Punch Taverns is one of the UK’s largest leased pub companies with a portfolio of around 4,500 pubs nationwide. These pubs are operated by thousands of entrepreneurial partners who run their own businesses on leased pubs. Faced with multiple challenges from decline in beer volumes, smoking ban, the recession, to new competition from supermarkets, it is critical for Punch Taverns to make strategic pub investments to improve sales. The right infrastructure and business improvements can often triple annual sales per pub.

While the investment process is critical to growth, it is also complex and takes 12 to 14 weeks. It requires extensive planning, documentation, collaboration, execution, project management, and effective launch across teams and geographies. Kevin shared the following steps to successfully reinvent the process and implement Appian at Punch Taverns:

• Conduct a series of workshops to understand the current process and design the future, ideal process
• Build the first iteration of the BPM workflow using an agile, iterative methodology, incorporating user feedback
• Present the Appian solution and new investment process, followed by hands-on detailed training in pilot region
• Develop documentation and the investment process, provide support
• Launch initial trial in a pilot region with multiple iterations before a three-month roll-out to remaining regions

Kevin shared that the end users love the new process and how Appian makes their job easier. By providing a central system to store critical investment documents, list project team members, track and monitor the process, the team can work and collaborate more effectively. The average pub investment cycle time is now 5 to 6 weeks, a 40% reduction from the previous process.

John began the session by encouraging new BPM practioners to be change agents and keep these attitudes in mind throughout the journey:

1. Lead through vision and find the Path
2. Keep your eye  on the prize (the end results and business benefits)
3. Engage others early and often to make them participants in the process

Following an introduction on PPD, a leading global pharmaceutical contract research organization with operations in 46 countries and more than 12,5000 employees, John then shared five tips to help other BPM professionals be more successful:

1. Select your process case by defining the business problem, knowing return on investment (ROI) metrics, and defining the business scope and requirements within 90 days to make sure the project moves forward. He emphasized the importance of choosing and successfully implementing the first BPM project as a foundation to create additional applications.
2. Recruit your organization by identifying talents and cultivating great team dynamics, collaborating and reaching across functions, and promoting innovation efficiency to build a process organization. John talked about the importance of engaging with Appian Professional Services to get the help from seasoned experts in the beginning of an BPM journey.
3. Establish the platform by choosing a product that meets their needs, which places great emphasis on ease of use for both business users and technical specialists.
• John also mentioned the importance of keeping it simple to one module or product that’s encapsulated with all the key features that meet their requirements, including social, mobile, and cloud.
• John’s decision to deploy Appian on premise or cloud was pretty clear and simple. By going with cloud computing, John and his team were able to focus on the process, rather than the IT infrastructure, systems, maintenance, and upgrades.
4. Leverage Appian features by building modern worksocial applications with News to show what happened, Tasks to indicate what needs to happen, and Actions to empower users to make things happen. Rather than doing mobile development, John likes that he can check one checkbox in Appian to enable support for various mobile clients and web browsers.
5. Deliver and execute to build demand by planning for success and making sure that the team can scale to meet new business needs and handle multiple BPM projects with best practices, effective tools, and methodologies.

Good luck with your BPM journey and we hope to hear your success story at Appian World 2014!

Cindy Cheng

Director of Product Marketing
Cindy Cheng

Experience the power and simplicity of worksocial at Appian World. We created a mobile conference application to help you maximize your time, interact with presenters and attendees, and share your experience at our premier BPM conference. The Appian mobile app allows conference attendees to participate from a mobile device, easily access the following information and more from their fingertips:

• Venue and Travel Information
• Twitter Updates
• Conference Agenda
• Session & Conference Feedback
• Share Your Experience with Multimedia
• Online Collaboration

The Appian app is available for download on Apple iTunes, Google Play, and Blackberry World to work with iPhones, iPads, Blackberry devices, Android  phones and tablets. As with other Appian BPM applications, you’ll also have access to the same features from a web interface. We encourage all attendees to BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) to make Appian World 2013 an interactive experience on and offline.

