ARIS BPA Reviews

All macro processes and processes in the area of ​​continuous improvement were modeled in the company. These were done with the primary purpose of documentation and having a centralized place for processes.

ARIS is an important tool for my organization. This tool is the core of our processes and different business areas.

BPA, the modeling tool, is the main module used because of our need for documentation.

Areas for improvement include sales, prospecting, shopping, customer service, after-sales (claims and advice for the client), and all processes pertaining to customer loyalty.

ARIS BPM is an excellent platform to define, design, and analyse business processes. We have used ARIS to establish business process frameworks in organizations based on various frameworks like CMMI, EFQM, Malcolm, etc. Also, ARIS BPM is used to analyse, simulate, and optimize business processes.

We are a BPM consulting organization. We have improved processes in various industries like insurance (payout and claim management), hospital (admission and discharge process), manufacturing (order to dispatch value chain), and many more. With ARIS, have implemented effective enterprise process architecture and business architecture. 

1. ARIS process modeling and analysis: It allows integration of end-to-end business processes with the organization's vision, strategies, and business objectives, through visual management.
2. Business Process Analysis: We can simulate, optimize, and analyse business processes based on various business requirements. It assures our rolling out the best processes.
3. Process Governance: Change management, process reviews, workflows, etc.
4. Process Simulation: To do the various what-if analysis. 

Training is one of the important aspects for process awareness. As soon as a process is rolled out, process training is required. If ARIS could generate output in PowerPoint, it would be great for business users.

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We used MS Office, Visio to define, analyze and maintain business processes and architecture. But these tools were neither much useful nor easy for business analysis. 

The primary use for the solution is as an enterprise architect tool, but in the start it was about processing; modeling all kind of business processes. And that was before I even mention BPMN. Today, we have switched to using BPMN to do all the different kinds of business process modeling.

This product is supporting it very well.

I'm now working as an independent consultant, but in the past, when I was using it we could really quickly get a picture of what kind of business processes were being used across the entire organization, and which could be reused, and be sure that no one else is doing it another way. 

For example, the HR part, in that organization there were about 20,000 people working there. From an HR point of view, they had to do everything the same way, when they were hiring people, or when they were paying money, etc. There, we had a strong opportunity to define, describe, so that everybody could go in and see, "Okay, that's the way you have to do it. We have to follow these rules."

We could also create a good connection between the description of what we were doing the application. In this part, it was primarily SAP - and ARIS was coming from the SAP world in 1992, I think it was around then. They started as an independent firm, so they could do these things. That's why it's a very strong part, from when it started, but it has been developed now as an enterprise architect too.

The good thing about using this tool is the repository that gives us the opportunity: If you want to do modeling with the old notation form, ours was EPC, you can use the same object in the BPMN because the database is built in a way that you can use both things. So you only have to define it once, and if the notation form is BPMN and those kind of activities, you can use the same EPCs, so there is a connection between them. That is why it's a very flexible tool.

Furthermore, you can use this tool as an enterprise architect tool. So from an architectural point of view, when you're looking at the business area, you can find all the information you have to use as an architect.

The most important part of it, from my point of view - the way I work with it - is from an architect point of view. What I'm using it to handle, from the top-level management part, is where we talk about the strategy, then down to the business part, down to the information part, down to the application part, and to the technology part. So I use everything in the tool.

But, if you have to see it from a BPMN prospect, it will be the BPMN part of it. 

Also, the UML parts have been improved very much in the last two years. And it's very powerful now to combine the BPMN and UML parts in the product, because you can make a connection between them, so that you have the right interoperability between them. So if you're doing data modeling, you can use your class diagram and bind that to the BPMN part. That's a very strong part of it too. Had now implementet the Danish public ad on "Plusprofil" to the UML packed.

I have been talking with developers for many years, and it was before using your UML class diagram and those things for defining data. One of the issues is, when you are defining databases, the way they use entities and relationship diagrams, the way we can define data, like data models, there is still a part they could improve. By using the UML part, you would use that instead of the old fashioned way of an entity and relationships diagram. But there they have a still point where they could improve.

It is a very stable product. In all these years, I think once or twice in the beginning it gave me trouble, but never with stability. It's a very stable product. There are a very few bugs. When you find a bug, just give them a call or write to them and they will fix it. Today they are coming out with two major releases every year. They are really fast to go in and say, "Here is the update for that." So the stability is very good. 

It's also very good at scalability. If you follow what they are saying, how many users you should put on, etc., no problem.

The biggest challenge today is that people will not pay to have the right technology installation. For example, is there enough room for you at the network level to work with this product? In the new version where we can switch between the heavy one or the light one, the browser, there is no problem. It works. No problem.

The level of technical support is very high. Very good.

No, I didn't use a previous solution. If you ask me, if I have to choose between different kinds of solutions, I would prefer to use this. It is the most flexible and most user friendly product you can get. I would not switch. But, of course, when you are consulting, you also have to use other tools. Now, today, I'm also working with one of other tools, like HOPEX from MEGA. It's also one of the biggest tools that you can use. If I have to choose, I will choose ARIS instead of MEGA.

Of course, there are different things they can do, but I would still prefer to use ARIS. For the moment.

Every tool, like these - with so many different things you can do with these tools - you need, of course, education about the tools, and you have to make choices. What part of it will you use? It is always like that. When you work with it during one or two days' education, I think you will be very capable of using it in the area that you would like to work in.

For example, if you are using it in BPMN, one day of education and you will already be one of the best people to model BPMN with this tool. Still, BPMN is a big area to go into. Start small but think big.

You will never get a fixed price for this product because they will go in and ask you what kind of environment would you like to set up? How many people will you work with? How big is your organization? 

