The question 'what is a process?', often results in the answer ‘a series of actions taken to achieve a particular end’. Whilst this is true, it doesn’t really help to explain why understanding your processes is so important or indeed why we should all care what a process is. Read on for an answer…
This article covers:
- What is a Process?
- The Benefits of Process Thinking
- How To Capture Business Processes
- Getting Everyone to Follow The Process
What is a Process?
A process is a series of actions taken to achieve a particular end. In other words, it’s what we do in order to achieve something.
However, a process can also be defined as a series of actions that transform inputs into outputs. This is most easily understood when thinking about the processing of physical goods, when a process is the mechanism by which raw materials are converted into products.
For example, baking a cake will involve taking various ingredients (the inputs) and producing a cake (the output) using the recipe (the process).
Manufacturing is often thought of in process terms, indeed many business process management and improvement methodologies were first developed by the manufacturing industry – where the inputs and outputs are easy to spot and the steps to transform them are generally thought of as processing. So, when it comes to what many of us do for a living - sit in front of a computer all day - it’s often much harder to think of our work in terms of inputs and outputs. However, if we do there are multiple benefits to be had.
The Benefits of Process Thinking
Right now, I am writing a blog article… but what’s that got to do with process thinking? Well I am transforming my time and my knowledge (inputs) into what I hope will be a useful blog article (output). I don’t need to think of this as a process in order to do it, but if I do, I will be able capture the elements that are repeatable and in future step through them in a consistent manner – rather than inventing the wheel each time.
Thinking of writing a blog article as a process means that I can be more efficient each time I write one, and also capture the actions I go through to share with colleagues, so that we all take a consistent approach.
It’s very likely that having done so a colleague will suggest some improvements to my way of working and then we will agree a best practice approach. This will be particularly helpful when new members of staff join the team.
So, the headline benefits of process thinking are:
- To embed repeatable working
- To ensure consistency of working
- To agree best practice ways of working
- To support staff training
Of course there are many other benefits, but I hope that these explain why we should all care what a process is.
How To Capture Business Processes
Now that you are convinced of the benefits of process thinking, what’s the next step?
Process Mapping is, without a doubt, the best way to document your business processes. Although there are many ways to document how your employees should be working, such as technical documents and work instructions, nothing is as simple, clear and easy to understand as a process map.
A process map identifies all the steps and decisions of a process in diagrammatic form, creating unambiguous, uncluttered visual instructions, so that everyone can easily see what they need to do.
Triaster have been working in the Process space for 30 years and in that time we have developed the noun-verb process mapping methodology, to better map processes. To find out more please read: Noun-Verb: A Simple Process Mapping Methodology
Getting Everyone to Follow The Process
The key thing is to get everyone to follow the business processes that you have agreed as best practice.
This is problematic whether you work for a very large organisation who already has their processes all mapped out and shared via a great BMS (business management system), or if this is the first time that you have thought about what you do as a process.
The best way to get everyone to follow your Process is by creating a Process Library which is both useful and useable - to ensure it is used by everyone. For more information on how to make your Process Library Useful, Useable and used we recommend reading: The 3 ‘U’s of Great Process Libraries.
Related Articles:
Noun-Verb: A Simple Process Mapping Methodology
3 Common Business Process Mapping Mistakes (and How to Avoid Them)
Capturing a Business Process: 3 Tips for Process Discovery Workshops