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Using BPM to support data integration and MDM activities
Tuesday, August 24, 2010 by Neil Ward-Dutton
For a while now, when I’ve had the opportunity, I’ve been asking IT vendors offering IT management-related products if they’ve ever considered using a BPM toolset/engine for the implementation of management and governance processes for customers. A lot of the time, I only got blank looks.
Now though, there seems to be growing momentum; and one area I’ve noticed particularly is Master Data Management (MDM) and data integration. Earlier this summer I learned that one of the big drivers for use of SAP’s NetWeaver BPM technology in Europe is in support of MDM work within customers’ organisations; and yesterday Appian announced the addition of new features to support customers wanting to manage processes specifically related to data integration and MDM work.
Then today, via @GregChase, I came across this story. It’s an interview Greg did with Octavian Wagner, who works in SAP’s mergers and acquisitions team on the IT side. He discusses how his team uses NetWeaver BPM (along with other data integration and management technology services) to structure and part-automate the process of migrating key information (particularly customer data) from acquired companies into SAP’s core systems.
According to Wagner, NetWeaver orchestrates ETL services, elements of SAP Business Objects’ data services (like record matching), the NetWeaver BRMS and other systems – as well as bringing data quality analysts and managers into the process to perform checks and signoffs before staged data is imported into SAP’s systems. The podcast is certainly worth a listen.
I spoke to my new colleague Helena Schwenk about this, and she made a couple of interesting points:
The big challenge with any information management initiative such as MDM is how to engage with the business in terms of data ownership, data stewardship and data governance. Using BPM technology as a “wrapper” around MDM activies should provide potential to help with this aspect. The bottom line is that MDM is hard, complex and costly stuff to do, and anything that can help expedite and bring greater efficiency to the process will certainly help.
I’m very interested to learn of any more examples of BPM technology being used to automate aspects of infrastructure or service management, including data integration/MDM, so please drop me a comment if you come across anything relevant!
[Lastly, as an aside: I also came across this guide from SAP, which details how MDM's own workflow tools, Business Workflow and NetWeaver BPM compare in the context of managing MDM-related management and governance processes].
Posted in Analytics, Information Management, BPM
Earlier i didn’t knew about “BPM “.
Thanx for sharing.