Business activity monitoring

Business activity monitoring (BAM) is a category of software that aids in the monitoring and tracking of business activities implemented within computer systems.

BAM is a concept introduced by Gartner, Inc., referring to the collection, analysis, and presentation of real-time information about activities within organizations, including those involving customers and partners. BAM tracks both individual business processes, often managed by business process management (BPM) software and sequences of activities that span multiple systems and applications. Its primary goal is to give operations managers and executives a clear, real-time view of business operations.

Description

BAM software provides real-time insights into the status and outcomes of operations, processes, and transactions, helping organizations collect and use this information effectively. BAM systems typically display data on computer dashboards, but they differ from business intelligence (BI) dashboards. In BAM systems, events are processed in real-time or near real-time and immediately displayed, whereas BI dashboards typically refresh at scheduled intervals by querying databases.

Certain products offer trouble notification functionalities, enabling them to interact directly with the issue tracking system. These functionalities allow e-mails, voice or text messages to be relayed to individuals depending on the nature of the issue.

Processing events

Newer versions are based on complex event processing (CEP) technology and can process greater volumes of underlying technical events to derive higher-level business events, therefore reducing the dependency on BPM.

Related fields

• Business service management
• Business intelligence
• Business process management
• User activity monitoring
• Business monitoring software