If you’re new to business process work, you may be eager to immediately focus on how you can improve a process, but resist jumping in too quickly to see what you can fix. You want to know the baseline first, so you can see if your improvements are working. To establish your baseline, start by identifying the boundaries so you understand the start and end of the process, draw the map so you’ve identified the activities involved, estimate how long the process takes and how much it costs, and validate that the information you have collected is correct before proceeding to the improvement step.
Improving a business process is similar to losing weight. You know you have to change your daily routine. You can change your eating habits and cut out dessert, add an exercise like jogging, or team up with a friend to get motivated. The same type of evaluation has to occur to improve a business process.
There are many techniques you can use to look for improvement opportunities, including:
- eliminate bureaucracy (although it is easier said than done, it is it is possible)
- evaluating value-added activities (what the client or client Really to worry)
- eliminating duplication and redundancy (why do things twice)
- simplifying everything (or KISS – keep it simple
) - reduce cycle time (a key customer or customer concern)
- seeing how you can automate the process
Of course, you can use whatever technique you find useful, but I’ve found these six methods to be consistently helpful. I like to apply each of the techniques one at a time and in a certain order because doing so helps ensure that you squeeze every last bit of improvement out of each one. So spend time challenging the bureaucracy; determine which activities add value to your customers/clients; look for opportunities to reduce the number of employees doing the same thing, simplifying forms or streamlining a step in the process; and set a cycle time reduction goal.
One question you have to deal with in process improvement is technology:
Does technology drive the process?
Prayed….
Does the process drive the technology?
If you’ve been involved in a large system implementation, you’ve probably seen technology drive the process. I feel like you should only automate a efficientit’s not an inefficient process, so I prefer the latter.
Bill Gates is credited with saying, “The first principle for any technology you contemplate introducing into a business is that automation applied to an efficient operation will increase efficiency. The second is that automation applied to an inefficient operation will only entrench inefficiency.” “.
Applying improvement techniques is the sixth step to improve the effectiveness, efficiency and adaptability of your business.
Copyright 2010 Susan Page