Microsoft Mines Process

 We worked with Microsoft to explore process mining:  Was a good idea, Now they are further investing in the idea.   See my links on the examination in this blog 

Microsoft bought process-mining vendor Minit earlier this year. Today, it's introducing a preview of new processing mining capabilities in the process advisor in Power Automate: https://t.co/PGHSjRjCKn  Via Mary Jo Foley. .... 

Via Microsoft:

  " ..  While analysts use process advisor to get deep insights into how the processes are run, uncover the root cause analysis, and provide actionable inputs for the whole organization, business users including chief financial officers (CFOs), chief operating officers (COOs), chief revenue officers (CROs), and chief marketing officers (CMOs) use process mining dashboards to take a near real-time pulse on their organization which can capture opportunities for process improvement and higher operational efficiency while mitigating undesired process outcomes.

Process mining and task mining have wide application across industries and use cases. The use cases where our customers currently drive the biggest value include order to cash (O2C), procure to pay (P2P), robotic process automation (RPA), regulatory compliance, and order to activation.

Process mining delivers a holistic view of company-wide bottlenecks and inefficiencies. These capabilities in Power Automate provide our customers with a complete end-to-end automation solution, from process mining where customers can identify automation opportunities, to business process automation and RPA, to desktop automation.  ... ' 

Uses of Process Mining

Had heard the term 'Process Mining' relatively little used lately.    But as I mentioned in recent posts, it helps you to understand how existing process and related decisions are done today.   Once that is understood, you can use forms of business process modeling to improve them.   And AI or other forms of analytics, to look for patterns that can be improved.    Very natural progression. so I can understand IBM's interest, given their considerable background in the BPM space.   We used their systems there.

German process mining startup Celonis teams up with IBM and Red Hat   By Douglas Busvine in Reuters

BERLIN (Reuters) - Celonis, a fast-growing German process mining software startup, has struck a strategic partnership with IBM to help companies make the most of the digital transformation that many are undergoing at speed.

IBM’s Global Business Services consulting arm will weave the Celonis Execution Management System into its offering, adding the ability to analyse data thrown off by processes like supply-chain management, finance or procurement to identify weaknesses and recommend fixes.

Celonis will also shift its software stack to IBM’s Red Hat OpenShift platform, which enables companies to operate in an open ‘hybrid’ setting that can include public or private cloud data centres, on-premise servers and mainframe computers.

That represents a big step for the Munich startup, which last raised funds here from investors at a valuation of $2.5 billion in 2019 and counts Coca-Cola, Siemens, Uber and Vodafone as clients.   ... " 

Process Mining

A mostly historical look at process mining.    Not a convincing enough view of why you should use it,  and in particular link it to AI.   Also its need to actual know the process, in other words model it, both current and proposed, and its links to BPM.   We did to great success. 

What Process Mining Is, and Why Companies Should Do It
Thomas H. Davenport, Andrew Spanyi in the HBR  ....

Siemens and Artificial Intelligence

Been taking a closer look at what German industrial conglomerate Siemens is doing and thinking in the space of AI.  Good section on their thoughts, approaches and direction.   Also about replacing jobs and people.

The Brain Behind: Artificial Intelligence

Innovations at Siemens
“Software can be very intelligent. But it cannot replace people.”

Rolf-Dieter Heuer is confident that clever machines can help us  –  in research, industry and daily life. In an interview, the former director general of CERN and long-standing president of the German Physics Association (DPG) explains why we will still need intelligent people as well. ... "

See also Siemens.com.  And the Wikipedia outlines its history.

I also recently wrote about Siemens doing process mining and modeling, a particular interest of mine.

Siemens and Process Mining

Note always the potential connection between process mining and business process modeling, to set the stage for more value, and to guide future process mining.

Siemens and Process Mining    By Lindsay Clark in Computer Week

German industrial conglomerate Siemens has turned to process mining to reveal inefficiencies in the way it pays suppliers, organises logistics and runs order-to-cash processes
When global manufacturing giant Siemens created a central data lake, it had no idea it would generate such positive business benefits. Compliance was the main reason it started to collect data from its disparate ERP and finance systems and put them in one place, from 2008 using an Oracle database, and then from 2012 using SAP’s Hana technology.

But from 2014, it began to realise the data could do more than help the organisation mitigate risk and provide financial reporting. Using a technique called process mining, the company began to reveal inefficiencies in the way it pays its suppliers, organises logistics and runs its order-to-cash process, creating savings for the business in the 10s of millions of Euros.  .... "

Process Mining

Process mining     From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ....

Process mining is a process management technique that allows for the analysis of business processes based on event logs. During process mining, specialized data-mining algorithms are applied to event log datasets in order to identify trends, patterns and details contained in event logs recorded by an information system. Process mining aims to improve process efficiency and understanding of processes.[1] Process mining is also known as Automated Business Process Discovery (ABPD).[2] ... " 

Process Innovation with Data in a Digital World

Have always thought in terms of process.  By doing that you can think not only what a process produces in terms of value, but also in terms of data that can be used for further examination and improvement of how things get done.    Even just mapping the process generally can provide  actionable value ....

This Bain article By Chris Brahm and Peter Guarraiais is insightful about an overview of the approach, and makes my  point.  Good complete read:

" ... Remember when the typical reengineering approach boiled down to eliminating, simplifying and automating processes? Seems quaint at a time when digital technology allows companies to transform how they operate, from one end of the value chain to the other. Breakthroughs in areas such as communications technology, analytics, Big Data and the Internet of Things have ushered in an entirely new set of tools to generate more value for customers. The goal of reengineering hasn’t changed, but the means have become significantly more powerful.   ... " 

Process Examination and Mining

Brought to my Attention again.  Worth a look.   Every data analytics problem should start with an understanding of the underlying process.  Its OK to start very simple, but do start with something.   Get agreement to its correctness.  Link it to the data involved.  Mining is not always required. Sometimes you can get value from just defining and examining  the process!

For harder examples:

The Process Mining Factory - Powered by Icris
We offer you Process Mining as a Service (PMaaS).   No need to install any process mining tools. Just open your browser, upload your log data and let the mining begin!   ... " 

And on to Process Improvement:   Paper 

Model Discovery, Process Mining with Fluxicon

This software, Fluxicon Disco, was new to me.  Described in KDNuggets.   I recall doing something similar in R, but this appears to cover the whole realm of process flow modeling.    Discovers a model from data, as opposed to BPM,  which has you create the model.

  " ... Process mining can analyze your process in a bottom-up fashion. You don't need to have a model of your process to analyze it — Process mining uses the history data in your IT systems.

Your IT system already records all steps of your process in execution. With process mining, you get a process model from these data. This way, your real process, and actual business rules, can be discovered automatically. ... "