Come prepared and get a head start to make sure you’ll hit the conference running. Complete these 2 steps before coming to Appian World 2013:

1. If you’re not a member already, join Appian Forum by completing the registration form.
2. Install the Appian app on your mobile device. See instructions below to configure.

Instructions

1. Install the Appian mobile app from the Apple iTunes, Google Play, or BlackBerry World
2. Start the app and tap “Set up my account”
3. Enter the server name: https://forum.appian.com
4. Enter your Appian Forum credentials, than tap Save
5. Agree to the Appian EULA

Read device specific instruction on this page. Join Appian Forum and download the Appian app to get started today. See you in a week at Appian World in Washington, DC!

Join us on Thursday, April 11th to explore these strategies in an insightful webinar on the Four Steps to BPM Project Success. I will be hosting the webinar and moderating questions. In addition, I will share how combining work automation and social collaboration improves visibility, coordinated action, user participation, speed of decisions and executions. 

Medhat Galal, VP of Enablement at Appian, will then discuss key behaviors that lead to BPM Success.  Medhat has over 14 years of project implementation experience. He has led and overseen hundreds of successful client implementations across industries at Appian. He will demonstrate how to overcome common challenges in scaling process innovation across the enterprise, then deliver tips and metrics to prioritize the right BPM projects (especially for that critical first project).

In addition, Medhat will distill complex processes and methodologies into four key elements to implementing transformative applications. In this one hour webinar, learn how to:

• Create a strategy and roadmap to achieve process excellence

• Build the foundation for enterprise transformation with successful project execution

• Implement with proven methodologies and best practices from experts

• Assure project rollout success, user adoption, and continuous performance

Register and attend this webinar to learn proven, repeatable secrets to any BPM success, from project to program.

Cindy Cheng

Pushing process to the edge to incorporate customers and partners has long been a goal of BPM. With social and mobile technology, that goal is now being realized. Instead of improving fixed and standardized processes (think manufacturing assembly line), today’s BPM professionals have to consider various dynamic, spontaneous, and often unpredictable interactions from multiple channels.

If you are interested in knowing how BPM can help triple sales revenues, Appian World is an event you must attend. Learn how Punch Taverns, a leading pub company in the UK, uses Appian to radically streamline its investment process and optimize performance “at the edge.” Given limited staff and resources, effective management of and investment in 4,500 properties are key drivers to maintain high quality and earn more than $300 millions in revenue.

Kevin Dalley, the IT Director at Punch Taverns, will share how he and his team utilized an agile approach to improve the investments process and implement a worksocial solution using Appian. Find out how they create trusted partnerships to build sustainable, successful businesses, and create measurable returns for the company.

Don’t miss this chance to learn how Punch Taverns and other companies are pushing process to the edge of the enterprise. Be sure to attend the full conference and join us for the welcome reception. We won’t be able to bring the Punch Taverns experience to DC but you may have a pint on Appian. Don’t delay and register for Appian World today. Cheers to your BPM success!

Cindy Cheng

Did you know that there are almost as many mobile-cellular subscriptions as there are people in the world? As global mobile penetration approaches 100% while Internet users remain at 40%, it is clear that mobile is becoming a more effective and important medium for just about everyone. Marketers, service providers, businesses, and even government agencies are placing bets on mobile techologies, which is one of the top three CIO priorities in 2013.

The ability to access information, update data, and collaborate from mobile devices can deliver a better customer experience  provide faster response time, and deliver higher quality service. A sound mobile strategy can make or break a company in today’s highly competitive and connected world. So how do you start embracing mobility and implementing effective solutions that are fast to rollout?

This post is a part of the mobile case study series from Appian’s Center of Excellence (CoE). The series shares proven strategies, best practices, and implementation methods of real customer use cases. View the embedded video for a quick demo of a mobile Facilities Management application in action. This example of tapping into the power of mobile and worksocial will help you see the possibilities in your organization.

