Business processes are available in all enterprises, whether it is in factories, business services or public offices. There has always been a need to optimise these processes. In the meantime, the market for business management software has enlarged. These products are available in various forms.

The goal of this diploma paper includes a choice of three products which had to be installed and tested. Choose from: Metastorm e-Work, Staffware iProcess Suite or IBM Lotus Workflow. Our target groups are small to medium sized companies as well as public authorities with 200 to 600 employees.

The products have been set up on the test environment system, and a criteria list for business process management software has been created. The products should meet the requirements of the users as well as the administrators. After which we had a valuation scheme in order for us to compare the various products. The goal is to inform the group concerned of our test results and conclusions.

The results included various points of view. In principle a business process management software can be useful both for small and medium sized companies. Although relatively high costs are involved at the beginning, in the long run it should pay off. In most cases the changing of the work processing results in cost reductions. Many positive points will show up indirectly.

The test products includes a large area of functions together with the necessary adjustment to the different working environments. The test results showed that the software from Metastorm is the most efficient one for the business group concerned. Staffware is clearly for larger companies with a few hundred employees. Lotus Workflow from IBM takes up a special position. The software is primarily recommended as an enhancement to an already existing Lotus Domino/Notes environment. This does not imply that this product is not compatible. It weakend the comparison to the other test objects.