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Move from Purpose to Impact
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Think you have what it takes to lead? At BRMI, volunteers are leaders. We offer you this opportunity to help other BRMs succeed while you build your leadership skills. We will help you move from purpose to impact.
>>Volunteer, today!
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Free for Professional Members
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Professional members receive The BRMP® Guide to the BRM Body of Knowledge eBook for free! This valuable BRM professional development training resource is a wonderful foundation-level overview of the art and practice of BRM.
>>Purchase eBook.
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April 2015
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As a benefit of BRM Explorers™ membership, we send you this monthly periodical full of data, insights and perspective that is essential for today's Business Relationship Managers. If you are a member, we hope you thoroughly enjoy this month's edition. Be sure to forward to other members of your team who could benefit from joining BRM Explorers™, our free membership.
Did someone share this newsletter with you? Embark on the exciting journey of professional development and accelerated career growth! Become a member of our rapidly growing BRM Explorers™ community today and join over 10,000 leading business executive professionals around the globe, who stay informed on the latest BRM trends and upcoming events. Welcome aboard!
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 Chris Clancy leads BRMI's Healthcare Community of Interest group. Communities of Interest is a benefit for all professional members within the Online Campus. Chris enjoys the enrichment he has gained since becoming a BRMI member. He says, "As long as we can maintain the levels of Strategic Partner or Trusted Advisor, the work we can accomplish is amazing. That in turn leads to a great feeling of enrichment. You're no longer just filling the role of a Service Provider and keeping the gears well oiled, rather you are building solutions that truly move the needle."
Déjà Vu
By Chris Clancy
I attended another monthly meeting of a professional organization, of which I'm a member, to listen to a speaker talk about how IT needs to transform. While the speaker himself was unknown to me, he had associative credibility; he was a consultant with one of the Big Four. For those of you that are old enough to remember, it used to be the big eight, then the big six and now we're down to the big four. That said, the audience was large, the topic was relevant and the interest level was high across all. The theme was how IT within organizations has to change how they interact with their clients or they could easily find themselves replaced. Much of his presentation was spent on the "new" relationship that we need to form with the leaders of our organizations. He had all of the right material but unfortunately (here's the repeat) he stopped short. His premise was built on the fact that we all need to become better Brokers. As he spoke, he very eloquently described a Service Provider. He was very firm in his convictions that the role of the broker was the direction we all needed to take. That we need to be able take the demand, requests, needs and align them with the right provider services in order for the business to achieve its goals. I couldn't help myself... I had to start asking questions. I said that I liked his presentation but what about the conversations that need to occur before the requests or needs hit us. What about the conversations around whether the request was the right thing to be doing? What business problem do our clients think they are solving or what opportunity are they trying to take advantage of? It was actually a very good exchange and the flurry of conversation across the room that it sparked spoke volumes. I believe that many of the service providers in that room truly understand the model we speak of here on this site, and they desperately want to get there, they just need help to find out how to do it.
So I share this story to let you know, when your company pulls in the big consultants, try to find out what guidance they are providing. Hopefully it is spot on but it doesn't hurt to check to make sure that they have the full picture.
>>Become a member. Join a Community of Interest.
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BRMConnect™ 2015
The Final Countdown
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Join us at BRMConnect 2015 with interactive workshops, led by BRM industry experts, that will leave you with knowledge of the latest trends and the most important developments in the art and practice of Business Relationship Management!
>>Register now
With less than two months left until BRMConnect 2015, your BRMI team and our conference partners are working hard to assure an absolutely amazing memorable experience for every attendee. We are pleased to announce that Service Management Art, BRMI long-term supporter and BRMConnect sponsor, has added an additional session to the already packed BRMConnect 2015 schedule. This is a post-conference session made available to all BRMConnect 2015 attendees at no extra charge, but RSVP is required to attend and seating is very limited!
>>Read more
There are a very limited amount of spots left available in our pre-conference BRMP® class! Take advantage of the amazing offer on this BRMConnect and BRMP® class bundle. Get certified and then join in on the conference fun!
>>Learn More
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We are conducting a research study into the major issues faced today by people in a Business Relationship Manager role. The data from this research will be analyzed and serve as an input to the Collaborative Learning Exploration sessions at BRMConnect 2015.
