Well thanks to many of you reading this, 2007 has been a truly memorable year for me in the BPM arena. I said when the year started that I hoped to visit as many countries as possible with my 2007 mantra "Think Differently!" - Well, with your help I managed Austria, Belgium, Dubai, Holland, Sudan, South Africa, India, USA, Portugal, and of course England and Scotland. If I have missed one or two then please accept my apologies.

Special consideration has to go to India, where I have in fact spent almost 8 weeks in the last 5 months. As many of you are aware, India is a give and take relationship, where I learn as much as I teach. Over the past months I have made so many friends in the academic worlds and in the spiritual worlds too, but lately I have also been privileged to spend time with CEO's of a couple of leading India companies. So if you are among the over 1,200 people in India that I have been able to spend time with in sessions, conferences, seminars or training classes - thank you - for you have given me back every bit as much and I hope to be able to put these learning's to good use around the world in 2008.

For those outside of India, then trust me, the lessons I have learned are invaluable in helping us to better understand and apply change in our organizations - I am assuming of course that those undertaking BPM or SOA are in actual fact trying to effect some change? And that the purpose behind such change is to deliver increased business performance? And that in doing so the biggest obstacle is usually that surrounding the issue of people changing? - - I only ask because sometimes in our technology centric world I think we forget what the purpose is!

In 2008 I will be making use of all the learning that UI have done and all the experiences that these CEO's have shared in order to help others achieve even greater success. Sure we will be using process as the vehicle, but as recent attendees have discovered there are many ways to make ourselves more effective and process maps is just one excuse to enable us to really transform the lives of the people in the process and to convert even the most cynical of business users to the idea that we really can help.

So I will finish by wishing you all the very best for the Christmas season and hope that you and your families have a peaceful, happy and prosperous New Year. I look forward to having the chance to work with even more of you in 2008 when the theme for the year will be "Act Differently!"

P.S. You can catch me at the ABPMP Chapter meeting in Tampa on the 9^th January www.abpmptpa.camp7.org or the at the BEA BPM and Collaboration Briefing on the 17^th January in London