In anticipation of their case study presentation at Building Business Capability in Las Vegas, Nov. 2 – 6, 2015, we asked Brian Childs, Manager, Business Rules & Process Management at Railinc and Cindy Scullion, Senior Consultant, Business Rule Solutions, LLC, a few questions about pursuing business excellence. Check out their interview in relation to their BBC case study presentation entitled, Architecting the Business Solution at Railinc.

Q: How is your organization advancing the pursuit of business excellence and how does it impact your business units/departments?

A: Business excellence is advancing at Railinc through our Rules and Process Modernization initiative. A large part of this initiative has included extensive training for our business analysts, and following up with an opportunity to practice what they have learned.

Q: Can you describe the challenges you face or have already overcome in establishing a more cohesive and productive company or organization?

A: The biggest challenge we face is getting time designated toward the new initiatives and keeping people away from project work, production issues, etc. It’s easy for people to get pulled into their normal, regular work.

Q: What are your near term goals for creating a more agile organization at your business or company?

A: Key this year has been establishing a consistent vocabulary. By making sure everyone’s talking the same language, it automatically makes them more agile.

Q: What’s the most valuable thing you’ve learned in 2015 thus far? What’s the most important goal/trend for [pick one or two: business analysts, business architects, business process managers and/or business rules managers] to keep in mind?

A: The most valuable thing we’ve learned so far in 2015 is it’s important to make training as painless as possible so the recipient has a better chance of benefiting. The most important goal for business analysts to keep in mind is to make time for training your company is willing to provide. Schedule time on your calendar to practice the skill or get the certification so the training has a chance to be incorporated into your skillset.

Q: What’s the latest method/process/tool you have implemented to help your organization or business run more efficiently and effectively?

A: Creating concept models, exposing English based rules, and BPMN diagram training have been the most exciting changes we’ve seen in 2015. These processes and tools help business, IT, production support, and have even helped the customer more clearly understand their own business.

Q: If you could give your five-years-ago self-insight and advice about this industry, what would you say?

A: This question is funny to me because 5 years ago is when I was first exposed to rules engines (Red Hat JBoss) while working as quality assurance on a project team. Upon understanding the benefits of exposed rules I met with my manager, the QA Manager, telling him how cool the technology is, explained the benefit and being from QA, I noted the potential risk of making changes without testing. I’m still as excited about it today which is the reason I’m in the role of helping facilitate the multi-year business renewal effort.

Q: Sneak preview: Please tell us a take-away that you will provide during your talk at Building Business Capability?

A: We will be discussing the wow factor that got everybody initially onboard to invest the time needed for learning-by-doing pilots.

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Don’t miss Brian and Cindy’s case study presentation, Architecting the Business Solution at Railinc, at Building Business Capability on Wednesday, November 4, 2015 from 3:10 to 4:10 pm.   Click here to register for attendance.