 During two Facilitated Discovery Sessions at BRMConnect, the conference participants will analyze the collected data, explore scenarios for dealing with the identified issues, and formulate recommendations.
We are asking for just a few minutes of your time to tell us what issues you face as a BRM. The questions are open form-we don't want to bias your input with pre-digested lists of issues-you get to tell us what's really on your mind!
If you chose to provide us with your email address, we will be delighted to share a copy of the research findings and of the scenarios and recommendations coming out of the conference. Thank you very much!
>>Complete the survey here.
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Tweet your reason for attending BRMConnect with the hashtag #BRMConnect. Be sure to join in on all of the hype in our conversations and follow the interactions surrounding the conference!
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"I want to tell you how much I enjoy my BRMI membership. The principles behind BRM work are such a natural fit for my native tendencies, especially value harvesting, understanding our customers' business, and then helping our internal provider side deliver the right service on time.
I'm taking a nine-month technical communications certificate course and in this final quarter I plan to make my term project a presentation on BRM since I want to be able to communicate this well to our team, my manager, and our senior leadership. The project will help cement the BRM knowledge for me, too, and several people in BRMI have already been extremely
helpful in this endeavor.
I really hope to pass that exam next month and have my BRMP! Thank you so much for your help in getting my membership started."
-Linda Hornung
University of Washington
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March's Member Spotlight: Frank Wander
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 By Mina Taylor
Former CIO, current CEO of PeopleProductive and BRM Institute's Executive Council member Frank Wander has spent plenty of time in the IT industry. When he's not spending time with family or sampling wines in a French parlour-like setting discussing an array of topics with his friends, the social Wander keeps his relationships a top priority both in and out of the workplace.
A graduate of Stony Brook, Wander's extensive work in IT through the years led him to create PeopleProductive in March 2014. Wander's brainchild focuses on productivity in the workforce--aiding companies whose efficiency has come to a halt. According to Wander, by aiding employers in "understanding the human needs and factors that drive productivity in the modern workforce," PeopleProductive is able to double or triple workplace output.
"IT is a business where teams of people across business and IT have to turn concepts into reality; that's where all the value gets created," Wander said.
Though these teams are supposed to work together to enable higher productivity, Wander has came away from his IT experience realizing the lack of relationships between the business side and tech side of running a successful company.
"In my line of work my main focus is one simple fact: I think caring about other people is highly productive. What inspired me ultimately is the fact that managers cared more about their computers and processors more than their people. They treated the people as parts and knew very little about them; they could basically take better care of a plant than their own people. I saw in that a problem, and an opportunity."
As BRMI Executive Council member, Wander's main role consists of lending an outside perspective to the BRM Institute and creating content to do such. Though not a BRM himself, Wander places a high value on relationships between coworkers and its direct correlation to productivity in the workplace.
"I think BRM Institute has an important mission. Business relationships are important just like all relationships are important and add value to all aspects of your life. Business-IT alignment and the relationship between the two is really what drive success. Humans are social animals and as such we need connections and a sense of belonging"
Gallup Studies on Employee Engagement show that workers who have a close friend at work are seven times more likely to be engaged. These same studies offer up several solutions to the dropping rate of employee engagement in the US--which is currently only at 35% and constantly declining. According to Gallup, one of the most effective ways to aid an engaging workplace environment is to align the organization and remove systemic barriers, which is a large part of Wander's focus at PeopleProductive.
"People with healthy relationships fosters an open and honest dialogue with one another, which helps create value for the company. It's a much more productive way to operate."
Wander continues to nurture positive relationships both in and out of the workplace with an active social life and quality time with his family.
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The Value Management Process
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The Value Management Process, illustrated in the figure above, tracks investments from the opportunity identification stage through delivery and operation. It comprises five major stages:
- Capture Value Ideas: This stage examines ideas/possibilities for business value. Its output is an Idea Document.
- Create Value Plan: This stage creates a plan for the value to be realized if the idea/possibility is pursued. Its output is a Value Creation Plan.
- Create Business Case: This stage completes a business case for all investments above a certain threshold.
- Approve Business Case: This stage analyzes submitted business cases, and approves them based upon their merit in terms of NPV and the strength of the case, and relative to other investments that are competing for resources.
