Business Process Management (BPM) - The Next Stage For Continuous Process Improvement on Space Programs.
- Paper number
IAC-08.D3.5.-E5.5.8
- Author
Mr. Alexandre Popov, Canadian Space Agency, Canada
- Year
2008
- Abstract
There are several concepts of space mission design and support for manned space exploration. The experience gathered on space station programs tells that process management is a key part of space operations. An increased emphasis has been placed on information sharing and knowledge management over the past few years on the International Space Station Program (ISSP). The demand to share knowledge both within and outside organizational boundaries has brought collaboration to the forefront on the program and spawned a variety of new architectural solutions that facilitate information distribution and knowledge acquisition. Combining the experience gathered on the space station programs along with “lessons learned” this paper introduces and discusses the business process management (BPM) methodology as a systematic approach on improving current mission design and support processes. BPM is an approach that focuses on optimizing processes to help make space programs more effective, efficient and more capable of adapting to changes. BPM is a subset of infrastructure management, the administrative area of concern dealing with maintenance and optimization core operations. The approach give rise to an enabling collaborative process that facilitates the creation, capture, and dissemination of information that creates corporate memory. The proposed methodology is a management discipline that looks at space mission support from the perspective of end-to-end cross-functional processes. The approach is enabled by new tools and technologies that transform that management perspective into solutions that automate, integrate, and monitor mission support processes.
The paper also discusses a new role, which is required to implement the proposed approach – the Business Process Expert. A key function of the Business Process Expert is the translating a description of how the process works today and how it could be improved, into process models that are not just requirements, but the foundation of executable process implementations. New modeling standards now make this possible.
A practical result of the work described in this paper is a web-based workflow prototype with inherent features such as access management, e-mail alerts, status monitoring, role/task (re-)assignments, on-line validation, real-time follow-up, escalation, delegation, audit trail, to name a few. A customized off-the-shelf platform serves as the prototype for a collaborative environment supporting most of the processes on space programs.
The paper is forcing a reader to look more broadly at the mission support processes and move away from a "build-to-last" approach to designing the processes that are built for change.
Note: The author certifies that the paper was not presented at a previous meeting, but financing and attendance of the author at the IAC at Glasgow to present the paper is subject of management approval.
- Abstract document
- Manuscript document
IAC-08.D3.5.-E5.5.8.pdf (🔒 authorized access only).
To get the manuscript, please contact IAF Secretariat.