In this scenario, a property management company wants to enhance their existing Facilities Management application by providing mobile access to activities currently performed through the existing Appian Application Portal interface. Accelerated growth within the organization has created a need to provide property managers with direct access to data to more effectively manage their facilities while they are out in the field.

The mobile application design gives property managers the power to manage their facilities via a mobile-client, through actions mirroring existing behavior currently achieved with quick-tasks. The implementation allows a property manager to update any data associated with a facility. Additionally, the mobile application provides means for managers to record and track site visits to a facility. Appian’s mobile capabilities also allow them to coordinate inspections and repairs with just a few clicks from their mobile device.

If the video piques your interest, you can download the full case study from Appian Forum and start accessing quick tasks with mobile actions today. If you don’t have a Forum account, it is easy to sign up.

Cindy Cheng

 
Prior to John’s current position at PPD, he was with the CME Group – the world’s leading and most diverse derivatives marketplace for risk management, futures and options trading. Under his leadership, John and his team successfully deployed a wide portfolio of different Appian BPM applications across various business units to automate and optimize various processes. These applications span across the organization, from product and portfolio management groups, IT services, human resources, to client services.
 
John will share tips and best practices on how to start fast and be smart about planning, creating, and deploying BPM applications for enterprise success. This is a session you must attend to help jump start BPM project of any size. Register for Appian World to learn from and network with seasoned BPM professionals, as well as Appian experts who have successfully implemented over thousands of BPM solutions around the world.

Cindy Cheng

The check mark next to each Technology priority signifies a match with Appian BPM Suite‘s capabilities: either as part of the product or as a solution. Furthermore, the worksocial approach from Appian is essentially taking collaboration technologies with workflow BPM (#4), enabling greater access of data and analytics (#1) to all users via mobile technologies (#2), available in the cloud (#3) or on-premise.

So how does Appian address top 10 CIO business priorities with BPM and worksocial?

1. Increasing enterprise growth: General Kinematics standardized processes on Appian to effectively scale the organization’s growth while maintaining quality. They achieved a 95% reduction in quote-to-case flow with Appian BPM Software.
2. Delivering operational results: One of the largest retail chains in the world uses Appian to inspect over 17,000 stores on iPads to consistently deliver premium customer experience with quality and with operational efficiency.
3. Reducing enterprise costs: US Marine Corps reported 60% reduction in procurement cycle time and 50% reduction in operational costs using Appian’s BPM platform.
4. Attracting and retaining new customers:  Car Stereo Plus mobilized its entire Sales and Installation workforce with worksocial from Appian to access customer information, manage appointments, input sales quotes, download installation instructions, and upload photos of completed jobs to provide responsive, quality services using modern technologies.
5. Improving IT applications and infrastructure: One of the top three global logistics companies increased its efficiency to handle IT requests by 92%, supporting over 400K employees and saving over $28M using Appian.
6. Creating new products and services (innovation): psHEALTH selected Appian as a platform-as-a-service to develop and go to market with customized health care applications in less than two months.
7. Improving efficiency: A loan services company in the US reduced loan processing times from 10 days to just 24 hours with Appian.
8. Attracting and retaining the workforce: The US Department of Veterans Affairs deployed Appian as a platform to recruit veterans and provide employment services, from on-boarding, skills assessment and development, coaching, job opportunity matching, interview and follow-up management, job placement and retention programs.
9. Implementing analytics and big data: Nokia Siemens Networks saves $16.5 million per year from an integrated sales forecasting system with Appian.
10. Expanding into new markets and geographies: Enterprise Rent-a-Car launched the new Rideshare business in 25 markets and migrated data from 25 different markets into one standardized system.  Now customer requests are easily accessible from the social interface and from mobile devices.

There are many more examples of how customers around the world are using Appian and embracing worksocial. Explore how other companies and their CIOs are getting their priorities list checked off with Appian on our customers page. Attend Appian World, the premier conference, to hear directly from business and IT leaders on how they are leveraging analytics, mobile, cloud, social, and BPM technologies to achieve growth.