Today, they have a fixed price to say, "Okay, just to start the business area, buy two licenses for modeling and eight people that can look into the product." They have this kind of fixed price. It's 50,000 Danish Krone. If you divided that by about six, then you get the pricing in dollars.

From my point of view, no, it is not cheap, but it is not too expensive because you get this big organization behind it, technical support, and all those things. It's not so expensive to use. It's a Rolls Royce in this field, I know that. Even for small organizations, they can get so much effect from using this tool, in a very fast way, so the money will be back in the customer's pocket very fast. 

Still, when you are going out, negotiate and find the right price. You will never get a fixed price: "It costs this and, if you take ten of these, seven of these and eight of these, and then it costs this." No, you negotiate every time.

At that time, in 2002, it had to be connected to the SAP environment. The ARIS tool set at that time was one of the biggest in this area, and that's why we were choosing it. There was something else, but it was not as good. Not stable for the SAP environment. I think it was because of the SAP environment that we choose this product, not others.

Today, I would say, from an architectural point of view, it was a good choice. You will see that in the EU, they also use it in the customer area for defining BPMN processes and data. So, they are using this in the EU now as the main product for these areas.

It is not a challenge to implement the product, not even from a technical point of view, because if you have rights to do things, it takes less than two hours to implement the whole package. Download the product and then just run it.

You have to go to the top-level people and talk to them and say, "Okay, what is your strategy to get a good view of your business?" If they say, "We would like to have something help us to manage, what kind of strategy that we have, what kind of rules, principles that we have to follow, that can give us a picture from the top-level and then traceability down to business areas." 

For example, here in Europe, we have a new law called GDPR, data protection. That's coming in here in May, in the EU. This product can help you to be sure that you will not get in trouble when they come and ask you, "Have you completely made all these different kinds of process descriptions that show us where you are using, how you are using the data, etc?" Here you have a product that can support that.

If you want to have the full picture, also from an architectural point of view, then you should buy a product like this or something similar to this. You have to go up and find the best. ARIS is among the top in industry reviews, and I would recommend it. But I am also using one of the others up there as well.

Again: Where do you need it? That's a very important question to ask. Where do you want to put in? If it's in the BPMN area, use ARIS. It's a very easy way to use it.

For integration purposes, where files or data from different systems are generated and passed on to the next one in the format accepted by that system.

Interactions between several systems with different data formats are made easy, which basically holds the whole system together. This is effective middleware.

MFT is quite attractive. A large amount of data is passed in almost no time and it is quite easy to use.

The data in the pipeline could be managed better. Sometimes previously-used data would be reflected in present variables.

Used for BPMN training and consulting activities on different customers and several industries, such as health care, financial, and automotive.

ARIS has a powerful simulation engine. The modeling features can be hard to master, but once you do it, the tool unleashes great benefits from modeling to execution.

The simulation engine and SAP integration are technically very robust when you consider my segments of expertise (health care, financial, and automotive).

The user experience's usability (in general) should be improved as the tool is updated.

It serves as internal Knowledge Management System where we keep all business processes and related documents in a single repository.

Object oriented modeling, so we can trace what's going on with the specified object.

It needs external API and the ability to navigate back, similar to "Back" in web browser.

No issues with stability.

No issues with scalability.

Nine out of 10.

For the standard DBMS, things are quite straightforward. Network security and server security settings can be issued.

If you can afford it, it's the best so far.

I rate it an eight out of 10. It's not a 10 due to the price.

You need a dedicated team to get the benefits. 

My first use case using ARIS was in a Brazilian tax project for a global cosmetic company. All the flows had to be analysed by the global team regarding the core model synergy.

Creating all the flows related to the "As-Is" process of the organization that must easily see the possible improvements and compare them with the best practices from marketing.

The BPMN notation and the share flow through users. It is nice to see all flows in a common, shared space for all the stakeholders to view the same thing and the same language.

The usability. Others tools are easier to manage without same complexity that ARIS has.

It is a complete tool, but it is not so user-friendly.

Primary use case of the solution is for implementing the digital management system of a company, documenting processes, documents, IT system, roles, and organization, and, of course, their interconnections.

ARIS is really flexible in terms of what you can do to customize your methodology, so it supports various flavors of management system implementations. For example, some companies have a greater focus on Risk and Compliance management, SAP implementations and roll-outs, process improvement and reorganization, etc.

I can give a good example from one of my last projects, where I worked as an external consultant. At an oil and gas company, ARIS really made a big impact in offering an integrated solution where all of the employees could easily access the relevant information on critical safety processes, thus lowering the risk of accidents and potentially harmful events.

In other projects I’ve worked on, I’ve seen that it really helps people working on SAP template rollout projects, as all project members have more or less common information about which company-wide processes are part of the rollout, and what are the specifics in the local process variants.

The most valuable feature is the flexibility of the solution to fully customize the methodology according to the company's needs, and to enforce that methodology with features like filters, semantic checks, and reports.

Also, there is a really powerful reporting API that allows you to create almost any kind of report you want out of your process and document repository.

The functionalities for search, query, and social collaboration are getting better with every new release of the tool.

The whole redesign of the content publishing platform, and move from Business Publisher to ARIS Connect portal was a great move.

There are some things in the collaboration module that could be improved a little, such as the functionality which dynamically pushes notifications to interested people when a process changes during the Release Cycle Management workflow.

Also, while the dashboarding solution for integrating all kinds of process-related information from company sources other than ARIS is getting ever better, my personal wish would be to have a module that is more targeted to an Agile implementation of some modeled processes (model–to-execute).

ARIS has an internal fully customizable workflow system called APG, which is very good, but it’s targeted mostly at creating workflows related to ARIS content, and not general workflows to support other processes inside a company.

I give it an eight out of 10, but I’m really happy with the product in regards to the primary use case.