How to keep your Pega Center of Excellence (CoE) relevant in a fast-evolving world

Many Pega clients have established some form of a Center of Excellence (CoE). Originally most CoE’s were set up to provide structure and control in a chaotic landscape and focus on standards for control and reuse first. But what we see today is that many CoE’s have not evolved beyond this initial focus.
Digital transformation is accelerating. Customers expect instant service, processes are becoming smarter, and technologies like Pega continue to evolve rapidly. But at the same time many Centers of Excellence (CoEs) are falling behind or even disconnected from business needs. So how do you ensure your Pega CoE not only stays relevant, but becomes the driver of innovation? In this blog, we’ll explore five practical pillars to keep your CoE relevant and future-ready.

 

1. Relevance of a Center of Excellence starts with business alignment

The primary purpose of a CoE is to help the organization achieve its strategic goals. This is how it should have been from the start, but too many CoE’s focus solely on technology, processes, and governance, without asking: where does this add value for the business or customer?
If you feel your CoE is operating too isolated, go back to the drawing table to realign it with the strategic goals. Involve business stakeholders in CoE initiative prioritization and most importantly use business value as the guiding principle for everything the CoE does.

 

2. Don’t Just Govern — Enable

Enablement is one of the core responsibilities of a CoE, but some mature CoE’s are now mostly known for saying “no”. In a fast evolving world organizations need speed, agility, and empowerment. Governance is still important, but a modern CoE should be more than ever focused on enablement.
So help your teams deliver reusable components and design patterns instead of doing everything yourself. Organize communities of practice for developers and BAs. And think like a platform provider: how can others build faster and more consistent with the help of CoE?

 

3. Embrace Pega’s Low Code

With Pega’s App Studio, Constellation UI, and Fusion, low-code development is more accessible than ever. But at the same time some Pega developers are struggling to make that change. How do you empower teams to make that change and support them how things are possible instead of how they are not? Give them the tools, support and environment to make that shift. Lead by example and provide playgrounds and showcase successes. And related to pillar one, involve the business stakeholders in this shift as it should accelerate the time to value.

 

4. Stay Ahead & drive innovation

A strong CoE is not reactive, it stays one step ahead of the rest of the organization and drives innovation. That means investing in knowledge of the latest Pega capabilities and innovations like Blueprint, AI tools & capabilities (e.g. Knowledge Buddy, Coach, Agentic AI) and AI assisted development in App Studio.
You could do this by including an innovation track in your roadmap. Regularly assess new capabilities, evaluate how they could be beneficial to the business and work closely with your stakeholders to include them in (new) initiatives. Stay active in the outside Pega community and attend events or webinars.

 

5. Build a learning Pega organization

Staying relevant also means building a culture of continuous learning, sharing, and improving. Especially in a world where technologies and best practices evolve quickly. Create a central knowledge hub with tutorials, templates, and lessons learned. Host monthly guilds or learning sessions to quickly share knowledge. Set up structured onboarding programs for new developers and business stakeholders as they should know how to operate and contribute.

 

An example of a strong Pega Center of Excellence

At ING Wholesale Banking, we supported the CoE lead to successfully set up and run their Center of Excellence. It does all of the above and really contributes to the strategic goals of ING. Curious to learn more? Watch the breakout session from ING and Bovemij at PegaWorld 2025. Tim Ummels, CoE Lead & Central Product Owner Pega, shares his experiences with the CoE at ING and gives a special shout out to our delivery expert, Jan Willem.

 

Conclusion

A relevant Pega CoE is not a gatekeeper but a platform enabler. Not a bottleneck, but an accelerator. And above all: a trusted business partner helping to achieve business goals.

 

Curious how you can accelerate your Pega CoE?

BPM Company has helped many organizations, like ING, De Volksbank and Transavia, to design, build and run their CoE. Interested in discussing how a Pega Center of Excellence could benefit your organization? Contact our delivery expert, Jan Willem van Asperen – he’ll be happy to explore the possibilities with you. One of the services we might explore together is our proven CoE Maturity Scan, which provides a clear picture—within just two weeks—of where you stand and where the biggest opportunities lie.