since I semi-retired from good old Gartner. I would sure like to hear what topics you would be interested in, so I can more meet your needs. Please post a comment, if you think there is a need for a particular topic. 

Where in the world are the hits coming from?  The US is always number one by a wide margin and is not shown here. There is no surprise that France, Russia & Germany are at the top, but I am surprised that Russia jumped ahead of France this quarter. 

Smart Process Snippets: Enabling the Digital Business

It has been proven that end-to-end or large-scoped processes can behave intelligently by calling out to big data analytics, predictive analytics, cognitive knowledge services, mining, optimization, and signal or pattern recognition services. In many cases, the process software can embed these capabilities in a process/case to augment a case or process, identify opportunities for change, and make adjustments in flight. These are centralized and encompassing processes, but the idea of smaller sub-processes, or  process snippets, that can be leveraged in different contexts in a static or dynamic mode is emerging. They may be either in a centrally controlled case or process, or acting autonomously. How do snippets get smart? 

If you want more details, please see 
 http://www.tibco.com/blog/2015/12/14/smart-process-snippets-enabling-the-digital-business/

Art Projects for 4Q Quarter 2015

I concentrated on digital art this quarter and have some pieces to share with you. I managed to be shown in Art Scope Miami this month, so that was exciting. One of these days, I'll make a featured artist and head out to one of these big events. I hope you enjoy these and let me know if any appeal to you :) You can check out my web sites for older pieces.

Web Presence: http://www.james-sinur.com/  & http://www.jamessinur.com/

Digital Art: 

The Blues:

Cool Ripples:

Marble Explosion:

Color on Fire:

Paintings: 

Lava Flow:

Mystical Mesa:

Transforming Signals into Business Opportunities

There are many signals and events that emerge in and around organizations. Now add to that the signals that are merging in a real-time fashion in the geopolitical world and markets that are changing daily. In addition, there will be many signals coming from the billions of things in the Internet of Things (IoT). If you don’t have a headache thinking about this right now, let me add some more complication for you. Like the “Transformers” in the highly successful movie series from Paramount Pictures, signals can disguise themselves, so they look normal. Now, not only do organizations have to capture many more signals to process, but they also have to figure out which ones really matter as they can transform into an opportunity or a threat. While individual signals could mean something to organizations as they could be leading indicators, it is generally true that business patterns emerge from a number of signals sensed over time. Once recognized, these business patterns will require proper analysis, critical decisions, and appropriate actions. 

See the following for more details: 
http://www.tibco.com/blog/2015/12/09/signals-business-patterns-in-disguise/

2016: Process as an Enabler of Work in the Digital Era

Process is about to overcome the stigma of being only useful in saving costs and optimizing rigid work patterns in and around organizations. This will be true long term, but there is so much more to BPM. While business process management (BPM) is not considered one of the flashy technologies in and around digital business, it will become an essential enabler of digital businesses. Tomorrow's Digital Business Platforms (DBP) will have a strong thread of BPM for work management and the development of resource and task management. With the emphasis in digital business on incremental transformation, dynamic process / case behavior, rapid iterative development, visual business and better customer experiences, BPM is an obvious enabler for 2016 and beyond. The trends in digital business are unstoppable, so emergent and growing BPM will be dragged along as the invisible enabler.  See 2016 Predictions for Digital Business:

http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/12/2016-predictions-serious-digital.html

BPM will enable digital work because it can manage and collaborate with autonomous and intelligent resources. It can handle emergent business patterns, assist decisions and see that emergent work reaches critical goals and dynamic milestones. BPM can be the hub of visual development that works in an incremental and innovative way by supporting experimentation and fast low code development. BPM can support incremental composition, re-composition and incremental transformation allowing for evolutionary business practices as well as revolutionary new business models. BPM can be a hub for visual operations and customer customization within governance constraints.

Net; Net: 

A case management and explicit rule driven BPM with deep analytic capabilities (predictive included) will be essential in 2016.  BPM was born to support an agile, dynamic and speedy digital world. Make no mistake BPM will be inside of digital business without being flashy.

Additional Reading on Digital Technologies:

http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/10/creating-digital-business-platform.html
http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/10/selecting-technology-partners-for-your.html
http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/10/intelligent-process-management-in-your.html

2016 Predictions: Serious Digital Business Progress

When I look back on 2015, I saw organizations working diligently on creating a better user experience leveraging social mobile and the cloud. Some of the leading organizations were exploring new or extended business models leveraging digital technologies as they explored where they were headed in the dynamic digital world. Most organizations were trying to get their hands on how to plan the digital transformations in a incremental and rational manner. Some organizations, under serious business model threats, seemed to be reacting while the other majority of organizations were trying to learn how to better plan to transition to a better digital business.

