Process Mapping
Assessing Cost and Value in the Supply Chain: the Process Mapping
Activity
Process Mapping: Origin and Today’s Context
• Originally developed by General Electric in late 1980’s and early 1990’s.
• Management tool to define “Best Practices” as a strategy to improve bottom-line business performance.
• Business process is a “series of steps designed to produce a product or service”.
Business Process Re-EngineeringBPR
• All service processes and processes that support production can be considered business processes, and thus subject to improvement or re-engineering.
• A process is a “value chain” by its contribution to the creation or delivery of a product or service.
• Each step should add “value”
Value: Understanding What the Customer Values
A definition of an activity or work task that adds value is one that:
• Physically changes the work passing through the process with result being more valuable to the customer.
• Requested by the customer and that customer is willing to pay for it
• All other activities are by definition non-value added and should be eliminated.
Business Process Re-Engineering Examples
• Order Management Processes: Purchasing, contracts, receiving, shipping, storage, and materials management
• Financial Management Processes: Payroll, ledger control, taxes, accounts receivable, and accounts payable
• Information Management Processes: Database management, networking, and client-server applications
• Product Development Processes: Product design, testing, configuration, and documentation processes
• Human Resource Processes: Hiring, placement, personnel services, and training.
Motivations to Re-Engineer
• Motivator– Reduce Costs
– Improve quality
– Increase speed
– Overcome a competitive threat
– Change the organizational structure
– Other
• Percent– 84
– 79
– 62
– 50
– 35
– 9
Business Process Improvement Possibilities
• Eliminate duplicate activities
• Combine related activities
• Eliminate inspections
• Simplify processes
• Reduce batch sizes
• Process in parallel
• Outsource inefficient activities
Process Mapping in the EnterpriseBusiness Enterprise
Business GoalsBenchmarking
InformationCustomer
Requirements
BusinessProcesses
Market DistributionManufacturing
SupportProcurement
Logistical Integration
Business ProcessGoals and
Measurement
Business ProcessMapping
Cross FunctionalTeams
Process Mapping—Getting Started
• Begins with a representation of WHAT the specific process is
• Considers activities, information, and interfaces
• Usually shows activities as boxes and uses arrows to represent data and interfaces.
• Major output of the process map is a workflow diagram
Flowchart Symbols Used in Process Mapping
Process DecisionDocument
Data Stored Data Direct Data
ManualOperation
Preparation
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Steps to Analyze the Grief Process
• Identify specific causes• Re-analyze in context of linkages to process
activities– Which process activities can be streamlined?
– Is there a role for technology?
– Can certain activities be combined?
– From what perspective is the Process Map being generated? Originator? Purchasing? Supplier?
Benefits of Process Mapping “Grief”
• ID steps in process and time taken to complete
• ID where breakdown occurs and where time savings and additional value can be obtained
• ID where new technologies could be used• Original Problem not only solved, also time
and cost savings from redefining a process
Point of View Owner—Macro Process
Point of View—Manager or Supervisor
Point of View--Senior Mechanic
Point of View--Customer
• Example: Customer intake (ie. Admissions) at hospital– One view: map tasks performed by hospital
personnel to admit a patient– Real view: Patient perspective: routes, tasks,
signatures, and other rqmts the patient needed to perform
• Findings: 40 separate steps and a half-mile walk!
Take-Aways
• Process Mapping is a necessary early first step in BPR.
• Process Mapping is a requirement in Simulation Modeling
• Resolve question of perspective from bottom-up. Document/Key Task/Customer Value Add
• A best practice is a cross-functional team to perform Process Mapping.
• Start with micro-processes and build up and across
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