.svg){kind=logo}
As software “is eating the world”, it seems that EVERY company is a software company, at least to some degree, and the software they use and manage becomes one of their most valuable assets. In order to operate at the speed of business and deliver the best solutions, both internally and to customers, it is critical that companies use all that their software solutions have to offer. In terms of strategic assets, having the latest, most feature-rich versions of software will facilitate the agility required by modern enterprises to create and sustain their competitive advantages. To reduce constant learning curves and internal disruptions, incremental upgrades of successful enterprise software solutions gives the greatest lift, for the least time and effort.
Software upgrades lead to operational success
By upgrading to new software versions, companies benefit from “outsourcing” innovation at the tooling and platform level. With a process engine that extends to new channels and drives towards new goals, an agile platform equipped with modern workflow tools becomes the facilitator of IT and LOB team strategy. Teams are better equipped to test and execute pioneering changes when they are building on a tool equipped with the latest code base.
BP Logix has always been hyper-focused on two things: 1) product innovation and 2) customer success. The Process Director development team continuously explores how best to enable customer success within their BPM software investment. Additional features and functionality are not meant simply as a way to keep score against our competitors. Rather, continual advancement enables customers to operate on a stable, consistent, and innovative BPM platform, one that will always be able to support their changing business needs. We recognize that upgrading software is a fundamental element of business continuity and this becomes a critical aspect of our competitive differentiator.
Continuous innovation relates to better outcomes
Some organizations seek to disrupt by being the first to market with something new and exciting; others focus on ensuring the delivery of a consistent, stabilizing workflow software solution which supports repeatable business outcomes. Doing either one of these things (or accomplishing anything along this spectrum) requires a foundation on which organizational strategists and developers can build.
When a company doesn’t upgrade to the latest versions, there is not only the opportunity cost of not taking advantage of new features, but there is also the sunk cost of falling behind. With each new version comes a learning curve as well as some up-front changes to how the supporting team manages processes. As an example, when Process Director was upgraded to its current version, 5.0, users had immediate access to a host of functionality that could deliver new benefits, including:
- Support for compliance frameworks through out-of-the-box controls and compliance automation.
- Sentiment analysis for contextual data to make operational improvements.
- Addition of machine learning capabilities to drive behavioral and timeline-driven decision making.
- UI enhancements for iterative list search, inline text editing, calendaring, and knowledge views.
- New connectors for a variety of enterprise applications, including SharePoint 365, Microsoft Exchange, and Laserfiche.
Software upgrades map to customer needs
Among the inputs used to build new innovation should be insights from analysts and a deep understanding of business and market trends. But the most significant effort, however, goes into delivering a product that equips customers with solutions to real problems. This means incorporating a bit of crowdsourcing into the model, where key requirements needed by actual users are built back into the product in a continuous cycle of development and delivery. This model reduces the total cost of ownership and provides “future-proofing” for users. Rather than having to reinvest in new integration models and establish connectivity with other assets and applications in the customer’s IT stack, upgrades ensure a continuous compatibility with operating systems, browsers, applications, and third-party solutions.
The solution product team should understand the trends that are being adopted by customers and seeks to implement functionality that supports these trends. All of our developments — among them, no code/low code BPM, AI, digital application development, support for IoT — have been created to support the changing landscape of organizations that are adopting new technologies and environments for their business processes. Some are aggressively moving workloads into the cloud, while others are building a hybrid infrastructure of on-premises and multicloud systems. Because Process Director upgrades are all governed by general principles of aiding the flexibility and adaptability of customer needs, companies are able to take advantage of new technologies at a pace with which they’re comfortable.
The economics of upgrades
New versions of software happen in incremental steps, but they can lead to transformative effects. The time and cost savings of not having to hyperfocus on platform improvements enables teams to emphasize the implementation of the business goals they are trying to achieve. Through upgrades, new technology is readily available to complement the organization’s desires to make advances in capabilities and in reduction of costs and complexity.
Software is like any other type of asset; its utility and value diminishes over time. But upgrades generate continuous value; it’s like there is a built-in evolutionary component that adapts to meet new needs and reduce any identifiable issues. This becomes a critical asset for organizations that want a cost-effective, sustainable way of driving newer and better solutions.
