Recognizing that BPM practitioners
on the Business Side and Technical Side of our industry use different sets of concepts and
tools, the program splits into two tracks above the Fundamental level (as shown
in the figure below) to define separate Intermediate and Advanced level
certifications. Certification at each level requires certification at all
levels below it in its track. Candidates may take the examinations in any
order, but Intermediate and Advanced Certifications will only be awarded after
required prerequisites have been met.
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The twenty-five experts from top BPM companies
and well-known independent consultants who designed the
OCEB topical coverage and wrote the questions for the
set of OCEB examinations want peers and prospective
employers to feel confident about a certified candidate’s
ability to participate in or lead real-world initiatives
in enterprise BPM. To accomplish this, OCEB tests not
only a candidate's knowledge of the domain's standards
(such as BPMN™, BMM, and BPMM), but also aspects of the application of
those standards in the field, and of industry best
practices, over a wide range of business process- related
topics. Skills are
tested by asking a question about a short scenario,
presented in a few sentences or a small BPMN diagram; the
multiple-choice examination format does
not allow for extended problem-solving. |
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FUNDAMENTAL With this level of knowledge, and a
corresponding amount of industry experience,
a BPM Practitioner holding the OCEB
Fundamental Level Certification can be a
productive and responsible member of a BPM
team. On the business side of an
organization, supervised by a holder of one
of the higher OCEB certifications, the
practitioner and team may discover and model
business processes, or work with associated
Business Motivation models. On the technical
side, the practitioner and team may
implement a BPM Suite, or connect it to
sources of analytic data. OCEB Certification
at the Fundamental level is a prerequisite
for every other OCEB Certification. |
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BUSINESS
INTERMEDIATE With this level of knowledge and
expertise, and a corresponding amount of
industry experience, a BPM Practitioner
holding the OCEB Business Intermediate Level
Certification could be qualified to
initiate, organize, and lead, on the
business side of an organization, a BPM
project implementation of a single
application, perhaps with some
interdependent processes, or to supervise a
group implementing a sub-process that
integrates into an enterprise-wide system
coordinated by a holder of the OCEB Business
Advanced Certification. Or, such a Certified
BPM practitioner would be able to provide
high-level support in an enterprise-scale
BPM Center of Excellence (CoE), or direct
initial business-oriented training and
quality assurance for BPM technologies. The
OCEB Business Intermediate Certification requires the OCEB Fundamental Certification,
and is the prerequisite for the OCEB Business
Advanced Certification. |
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TECHNICAL INTERMEDIATE With this level of knowledge and expertise, and a corresponding amount of industry experience, a BPM Practitioner holding the OCEB Technical Intermediate Level Certification could be qualified for a number of responsible positions on the technical side of an organization: He or she could initiate, organize, and lead a BPM project implementation or integration of a single application within an existing technical architecture, applying the organization's business goals and objectives, or supervise a group implementing a process that integrates into an enterprise-wide system coordinated by a holder of an OCEB Advanced Certification. Or, such a Certified BPM practitioner would be able to provide high-level support for Technical-side topics in an enterprise-scale BPM Center of Excellence (CoE), or direct initial technical-oriented training and quality assurance for BPM projects. The OCEB Technical Intermediate Certification requires the OCEB Fundamental Certification, and is
the prerequisite for the OCEB Technical Advanced Certification. |
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BUSINESS ADVANCED With this level of knowledge and
expertise, and a corresponding amount of
industry experience, a BPM Practitioner
holding the OCEB Business Advanced Level
Certification could be qualified to lead a
major BPM project implementation from the
business community perspective, or to advise
senior management on the application and
optimization of business processes to
achieve strategic goals. He or she could be
able to provide both visionary and practical
guidance for large-scale enterprise-wide BPM
deployments with highly complex
interdependent processes, or establish and
manage a BPM Center of Excellence (CoE), or
design and provide in-depth
business-oriented training and quality
assurance for BPM technologies. The OCEB
Business Advanced Certification requires
both the OCEB Fundamental Certification and
the OCEB Business Intermediate Certification
as prerequisites. |
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TECHNICAL ADVANCED With this level of knowledge and expertise,
and a corresponding amount of industry
experience, a BPM Practitioner holding the
OCEB Technical Advanced Level Certification
could be qualified to lead the technical
side of a major BPM automation project, or
to advise senior management on the
automation and monitoring of business
processes to achieve strategic goals and
meet GRC requirements. He or she could be
able to provide both visionary and practical
technical guidance for large-scale
enterprise-wide BPM deployments with highly
complex interacting processes, or build and
manage the technical side of a BPM Center of
Excellence (CoE), or design and provide
in-depth technically-oriented training and
quality assurance for BPM technologies. The
OCEB Technical Advanced Certification
requires both the OCEB Fundamental
Certification and the OCEB Technical
Intermediate Certification as prerequisites.
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The three examinations in each track do not give us enough
space to repeat a topic, so the material tested on
a lower-level examination is not tested again on a
higher-level exam in its track. Consistent with this,
you'll find that the difference between levels as you
move up the OCEB examination series lies not so much in the
difficulty of the individual questions as in the scope
of material they cover. We believe that the range of
material covered by the Intermediate and Advanced
examinations in both tracks is extensive enough that
mastery is a significant accomplishment, and that practitioners who study
for and pass the Intermediate and Advanced OCEB examinations fully deserve the
elite status conferred by their accomplishment.
Should
I certify on the Business Side, or Technical Side, or Both?
Our BPM
experts designed the Fundamental certification to cover
the skills and knowledge most-used in BPM, plus a set of
topics - such as governance and process quality
frameworks - that come up frequently in conversations
and interactions in analysis and implementation of
business processes. At the Intermediate and
Advanced levels, there is very little overlap of
coverage between the two sides: BPMN coverage in the
Business track concentrates on aspects and constructs
used to represent the As-Is process, analyze it, and
build the To-Be process; moving beyond BPMN, the
business-side examinations cover business aspects of
process analytics, process optimization, governance and
regulatory compliance, and the business side of many
other topics. In contrast, the higher-level Technical
Side examinations cover advanced BPMN capabilities
concentrating on the ability to read and implement
complex BPMN models, including familiarity with the van
der Aalst workflow patters, topics in Business Rules,
SOA, and MDA®; Privacy and Security concerns, and Process
Metrics from the technical point of view - that is,
collecting information at the right places and the right
times for storage or display on a business
dashboard.
So - If you work exclusively on only one side - that
is, Business or Technical, but not both - and you don't
interact much with people or projects on the other side,
then certification in only one track may be enough for
you. But if you work at the
intersection of business process analysis and
automation, or concentrate on one side but interact with
people on the other, or if you're a consultant and use
your comprehensive expertise to establish credibility
with clients, you should seriously consider certifying in both the
Business and Technical tracks.
For more information or
questions about the OMG Certification Program, please contact
certificationinfo@omg.org
OCUP, OCRES, OCEB and OCSMP are joint programs of the OMG and the UML
Technology Institute (UTI)
Last updated on
06/28/2012  |
