Business Engineering
Emerging Trends
SystemicLogic News FeedThese times are not only turbulent and challenging but also represent an interesting epoch for the global financial services industry. Recent developments in the banking sector are topping the list of current hot financial events for financial services organisations. For these organisations the innovation imperative has increased both in intensity and urgency. Innovation across a number of areas holds the answer for organisations affected by the ripples of this new economic tide. Innovation is also increasingly becoming a potential tool for ensuring competitiveness and longevity for those threatened or are yet to be affected by global turbulence. Major areas of innovation focus include capabilities and processes, product and services, business models and business linkages.
In this current economic downturn, the BIG question for both local and international organisations in this sector is,
What innovation strategies can be used to reduce operational costs and improve service while at the same time maintaining company profitability and ensuring affordability of products and services?
SystemicLogic has talked the talk and walked the walk in this space. In 2008, research around innovation in the financial services sector was conducted. The research clarified key innovation concepts, principles and myths surrounding innovation and provided invaluable insights on how financial services organisations can be configured for change and create a conducive milieu for enterprise-wide innovations. In the same year, SystemicLogic provided innovation solutions for several clients in the financial sector including banks.
Check out the following innovation research artefacts:
Creating and Developing the New Organisation
The article fully explores the concept of innovation and highlights ways it can be applied to leverage agility and competitiveness of contemporary organisations.Read more...
Idea and Innovation Software Ecosystem
Like any other established discipline, this domain also require technology and management tools to rationalise the environment. In this paper an in-depth study of currently available software tools for innovation governance is provided. Read more...
Innovation and Technology: Perspectives on Dealing with an Unknown Future
The paper also consists of best of practice examples of innovation models and their use across the globe.Read more...
Innovation in South African Banks 2007: A Market Research
In the highly competitive market that the banks in South Africa find themselves, a means of differentiation is of paramount importance. Read more...
Innovation Patterns
This paper analyses a number of innovations trends in the banking industry against a definition and framework that should provide sufficient structure and resolution to encourage other researchers to adopt a systematic approach to the analysis of innovations. Read more...
Mobile Banking: The Current State of Adoption and Trends
The paper summarises the technology for mobile payments and banking, and examines the current state of adoption of mobile banking among the major banks in Australia and South Africa. Read more...
Reflections on Reframing Business
A highly involving presentation touching on fundamentals of business leadership and innovation. Read more...
Technology in Banking: Breaking the Barriers...
A very interesting paper for technologists interested in technology innovation in the banking space. Read more...
Also check the latest on the Built To Thrive blog, Social Innovation Systems
Limerick is a great city that is filled with history and Irish pride and is the host to the 2008 SPLC Conference.
The SPLC 2008 (SystemicLogic is a Gold Sponsor!) had brought together 233 people from some 15 counties. I’m the only one from Africa and there are a few people from Australia. The content is great as usual and the focus is still primarily on electronics, automotive, military and complex manufacturing related activity. We (Martin and I) were the only people with a focus on financial services. Our presentation and paper attracted a lot of attention as the move towards Service Line Practice is not being considered by this community.
The abstract of our paper is (Martin Krsek, Dr. Jay van Zyl, Robert Redpath, Ben Clohesy): Product Line concepts are widely used and adopted across a number of industries. Whilst the software product line concepts are readily accessible to commercial software product companies, the application within corporate environments whose core business is not software has been less evident. What are the types of challenges that large corporate organisations need to overcome? This paper presents a number of hurdles which have been observed during the adoption of the concepts at two large financial services organisations. One particular hurdle relates to the difficulty that business divisions within those organisations have in perceiving a return on investment when a product line is established that crosses business unit boundaries. Furthermore a number of enabling mechanisms, related to funding, IT project and general management aspects are proposed which are showing positive results in facilitating the adoption of Product Line Practices in corporate financial service organisations.
Check out Jay's blog on http://www.BuilttoThrive.com
Process is playing a more predominant role in the modern business organisation today. With the growing maturity in technology, process promises to provide the means by which businesses can come closer to designing their own destiny. There are still significant challenges that need guided resolution, specifically in the local context. The constant pace of change and separation of processes and technological capabilities still threaten the ability of organisations to effectively promote process design and implementation internally, leading to a clear shift in the so-called selling point.
What is the next big thing in Process?
Reality places the focus on maximising the real benefits of process competency within the organisation. Process - The New Era will be the theme for this year’s high profile Realities of Process Conference hosted by Systemiclogic.
SystemicLogic would like to invite you to this year’s event which promises to cover a wide range of crucial topics, all intricately related to the theme of improving and sustaining process development capabilities into the future. The Realities of Process Conference also aims to provide critical insights and constructive solutions to the challenges facing practitioners and drivers of process change inside the modern organisation.
The facilitators and presenters at the Realities of Process Conference brings a wealth of knowledge, years of experience and practical insight to the table, all of which aim to support and enhance critical decision making, current and future planning initiatives in the work environment.