- Capture and Communicate Value: This stage executes the Value Plan to track, audit, and communicate the actual value generated versus the value forecasted in the business case and to optimize the value delivered in the light of experience.
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IIBA ® is to release BABOK ® Guide v3 on April 15, 2015. IIBA says, "BABOK ® Guide v3 is the essential resource to help practitioners and their stakeholders deliver business value and create better business outcomes. BABOK ® Guide is the most credible and authoritative source of knowledge and practices for business analysis."For the latest information on the upcoming launch of BABOK ® Guide v3, please visit IIBA ® online. |
| Sr. Manager Business Engagement Management
Church & Dwight - Ewing, NJ
Are you looking for a business relationship management opportunity? Or looking to hire a business relationship manager? Check out our BRMI Job Boards!
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Events
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BRMI Webinars & Events
Member Privilege
BRMI members can view any archived webinar at any time! Not a member? Join now!
*Please note that these events or course listings are hosted by the sponsor, and not BRMI.
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April Webinar:
"Value Management - BRM Role"
Tudor Rees
Tuesday, April 14, 2015
11:00 a.m. EDT
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Please join us for this 60-minute webinar, with Tudor Rees, Associate, LEF, who will discuss:
- What is Value Management?
- What is the role of the BRM in relation to Value Management?
- What tools, techniques and new thinking is available to the BRM to drive business value?
>>Register Now
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Ask an Expert!
Extracted from BRMI Online Campus
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Question:
I am trying to create some Metrics and KPIs for senior IT management that will be tracked and presented on a quarterly basis for the BRM organization. Can I get some inputs on what is typically tracked?
Our Expert, Vaughan Merlyn, Says:
- Be careful looking at other people's metrics and KPIs. Yours should be created for your specific organizational context and goals. For example, what are the key business dials and how does the BRM contribute to these? What are the key business challenges/issues, and how does the BRM contribute to these?
- Have you looked at this set of wiki pages Metrics in our member's only Online Campus?
- I'd be happy to have a conversation with you on this topic--just let me know if you are interested in this.
Our Expert, Aaron Barnes, Says:
I'll break the process down a bit further based on my experiences. If you are trying to achieve strategic partner maturity, you will want to tie success metrics to the dollar value delivered (tangible and intangible) not to satisfaction surveys but realize this may take some maturing of your organization to get there. Here is the approach:
Low Maturity - Ad Hoc or order taker on the maturity model
If you are just starting out, all you probably have is satisfaction surveys with your business partners on how the provider (HR, IT, etc.) is delivering. Surveys tend to be very subjective and usually end up being more about how someone feels on a particular day versus being an overall indicator of delivery. However with that said, you can still glean some actionable information from surveys.
Mid-level Maturity - Service provider on the maturity model
Report out system up-time and SLA accomplishments. How did we do keeping the lights on and trains running? Be warned, business could not care less about this information, it is expected that you can keep the lights on and trains running.
Moving Up in Maturity - Trusted Adviser
Key metric reported would be the value of projects that were "approved to go forward" through the intake or demand management process. In the initial year or two for BRMs, give them goals of achieving X dollar value to the business in "approved" projects. This will get your BRMs focused on building successful business cases that really drive business value to the organization. Notice I said "approved projects" and not delivered. This is intentional. BRMs starting out can easily influence what projects will be brought forward to the organization through business cases. Influencing the actual delivery of these projects and true value realization will come from higher skilled/more mature BRMs, provider teams, and business relationships.
Highest Maturity - Strategic Partner
Ensure you have full value management in place before setting goals in this level. Give your BRMs goals for how much business value was realized by line of business (tangible and intangible). You get here by defining the key performance indicators (KPIs) with your business partners for their particular line of business, usually 3 - 5. In the Ideation phase, you create value management plans and ensure projects that move forward truly impact these KPIs. Leverage these KPI's to say "No" to projects that do not move the needle. Ensure value optimization and realization occurs as defined in our value management section, which is in our member's only campus. BRMs can then report out how much true monetary value the business partner in conjunction with the full provider delivered. Your CFO will love this!
A side metric of this that you will also want to report out is how many projects were said "No" to. It is important to show people BRMs "manage" demand, not just a glorified salesperson drumming up new work all the time.
Become a BRMI member now, and ask your own question of our experts!
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