This section includes a chronologic listing of SPOTLIGHTS, a monthly feature added to BPTrends in March, 2004. SPOTLIGHTS are short essays on the current status of a specific BP topic, along with links to all related articles we have previously posted to BPTrends.

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• Notes on Innovation: RFID Tags
  Paul Harmon - July 20, 2010
  Our first Note on Innovation introduces Radio-Frequency IDentification tags—chips that can be embedded in products that are used to track and locate items in supply chains or on the retail floor.
  

• Organizational Change and Transformation
  Paul Harmon - June 22, 2010
  In this Spotlight, we review some of the Articles we have published regarding how organizations can change their cultures and, given the special concerns of our readers, how organizations can become more process oriented.
  

• Business Process Frameworks
  Paul Harmon - March 23, 2010
  Slowly but surely business process frameworks, like eTOM, SCOR and VRM, are gaining the attention of organizations that want to move up the process maturity scale as quickly as possible. With a minimum of effort, a business process framework can significantly change the way an organization conceptualizes and manages its processes.
  

• Innovation
  Paul Harmon - December 22, 2009
  Innovation continues to be a much written about topic. In this Spotlight, we provide a few comments on Innovation and look at some of the Articles BPTrends has published on this important topic.
  

• Business Rules and Business Processes
  Paul Harmon - November 17, 2009
  This Spotlight will focus on Articles we have published on the use of business rules and on how business rules are increasingly being used to simplify and support process analysis.
  

• Business Intelligence and Mining Techniques
  Paul Harmon - October 20, 2009
  This month, we turn our Spotlight on Articles we have published on Business Intelligence and Mining Techniques that can help managers find patterns in the midst of overwhelming amounts of data. In the past two years, the leading BPM platform vendors have acquired BI and Mining companies, so it's easy to predict that we are going to be hearing a lot more about the power of using BI and Mining in conjunction with Process Monitoring.
  

• BPTrends BPM Surveys
  Paul Harmon - September 22, 2009
  BPTrends has conducted two major surveys of the BPM market, and we have just launched our third. This month, we Spotlight our previous surveys and identify some trends readers might want to think about as they prepare for 2010.
  

• Human Performance Improvement
  Paul Harmon - July 21, 2009
  Geary Rummler always claimed his goal was performance improvement. The term means many things, but one thing it definitely meant to Geary Rummler, and to the International Society for Performance Improvement (ISPI), is a methodology and tools to improve human performance. In this Spotlight we consider some of the Articles we have published on human performance improvement.
  

• Balanced Scorecard
  Paul Harmon - June 23, 2009
  Kaplan and Norton's Balanced Scorecard, including its associated model that ties strategy to processes, is one of the major contributions that business school theorists have made to Business Process Management. In this Spotlight, we consider some of the many Articles we have published on Scorecards.
  

• Process Maturity Models
  Paul Harmon - May 19, 2009
  There are, today, several business process maturity models and several ways to use them. BPTrends has published a number of articles on this subject, and we consider some of them in this Spotlight.
  

• SOA Governance
  Paul Harmon - April 21, 2009
  Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) is a hot topic, at the moment. It provides a better way of structuring an organization's infrastructure to support process automation. SOA Governance, the process by which an organization manages SOA, is an important aspect of SOA. BPTrends has published several articles on this subject and we consider some here.
  

• LEAN
  Paul Harmon - March 24, 2009
  In this Spotlight we take a look at some of the Articles that BPTrends has published that describe the Lean approach to redesigning and improving processes.
  

• Return on Investment
  Paul Harmon - February 17, 2009
  In this Spotlight, we take a look at some of the Articles BPTrends has published that help organizations determine the ROI and other advantages or disadvantages of undertaking a business process change project.
  

• BPM Market Overviews
  Paul Harmon - January 20, 2009
  In BPTrends Reports and Advisors we have tried to offer our readers a number of broad market overviews. Here are a few from the past, reviewed with the advantage of hindsight.
  

• BPM and SOA
  Paul Harmon - December 16, 2008
  This month, we focus our Spotlight on Columns and Articles we have published on the relationship between BPM and SOA. We consider the relationship between the two technologies and how companies can develop and coordinate BPM and SOA programs.
  

• Business Rules and Business Processes
  Paul Harmon - November 18, 2008
  This month, we turn the BPTrends Spotlight on Articles that consider the use of Business Rules, and, more particularly, on how Business Rules can be used in conjunction with business process analysis efforts.
  

