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Background Importance What it entails Who benefits Why promote it SMCN home

Background and reasons for Business Process Mapping? Process mapping is a management tool developed and implemented by General Electric originally to improve the bottom line performance of the business. General Electric has consistently been rated as one of the most powerful and best-led enterprises in the world with a proven record of outstanding sustainable results. Its purpose is to promote: - Understanding of what the business does (Process Modeling) Change and improvement by tackling weaknesses and wastage Getting the specification & configuration right first time. Verification of new process changes without disrupting the business, zero risk. “Buy in” by the process owner. Business process mapping involves the examination of key business functions and explores the inputs, outputs, processes of those functions and most importantly their interaction with other functions. It’s a hierarchical approach effectively disseminating the business on a level-by-level basis. Top down it represents the trading model; bottom up it defines the user operation. The Importance Of Business Processes The importance of investment in process can be best described with the use of the following diagrams that describe Enterprise Process Management. Firstly, most businesses exist to serve a customer; they will also have a reliance on their suppliers. Each business can be broken down into the basic elements shown below in the diagram. To operate effectively, or should I say to operate at all, these elements must work well together Without people a business could not operate and to keep them effective there are obvious areas of regular and routine investment required as can be seen in the diagram below. If you don’t keep broadly up to date with technology you can quickly be left behind. That doesn’t mean being a slave to each new gizmo but there is a need to be aware of what’s happening in your market space & consider its worth. The bottom line is that if you slip too far behind your basic trading ability will be compromised Product focus is the most obvious area of all. Organisations will spend a lot of time and energy in sourcing, developing & marketing. If a business does not have this basic intelligence about what the market needs and how you will fulfill this need, you don’t stay in business for long. To recap, these areas of people, technology and product will all attract plenty of attention in an organisations quest for a secure and profitable market position. Lets now consider process: No process = waste, chaos, crisis It’s common to look at your business processes when replacing or evaluating systems. There’s often an attempt to document the related procedures when you implement. It’s also a fact that systems fall into disrepute and create a loss in confidence when they fail to deliver against processes that are not defined. It should be apparent that process knowledge is fundamental to how a business functions. What does mapping entail? Business process mapping is a specialised service that involves analysis and documentation of the key business processes as a means of identifying wastage and providing improved efficiency. The key aspects of Business Process Mapping are as follows: Review of key business processes Capture of key business policies and procedures Improvement planning and implementation Creation and maintenance of quality user procedures The mechanics of Business Process Mapping involves: Review of strategy, policy, procedures and practices Define in outline the key business functions Review inputs, outputs and examine activities Drill down to system's operation and extendable to user training material Use as basis for retraining and rationalisation Business Process Mapping is an important investment that can be justified by… High price of neglect Risk of disturbance when things go wrong Ease of commercial damage The hurt caused by waste and inefficiency Massive benefits of consistency This process orientation is applicable to all businesses, but in particular it will apply… To those trying to achieve with reduced resources In any fast moving market sector When it’s a start-up venture For anyone experiencing high growth To anyone looking to improve efficiency In the search for competitive advantage Anywhere where external compliance is required When there is a reliance on third parties Who will benefit? People who have responsibility for process management People who want to identify their core processes with a view to improvement. People involved and responsible for process re-engineering initiatives. People focused on change and efficiency in their organisation. Leaders who have recognised that business processes affect the entire organisation. Why we promote Business Process Mapping? It affirms that we understand a Clients business It ensures that the Client will understand their business. It forms a secure base for configuration of system solutions. It provides an effective means of functional gap analysis. It ensures that conflicts can be identified and resolved It ensures that Interface requirements are identified at the outset. Background - BACK TO TOP