Starting the BPM journey (2)

So you have chosen the correct path for your business vis-a-vis drive down admin costs or attack high value/risk operations and for good or for bad you now need to "do something".

Common and worthwhile advice is to map out the process "as is" - this means draw out the logical steps and decision points of the process as it currently exists and you understand it today. Invariably this means setting up workshops with the various stakeholders, recording their comments and then extrapolating your notes into a pictorial representation of actions, responsibilities and directional flows (perhaps prepared in Microsoft Visio or - shudder - PowerPoint. There are some very powerful tools to help here - more on this later).

So now you think you know what the process looks like and you may be able to identify some of the problems/challenges/breakdowns/fractures/bottle necks etc.

Next step for most if not all protagonists is to map out the process as you would like it "to be". Look to iron out the wrinkles, reduce the number of handovers, drive down human errors and remove the areas that cause iterative queries, rework and indecision. Especially look for where things get stuck in the lifecycle and concentrate on driving down time wasted whilst nothing happens (time lag).

Now what? Workshop it - take it into the boardroom and expose it to the rigour of team thought. Allow the stakeholders an opportunity to assess and critique your thoughts and plans and give you guidance on improvements and problems. Take them seriously - you will get a better outcome. This is a good change management tactic too - people involved in the design of new ways, and educated early on why and what any changes will be, are invariably more willing and supportive of the change when it comes.

Rework the "to be" and re-workshop it. When all done start asking the stakeholders to commit to some service levels around the handover points from one org-chart responsibility to the next (or be more radical). If you go on the premise that "the customer deserves a quality experience" at each point (starting with the real end-customer and working back through the supply chain) then at each handover point you will be able to identify a factor that directly impacts on the quality experience of the customer-end of each handover. A sales manager may say "my team will commit to placing correct orders on service delivery 100% of the time". That's a good start, now work back from there. (You will need to measure these commitments so keep them tangible and objective).

Looking good - you now have a documented, commonly understood, consultatively honed and improved process ready to be implemented with service level agreements for quality at each responsibility point in the process lifecycle.

Whew, take a break, you deserve it!