Process management: An insight

A look at the component parts of Process Management and the importance for the customer.

The activities which constitute Process Management can be grouped into five categories:

• Design - Process Design encompasses both the identification of existing processes and designing the "to-be" process. Areas of focus include: representation of the process flow, the people within it, alerts & notifications, escalations, Standard Operating Procedures, Service Level Agreements, and task hand-over mechanisms.
• Modeling - Modeling takes the theoretical design and introduces combinations of variables, for instance, changes in the cost of materials or increased rent, that determine how the process might operate under different circumstances.
• Execution - One way to automate processes is to develop or purchase an application that executes the required steps of the process. However, in practice, these applications rarely execute all the steps of the process accurately or completely. Another approach is to use a combination of software and human intervention which can be more complex, making documenting a process difficult.
• Monitoring - Monitoring encompasses the tracking of individual processes so that information on their state can be easily seen and statistics on the performance of one or more processes provided. An example of the tracking is being able to determine the state of a customer order (e.g. ordered arrived, awaiting delivery, invoice paid) so that problems in its operation can be identified and corrected. The use of Service Level Agreements can be key to effective monitoring.
• Optimisation - Process optimisation includes retrieving process performance information from the modeling or monitoring phase and identifying the potential or actual bottlenecks and potential rooms for cost savings or other improvements and then applying those enhancements in the design of the process. This helps to continue the value cycle of process management.

The importance of Process Management upon the customer

A work process is a series of tasks that transform inputs into outputs.

• Some work processes result in delivering a product or service to an external customer (example: power generation plant operations).
• Some work processes receive inputs from an external supplier and provide products or services to an internal customer (example: ordering parts).
• Some work processes are internal to the organisation - internal suppliers and customers (example: maintaining plant equipment).
• Organisational performance depends on the efficiency and effectiveness of these processes.

Process management is the management of the processes an organisation uses to conceive, develop, produce and deliver its products and services over a period of time.

Process management can then be viewed as planning, organising, staffing, leading and controlling the processes used to get work done.

Process management is a structured approach to analyse and continually improve fundamental activities (process areas) such as manufacturing, marketing, communications and other major elements of a company’s operation.

Having a process view of the organisation means understanding the elements that drive and direct the business.

Management by process focuses on a holistic view of the complete set of processes for the organisation. It means managing and reviewing the business as a system of interrelated processes to improve business and process performance:

• Defining processes, key customer requirements and process owners.
• Measuring performance to customer requirements and key process indicators.
• Analysing data to enhance measures and refine the process management mechanisms.
• Controlling performance through ongoing monitoring of inputs/operations/outputs and responding quickly to problems and process variations.