Business Process Management (BPM) is a methodology to ensure that all the processes support a common set of goals and objectives. It involves automating and/or improving the effectiveness of process activities, tasks and outcomes to accomplish particular business purposes. Its goals include not only efficiency and productivity but, beyond them, control, responsiveness and improvement. Efficiency enables individuals to maximize the time they can devote to priority business tasks and to maximize throughput. Control assures that company resources are aligned optimally to execute strategies. Responsiveness and improvement support the competitive differentiation that enables a company to excel over others.

BPM, then, is about improving processes and implementing systems that enable the improvement. In pursuit of this mission, BPM starts with the following assumptions:

• As a business changes, so must its processes; as a result, they need to be revisited periodically.
• Processes are used by multiple organizations and stakeholders.
• Processes interact with systems and people. Those people can be employees, customers, suppliers or other stakeholders.