CC-97-121 MANAGING PROCESS INFORMATION APPLICATIONS WORLDWIDE WITH THE INTERNET

Description:

In an effort to remain competitive and use technology for growth, BP has created a competitive edge by adopting a coherent process information technology strategy. This strategy is in line with BP’s achievement in migrating to standard desktop tools, common operating environment worldwide, and networking of technologies and expertise. Adoption of this strategy required casting off the old paradigm of large information systems projects managed by numerous teams of software designers, consultants, and managers. It is replaced by a small team of highly focused engineers combining process and operational knowledge with software tools and a networking strategy. The end result is a new way of project implementation, development of user-oriented applications, maintenance, and training. Through this strategy, BP has achieved significant cost reductions in implementation. It has accelerated the pace of implementation by several folds and reduced the cost of maintenance and training as evident by significant reduction in staff dedicated for this purpose. BP is reaping the enormous benefits which come from more accurate process information on users’ desktops for performance monitoring, engineering, and productivity improvement. The message from our experience in adopting this new paradigm is that sites can dramatically simplify the task of installing new or replacing legacy information systems. This paper reviews our strategy and methodology for real-time system implementation, application development, and on-going maintenance. We will also show examples of several very useful applications which have been developed with input from users worldwide.