General Information
Date: 09 September 2008
Venue: SAP Business Park, 1 Wood mead Drive, Wood mead, Johannesburg
Program Schedule
Agenda
08:00-09:00 - Breakfast
09:00-10:00 – Bridging the gap between Process and IT
Stefanos Papadopoulos
ABSA Capital IT Architecture
10:00 -11:00 – Strategy driven process
Rudi Kruger
CEO Espial Branding & Design
11:00 – 11:30 - Tea
11:30 - 12:30 – Mapping a business process & interpreting the results for process optimization.
Rose Atkinson
Industrial Engineer
CCI-Growthcon (PTY) Ltd
12:30-13:30 - Lunch
13:30-14:30 – Process frameworks
Niel Wiid
Director Strategic Projects
SystemicLogic
14:30-15:30 – Open Discussion: Tools
Delegate participation
16:00-16:30 – Close
Herman Ferreira
Process Portfolio Manager
SystemicLogic
Please forward all responses to joshna.samputh@systemiclogic.net or contact Joshna Samputh - (011) 706-7222 / 3161
This event is sponsored by IBM South Africa.
Realities of Architecture Conference
The challenging economic setting and the significant shortage of skills resources in the local market context is shaping the future of architecture in the modern organization. These realities place a renewed focus on practitioners in architecting for sustainability and performance. This evident lack of access to resources and ongoing financial pressures set the stage for this year's high profile SystemicLogic Realities of Architecture Conference.
SystemicLogic would like to invite high profile practitioners to this year's event that promises to cover a range of crucial topics related to the theme of architecting for performance and sustainability. The SystemicLogic Realities of Architecture Conference aims to provide critical insights and constructive solutions around the challenges facing architecture practitioners today.
The Realities of Architecture conference speakers bring a wealth of knowledge, year of experience and practical insight to support critical decision making, current and future planning initiatives.
Date: 26th of June 2008
Time: 8:30am for 09:00am
Venue: SAP Business Park, 1 Wood mead Drive, Wood mead, Johannesburg
Price: R3200.00pp ex VAT
Topics
08:30-09:30
Patterns of Architectures and the Timeless Way of Building
Lessons and techniques from other industries present important guidelines and analogies for architecture development in the modern age. "Patterns of architectures and the timeless way of building" provides key insights into architectural approaches in the building industry, bringing with it lessons and "art" and philosophy of combining different styles and patterns to which modern business and technology architecture practitioners can relate.
11:15-12:15
Business Architecture and the Drive to be Competitive
With the proliferation of the competitive environment and complexity, business architecture becomes even more important, but needs to perform under immense pressures. "Business architecture and the drive to be competitive" highlights the pressures of the modern business and architecture's role in supporting this increasingly dynamic environment.
14:30-15:30
Architecture Centers of Excellence
In an era where standards, skills development and optimal resource allocation is key to success, Architecture Centers of Excellence presents views on the function of architecture centers of excellence. This section of the conference presents a panel discussion on architecture centers of excellence.
15:30-16:30
Architecture Outsourcing…Revised IT Models
Architecture is primarily viewed as a core competency and strategic function of the modern enterprise. Can it be outsourced? How would it work? What are the benefits and pitfalls?
13:30-14:30
Contemporary Information Architecture and the Future of Decision Making
The value of decision making in the modern enterprise becomes emphasized in an age where information-overload is the norm. "Contemporary Information Architecture and the future of decision making" considers the importance of information architecture in today's pace changing environment, as well as key areas that need to require key focus.
10:15-11:15
The Value of Architecture when Implementing Complex Technologies
Architecture becomes crucial in an era where complexity is souring. The "value of architecture when implementing complex technologies" presents practical realities of modern day architecture's role in the ever-changing business environment – and how it's used to address the risks associated with large initiatives.
Please forward all responses to realities@systemiclogic.net or contact Cobus Smit / Vasha Brijlal at +2711 706 7222 / 3161
This event is sponsored by IBM South Africa.
Open Source in Corporate Organisations Today
Open Source as a paradigm has gradually made inroads in corporate organisations on both a local and global scale. Many organisations today are using Open Source as a viable alternative to proprietary solutions, but often choose to keep low visibility of its utilization and harbour remaining fears around support challenges.
Research and experience in adoption shows that Open Source is a realistic option for companies today, but that the decision is not without its challenges. It is within this context that SystemicLogic would like to invite you to our Open Source Open-Day Event. The event promises to present insightful views of the Open Source landscape, with valuable information around lessons learnt in adopting solutions on a broader enterprise scale. We also present a perspective on the current Open Source application stack and forward looking research in this space.
The event is also aimed at providing an interactive environment for sharing ideas and experiences.
Open Day Details:
Date: 7th of March 2008
Time: 8:30am for 09:00am
Venue: SAP Business Park, 1 Woodmead Drive, Woodmead, Jhb, SA (SAP as venue sponsor)
Cost: R1100 for non-participants (excluding VAT)
Open Day Topics:
- Keynote: Executive Overview of the Open Source challenge and landscape
- Open Source, myths and perceptions, challenges and experiences
- Local adoption of Open Source and lessons learnt
- Overview of Open Source application stack, migration paths and building a measurement instrument for Open Source solutions
- The Open Source Development Angle: Key discussion around internals of OSS development styles
- Open Source research agenda for 2008 in the South African market landscape