• People and Change
  Paul Harmon - October 21, 2008
  This Spotlight focuses on the people that make processes happen, on employees, on process managers, and on technologies to improve human performance in processes.
  

• Business Process Standards
  Paul Harmon - September 16, 2008
  September's Spotlight is focused on some of the Articles BPTrends has published on business process standards over the past few years. Some provide insight into trends, while others provide tutorials on the nature of the standards themselves.
  

• Governance and Maturity
  Paul Harmon - July 22, 2008
  This Spotlight looks at the wide range of articles BPTrends has published on process governance and process maturity.
  

• Software Tools for BPM
  Paul Harmon - June 17, 2008
  Business managers and business analysts rely on a variety of software tools as they seek to define architectures, analyze processes and implement solutions. This Spotlight focuses on articles that have been published on BPTrends on BPM software products.
  

• Business Process Frameworks
  Paul Harmon - May 20, 2008
  Business Frameworks like SCOR and the Value Reference Model represent one of the most exciting recent developments on the BPM scene and offer companies a path to maturity that can save them a lot of money.
  

• Innovation and Process
  Paul Harmon - April 22, 2008
  Most organizations understand that real breakthroughs require major innovations. This Spotlight looks at some of the Articles we've published on Innovation over the last few years.
  

• Spotlight on Business Intelligence and Analytics
  Paul Harmon - March 18, 2008
  This Spotlight will look at why BI and Analytics are important to managers and business process practitioners and point to some of the articles BPTrends has previously published on the topic.
  

• A BPTrends Spotlight on Creating a Business Case for BPM
  Paul Harmon - February 19, 2008
  
  

• A BPTrends Spotlight on Enterprise Process Architecture
  January 22, 2008
  This Spotlight will consider why an Enterprise Process Architecture is important and point to some of the excellent articles we've published on this important topic.
  

• ICSSEA, Paris, December 2006
  Paul Harmon - December 07, 2006
  
  

• Operations Reference Frameworks
  Paul Harmon - November 23, 2004
  This month we focus our Spotlight on Operations Reference Models or OR Frameworks. BPTrends has often referred to these as Second Generation Business Process Redesign. Recently, there has been lots of activity around the development and implementation of Frameworks and we believe that this is a critical factor in the growth of the BPM market.
  

• Analyzing and Redesigning Processes
  Paul Harmon - October 19, 2004
  This month we turn our BPTrends Spotlight on the various articles we have published that offer advice on analyzing and redesigning processes to make them more efficient.
  

• Discrete Event Simulation Systems
  Paul Harmon - September 21, 2004
  This month we turn our BPTrends Spotlight on the second of the two major approaches to statistical modeling - Discrete Event Simulation Systems. We consider the nature of the approach and review relevant articles previously published on BPTrends.
  

• Spotlight On Systems Dynamics
  Paul Harmon - July 20, 2004
  This month we turn our BPTrends Spotlight on one of the two major approaches to statistical modeling - Systems Dynamics. We consider the nature of the approach and review relevant articles previously published on BPTrends.
  

• An Overview of The OMG's Model Driven Architecture
  Richard Soley - June 22, 2004
  In this June Spotlight, Richard Soley, CEO of the OMG, presents a short essay on the role of MDA in modeling and software development, followed by Paul Harmon's brief descriptions and links to the many related columns, articles and papers previously published on BPTrends.
  

• Spotlight on Enterprise Architecture
  David Ritter - May 18, 2004
  This month we turn our Spotlight on Enterprise Architectures. David Ritter, Director of Business Development at Proforma Corporation, writes a short essay on Enterprise Architectures, followed by Paul Harmon's short descriptions and links to several articles we have published on Enterprise Architectures in the past.
  

• Business Rules
  Paul Harmon - April 19, 2004
  This month we turn our Spotlight on Business Rules, consider some of the recent developments in this technology, and highlight some of the articles on Business Rules we have published on BPTrends.
  

• Spotlight on Business Process Analysis
  Paul Harmon - March 16, 2004
  This is the first in a series of BPTrends SPOTLIGHTS - a new feature we have added to BPTrends. Each month we will e-mail our members a new SPOTLIGHT - a short essay on the current status of a specific topic along with links to all related articles we have previously posted to BPTrends. This month's SPOTLIGHT is on Business Process Analysis. We hope you find this new feature interesting and helpful.