2016 will be a very different animal. Traction will start to appear by creating target plans that can evolve with experience while working on some of the initial steps showing early success and lessons learned. Listed below are what I expect to see out of the fast follower organizations and a percentage of the follower organizations.

Crisper Digital Transformation Plans:

Expect to see better plans with targeted plans that bring together thought through structures including architecture diagrams, cost/benefits, organization, skills, technologies, projects, experiments and measures of success with feed back loops. These plans will consider executive vision, competitive comparison, constituent input, constraints, digital technologies and salvage plans for legacy business processes and applications.

Serious Point of View Journey Mapping:

Up until now a better customer experience has been a key driver for digital. This will continue, but other constituents will play a role as well. This includes partners, employees and vendors. As the walls between organizations disappear and the linkage of the virtual and physical worlds change, mapping journeys and points of view will be essential in creating a digital experience that wins for all involved. Right now organizations optimize on their own experience; not the perceptions and contexts of others interfacing with their organization.

Innovation Through Experimentation:

Not all plans will be baked, so there will be a certain amount of experimentation happening. This kind of fail fast and cheap approach will ripple through many of an organization on the way to the new digital world. For organizations that do not plan, this is a way to demonstrate potential. For those that do plan, isolating risk is a key habit that can be supported by experimentation. This way plans can be updated with emerging experience even if a great plan was created to start.

Incremental Delivery Guided by Goals:

It is important to keep the goals pretty stable, but the journey to those goals may vary and shift during the execution of any incremental plan. Evolution and emergence will play a significant role in the digital journey, but not creating an initial plan with solid expected outcomes and goals is risky. Incremental delivery gives a chance for low risk failure like experimentation.

Skills Shortages Driving Internal Development:

There will be skill shortages and organizations are accustomed to not investing in their people through education and training. This will change. The skills shortage will so severe, that organizations will be forced to invest in internal skill building over time. Short term savings for some of the digital projects can be used as a capital funding mechanism for skills development. Experimentation and incremental approaches reduces the investment and time line for skills mastery.

Learning New Change and Development Methods:

New or refurbished methods for quick and big change will have to evolve. Organizations committed to "wagile" methods that combine the best of the agile methods such as SCRUM with some of the planning disciplines in water fall and sequential methods, will benefit the most. Fast change management will become critical and people will have to be rewarded to embrace this kind of change now that the threat of losing their jobs has lost it's effectiveness for now. It could rear it's head again.

Leveraging Change Friendly Tools & Techniques:

Many of the emerging digital technologies support incremental development and composition. It will be important to select types of technologies that allow for a "do it; try it and fix it" approach. Business process management tools are particularly good at this, but few other tools categories have the model driven approach to development, testing and improving.

Net; Net:

In 2016 organizations will get serious about digital while they save enough money to fund the digital efforts by the incremental delivery of funding. This will sort out the pretenders from the winners. We will see emerging success and failures in 2016. We have a lot to learn and change in 2016.

Further Reading on Digital Plans: 

http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/11/the-top-seven-ingredients-in-digital.html
http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/11/the-top-seven-digital-plan-inputs.html
http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/11/the-top-12-digital-technologies-to.html

Additional Reading on Digital:

http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/10/what-is-digital-business.html
http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/11/is-digital-for-everything.html
http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/11/getting-to-situational-business.html
http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/10/selecting-technology-partners-for-your.html
http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/10/creating-digital-business-platform.html

Enabling the Incremental Business with Composition

Organizations are constantly looking for ways to make their business operations more agile or adaptable, as this is table stakes in the new digital era. As signals, patterns, and scenarios emerge, organizations must quickly respond. This need has been present for a long time, and the time to market response is just speeding up to the point of near real time. One of the most effective responses to the “need for speed” world is incremental composition and re-composition. This incremental approach can occur during development and operations of processes and applications. This approach makes a big difference with the experimental and incremental transformation forces that have been released in the race to digital. To read more click the link below and additional reading below. 

http://www.tibco.com/blog/2015/11/30/incremental-composition-the-engine-of-agility/

Additional Reading on Creating a Digital Plan:

http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/11/the-top-seven-ingredients-in-digital.html
http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/11/the-top-seven-digital-plan-inputs.html

Additional Reading on Digital:

http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/10/what-is-digital-business.html
http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/11/is-digital-for-everything.html
http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/11/getting-to-situational-business.html
http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/10/selecting-technology-partners-for-your.html
http://jimsinur.blogspot.com/2015/10/creating-digital-business-platform.html