The BPM 2026 organizing committee is pleased to welcome Tom Davenport as a keynote speaker at the 2026 International Conference on Business Process Management, hosted by York University.
His keynote, “The Marriage of Process and AI,” will address one of the central questions facing organizations today: how to realize the value of artificial intelligence not simply by adopting new tools, but by rethinking the business processes in which those tools operate.
Davenport has long shaped how researchers and practitioners think about process, analytics and technology-enabled organizational change. His work on business process redesign and analytics has influenced both academic research and managerial practice, and his recent writing has focused directly on the relationship between AI, process management and organizational performance.
“We are delighted to welcome Tom Davenport to BPM 2026,” said Arik Senderovich, assistant professor in ITEC and co-chair of the conference. “For many of us in the BPM community, Davenport’s work is not just background reading, it is part of how we teach and define the field. In my own BPM course, the fifth slide introduces the question ‘what is a business process?’ using Davenport’s definition. Having him speak at BPM 2026, especially on the connection between process and AI, is both timely and meaningful.”
Drawing on decades of research and practice, Davenport will discuss why AI initiatives often fall short when they are disconnected from process redesign. He will outline a renewed approach to business process reengineering, examine the organizational obstacles that slow AI adoption, and highlight how early adopters are bringing together process thinking, analytics and AI capabilities.
The keynote will also explore the role of AI in incremental process improvement and the growing importance of process intelligence in linking AI initiatives to measurable organizational outcomes.
Early-bird registration closes July 14.
About the Speaker
Thomas H. Davenport is the president’s distinguished professor of information technology and management and faculty director of the Metropoulos Institute for Technology and Entrepreneurship at Babson College. He is also a fellow at the MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy and the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI.
Davenport has been recognized as one of the top 25 consultants, one of the 100 most influential people in the technology industry and one of the world’s top 50 business school professors. He is the author of 27 books and more than 300 articles for Harvard Business Review, along with hundreds of additional publications. His most recent co-authored books include The New Science of Customer Relationships and Agentic Artificial Intelligence.