BPM and the Internet of Things
What will life be like in 2025 when billions of smart devices are connected to the Web? Recent research by the Pew Internet Project looking at digital life in 2025 gives some pointers to what life might be like once all these smart devices come on-stream. The Pew report reflects that this is a market in the very earliest stages of its evolution, with little overall consensus and concerns being expressed around the social (privacy, exclusion) as well as technical implications (integration) of the “Internet of things” (IoT). One word, however, that pops up frequently in the Pew report is “invisible.” The Internet of things will be notable for being invisible.
IoT and “Outsourced” Processes
As humans, we have pretty much mastered our ability to generate data, and the emergence of the IoT will take our ability to create data to another dimension. What we haven’t mastered, however, is our ability to increase time. Human attention is limited. As a result, many of us may be happy to outsource our attention to important, yet mundane processes, enabling us to focus on more critical or enjoyable activities. For example, service scheduling, insurance renewals, shopping for the best interest rates, performing price comparisons and health monitoring are all important processes that many of us would be happy to outsource.
To date, much of the IoT debate, outside of industrial IoT, has involved smart-home solutions and wearables. Yet, many of these solutions are not invisible and instead draw users further into the Web rather than freeing users from it. Having milk bottles, fridges, toothbrushes and shoes sending you alerts and competing for your attention seems ludicrous. Successful IoT solutions will be those that remove complexity from our lives, rather than add to it with yet another user interface that demands our attention. Two technologies that will be key to delivering the invisibility of the IoT are business process management (BPM) and case management.
The Value of BPM and Case Management
IoT devices capture data about themselves, their environment and their users. The value of this data can only be fully extracted if it is made available to businesses and, by extension, connected to business processes. Collecting customer usage data is pointless if the data doesn’t rapidly find its way into the hands of a sales person or the product development team. Information on a product performance issue—or whether an elderly relative hasn’t taken her pills—is of limited value unless used to trigger an automatic support process. But simply triggering processes is not enough. Optimized data collection on the smart device must also be supported by optimized business processes orchestrated by BPM and case management applications.
The most basic role of BPM suites is to automate and optimize mundane and repetitive processes, thus freeing employees to focus where they can add more value. Data has always been the blood in the veins of BPM solutions, used to trigger processes, recommend next-best actions and guide employees. BPM applications are thus perfectly suited to act as the interface between IoT devices and the enterprise, delivering the invisibility and background processing that will be required by IoT solutions. For more complex processes involving IoT devices—for example, field service, medical and insurance processes—case management suites, such as the KANA Enterprise™ platform, can be used to manage and optimize the interface between the smart device and the organization and its employees. In effect, the IoT device becomes another channel of communication between the customer and the organization.
From insurance to medicine, IoT process applications are starting to spring up and deliver some significant benefits to users. For example, in car telematics, devices that monitor driver behavior and adjust the insurance premiums accordingly are becoming widely adopted, especially as a way of reducing premiums for young drivers. Some telematics providers include an accident service with the black box device, alerting the insurer in the event of a collision. That is an example of an invisible IoT process execution.
Originally considered back-office applications, BPM and case management have moved to the front of the house and into contact centers, integrating with customer relationship management (CRM) applications and mobile applications to deliver optimized customer service solutions. The recent transition of BPM to the cloud and the emergence of BPM PaaS (platform as a service) make it ready for the next stage in its evolution through integration with IoT devices.
IoT solutions will, for the most part, be invisible, acting as an airbag for our lives, ready to step in when we need it, not constantly competing for our attention. IoT solutions will be a mix of technologies, from the smart devices themselves to voice recognition software and data warehouses. For many IoT solutions, BPM applications will be a key component. BPM and case management technologies can orchestrate automatic processes triggered by smart devices, freeing users from mundane processes and interrupting our daily lives only when a decision is required.
Learn more at www.kana.com.