6- Process design (designing)

Question 1

What is process designing about?

Answer 1

-it involves defining the activities within a process.
-it involves calculating the details of a process
-it must reflect relative priority of the performance objectives
-it defines the way units flow through an operation.

Question 2

Why is process design important?

Answer 2

it is crucial to have good operational processes and avoid business failure. It should reflect strategic performance objectives.

Question 3

Describe the 2 ways of seeing processes

Answer 3

-Everything are processes. it aims to standarize disciplines to achieve max. efficiency.
-Processes are made by people: you cannot treat people like machines. Against standarization.

Question 4

little’s law

Answer 4

trhoughput time=work-in-process x cycle time

Question 5

ways of configuring processes?

Answer 5

-series (long-thin) sequential configuration: increase number of stages
-parallel (short-fat) configuration:increase amount of work at each stage

the best configuration depends on your needs!

Question 6

process mapping

Answer 6

we need to know process behavior. there are many types, but all of them:
-identify different type of activities in a process.
-show the flow of transormed resources through the process.

When process mapping, it is very convenient to ensure process visibility : arrange mapping of processes in a way that degree of visibility is made obvious.

Question 7

What are process flow objectives?

Answer 7

It should include performance objectives (quality, cost, flexibility, dependability, speed), but also consider:
-throughput rate: nº of units passing through the process per unit of time
-throughput time: time taken to transform inputs into outputs in a process.
-work-in-process (WIP): avg nº of units in the process over a period of time.
-utilization of resources: proportion of available time dedicated to perform useful work.

Question 8

What design factors influate the flow objectives?

Answer 8

-variability of outputs
-configuration of the resources
-capacity of the process
-variability of the activities

Question 9

how to configure process tasks and capacity appropriately?

Answer 9

-we need to understang task precedence: redesign needs to preserve inherent of precedent activities (what act. need to occur before others).
-consider series and parallel configurations