I am currently reading Thomas Davenport’s book “Thinking for a Living”. Though I had scanned sections of it before, this is the first time I am giving a thorough end-to-end reading. As I read it, I thougI would pcik out the parts relevant for Human Process Management.  In chapter two he gives a classification of different types of knowledge intensive processes which I think does a good job of segmenting the standard tools available today for knowledge workers.

• Transaction Model – Here companies use either bespoke applications, with the rules embedded in the app (e.g. CRM), or use BPM to build the app
• Integration Model – that is where BPM is most valuable, and BPM focus today.
• Expert Model - Browsers, Document repositories and  personal productivity applications are the tools available.
• Collaboration Model – This is what Human Process Management addresses. These are the unstructured, ad-hoc processes that people do everyday in email and documents, where  the overall work product is dependent on groups of knowledge workers collaborating. The fact that email reigns king for knowledge worker collaboration and coordination is show in a different chart, with knowledge workers spending about 20% of their day in email (even though the data is about 5 years old, itstill holds).