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In This Issue: Issue #41

Use Your Process Improvement Successes to Show What's Possible

We Share Lessons Learned and Best

Practices

The Roadmap starts with the Discovery Pathway

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We share lessons learned and best practices..

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Process Perspectives Newsletter January 2014 - Use Your Process Improvement Successes to Show What's Possible

Welcome to this month's issue of the Process Perspectives Newsletter! Our goal is to provide you with specific insights so you can help your organization:

Be more successful with your process improvement projects Make progress on the road to Process Based Management (PBM)

In the main article, we discuss how to use your successful process improvement projects to build support and to show what is possible from process improvement. We support that discussion with the Process Improvement (PI) Quick Assessment question this month: "We share lessons learned and Best Practices:". The responses show that most organization share lessons learned on an ad-hoc basis, with only a small percentage sharing across either process teams or the organization as a whole. If you were to complete a Process Improvement Quick Assessment, how would your organization answer this question? In the last section, we focus on the Discovery Pathway in the PBM Roadmap. This initial pathway in the Roadmap helps an organization determine where they actually are in their PBM efforts, so they can plot the path to move forward. Let us know if there is a specific topic you would like to see covered. Keep up the good work on process; your customers see the difference. Pat Dowdle Jerry Stevens Process Strategy Group

Use your Process Improvement Successes to Show What's Possible Every organization has completed successful process improvement projects. They may be large or small, highly visible or low key, major impact or just in one area. The key point is that these successful projects can help you show what can be achieved from process improvement projects, and to move the overall process efforts forward. In prior newsletters we have discussed how and why communication is so important. We have encountered many organizations who struggle trying to make the case for process improvement, and have challenges moving process improvement efforts forward. Here are some of the reasons we see:

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There is a lack of clarity in the organization around the goal of the process improvement efforts. There are numerous approaches being used, which causes confusion. Many Senior Managers do not see the value of spending time improving processes. They have not experienced process improvement efforts first hand. The initial efforts may have been too big, and taken too long.

Discussion continues to be dominated by those "who really don't know what they are talking about".

Your successful process improvement projects help you address these challenges:

Communication of these early successes shows others what is possible, and how the approach can help in their area. Even small wins show the potential of process improvement. Develop stories around these projects to demonstrate the successes and widely communicate them. If you have not already done so, use these successful projects and the people who were involved in these process efforts to:

Develop a consistent approach which can be followed for future projects. Gain support from the senior manager that was impacted by these projects. Use them to market the successes and the impact to other senior managers. Develop specific language that others can use to create a consistent message and vocabulary around the process efforts. Keep it simple and focused, and uselanguage that will resonate in the organization. Identify additional opportunities for process improvement.

Your process successes are a key to showing what is possible, and moving your overall efforts forward. Even small wins allow you the opportunity to communicate the favorable impact and potential of process improvement. There is no better way to gain buy in and to get others on board than to show them actual successes and to demonstrate the value that can be achieved.

January Process Improvement Quick Assessment Results This month we discuss the results from the Process Improvement (PI) Quick Assessment. We tabulated the responses to the PI Quick Assessment question:

The responses indicate that most organizations (51%) share lessons learned or Best Practices only on an ad-hoc basis, not widespread:

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Only 24% indicated that lessons learned are shared internally within departments. These organizations are starting to build the mechanisms to share lessons learned on a broader basis. The lowest response (11%) indicated that best practices and lessons learned are shared across process teams. These organizations are not leveraging the work done by other process teams and are missing a great opportunity to instill successful process concepts in all of their process teams. Another 14% said that lessons learned and best practices are shared across the organization. These organizations will be much more successful in building a culture of process thinking since they are actively sharing the successes of their process efforts.

Organizations that are successful at process improvement utilize the knowledge and experience of successful process efforts and replicate those techniques and concepts to all their efforts. In order to build a successful process based organization you need to create an environment where successes are shared and leveraged by all process efforts. Since these responses are from various organizations, they do not provide the level of insight that would come from many people in the same organization taking the PI Quick assessment. What would the PI Quick Assessment show for your organization? Even more insightful, what would the different roles in your organization think about your process improvement efforts? To find out, our Targeted PI Quick Assessment would be an ideal starting point!

The Roadmap starts with the Discovery Pathway

As was discussed last month, we have significantly expanded the Roadmap content we have available for anyone to access on the PSG Website.

The first pathway in the Roadmapis

Discovery, this pathway identifies the steps an organization would use to get from the Aware state to the Foundation stage. We have found that many organizations eitherfeel they are already past this state or they think they know where their process efforts are at. This is far from reality; most of the time we find that organizations have no realunderstanding of the critical items that must be in place for a successful process journey! The key outcome of Discovery is to determine if the organization is ready to proceed forward with their process efforts. Our preferred way to do that is through an assessment. A more detailed description of the Discovery Pathway is available on the Roadmap page of our website.

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To get insight into where you are on the process journey, take one of our Free Assessments: Focusing now on Process Improvement, take the Free PI Quick Assessment

Moving toward process excellence and managing the organization from aprocess perspective, choose the Free PBM Quick Assessment.

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