Once you have decided that something is broken in the organization that process change may be able to fix. (“See the I don’t want to deal with it now!” posting), we have to take some action. If this is your first project, or perhaps you have just seen one that hasn’t worked out so well, you may be nervous. A certain amount of apprehension is not a bad thing. It should help you prepare better, understand the scope of the problem and determine potential pitfalls and outcomes.
Any good project manager will tell you, it’s better to know where the bodies are buried before you start out. So more knowledge about potential problems is a good thing. At least that way you can do some risk assessment and planning.
Stepping up and stepping out
A number of items will help you step up to this challenge. Some of these are skills and are knowledge, others are more motivational factors. Let’s start out with skills and knowledge. Your checklist should include:
- Scoping out the project needs
- Personal research on how to Discover, Communicate and Improve processes
- How to manage a BPM project
- Best practices on all of the above
The items in the list above will be tackled separately, and will be the subjects of future posts. We still have the motivational factor. At the end of the day you will need to volunteer or make yourself available for the project. This means standing up and saying “I will”, “Step out of the boat”, “I am ready for this challenge”, or whatever is going to make you take the challenge.
Over many years, I have seen huge career development occur by a commitment to this first step. After all you can’t reach the fruit unless you climb the tree and move out on a limb.