Cindy Cheng

Appian World will feature luminary industry analysts, Appian customers, and executives to share insights on disruptive new technologies that are changing the way we work, how they’re leveraging them, and visions for the future. In addition, the conference will include beginner, developer, and business tracks for attendees of varying skills and interests.

The “Starting the Journey” track is for attendees new to Appian and to BPM. The first breakout session, “worksocial Comes to Life,” will showcase a number of functional applications built on Appian. These worksocial applications incorporate Business Process Management (BPM), collaborative social features, and native mobile access to extend participation to all users in the enterprise in an integrated suite. In addition, see how dynamic rules, case management, and analytics play a role in an intelligent BPM Suite (iBPMS).

In “worksocial Comes to Life”, we will share and demonstrate how to leverage Appian’s worksocial capabilities in the following scenario:

• Accelerate new customer on-boarding
• Increase productivity at field inspections
• Simplify IT service request management

The broad use cases apply to multiple industries, from financial services, insurance, pharmaceutical, retail, services, to government and more. These modern BPM software applications are all built on Appian’s enterprise software platform, available on-premise or in the cloud, to simplify IT administration and maintenance. They are also easily accessible through social and mobile interfaces: business users can receive updates, complete tasks, initiate actions, and track accounts or cases wherever they are.

Register for Appian World today to see how to apply worksocial across a variety of scenarios, functions, and departments in “worksocial Comes to Life” and other sessions. Don’t miss this opportunity to meet and network with Appian executives, experts, customers, and partners to learn how worksocial can change the way you work and accelerate business growth.

Cindy Cheng

Recent Appian 7.x releases include additional new social features, designer and administrator enhancements, and platform updates. Here’s a summary of new features in Appian 7 to help with business improvement initiatives and social collaboration in your organization:

New Social Features:

• Follow influencers, decision-makers, and groups within the enterprise to stay informed of key events and announcements
• Send open or private messages to meet a variety of communication needs with an intuitive people and group picker
• Delegate worksocial and mobile tasks to team members for social collaboration with email alerts, audit trails, and analytics on every task for visibility and accountability
• Give “kudos” to an individual for public recognition of achievement and excellence
• See user activity stream in “participating” view to easily filter and access relevant posts and discussions
• Access social profiles and user cards to quickly find subject matter experts, access contact information, and follow the community member

Designer Enhancements:

• Easily and quickly add content from one or multiple applications to a master application
• Simplify data management and maintain data integrity with the ability to delete from multiple datastores
• Improve visibility and upgrade experience with enhanced documentation to view all Universally Unique Identifiers (UUIDs) for all process model nodes
• Enable cross-browser support with just one click, including: Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, and native mobile applications on Apple iOS (iPhones, iPads, iPod Touch), Google Android, and BlackBerry smartphone devices

Administrator Enhancements:

• Automate and simplify application change management to scan and document updates every minute
• Improve process intelligence and analytics with new process and social metrics
• Support for Islamic al-Qura calendar for Middle East customers and partners

Platform Updates:

• Support for Java 7, JBoss Enterprise Application Platform (EAP) 6, JBoss Application Server (AS) 7 on Appian 7.1
• Include JBoss AS 7 with Appian 7.1 for development
• Support for Microsoft Windows Server 2012 and Microsoft SQL Server 2012

Customers and partners may access and download Appian 7.0 and 7.1 from Appian Forum. Forum includes product documentation, resources, templates, an plug-ins to simplify your business process improvement initiatives with access to a community of Appian experts, customers, and partners. Users can also easily access relevant documentation by role, by release.

If you would like to learn more about Appian and how it can help bring worksocial to your enterprise, register and attend Appian World. The premier Appian event will feature industry analysts, customers, and various sessions for beginners, technical users, and business executives.

Cindy Cheng

Director of Product Marketing