ISD Lecture 7 & 8 Understanding and improving business processes

Question 1

Business process

Answer 1

A collection of: interrelated activities, initiated in response to a triggering event, which achieves a specific, discrete result for the customer and other stakeholder of the process

It’s important for a company to improve process not just development and implementing systems

Business process can be seen in the value creation model in the process performance - Creation of business value

Question 2

The method

Answer 2

o Scope: understand process context, scope and goals
o Analyze: understand the current (as-is) process
o Design: design the new (to-be) process

Question 3

Benefits with the method

Answer 3

• Focus on business processes – not just technology
• Diagrams are relatively easy to understand for customers and users
• The method includes enablers, that support processes, and contextual factors, that constrains processes and how the might be improved
• It shows how IT and processes might be integrated

Question 4

Challenges with the method

Answer 4

• You might get lost in making diagrams – become less agile
• Too many details, if not carefull
• Not suitable for all kinds of processes – best for relatively structured processes

Question 5

Criteria for a process

Answer 5

Work to be accomplished:
Involves work to be accomplished, typically by an organization, or some organizations that collaborate.
Name should reflect the outcome:
The name should reflect the outcome of the process as wanted by the customer (e.g. Recruit new employee).
Clear and important outcome:
The outcome must be clear, measurable and important for the customer.

Question 6

Name the areas of a process

Answer 6

Process area (The widest/Biggest)

Business process ( The level lower)

Sub process

Question 7

The Solution: Overview

Answer 7

Mission, Strategy, goals, and objectives

Question 8

Mission

Answer 8

The purpose off the organization – Why it exist? What it does, who it does is for and how it would like to be perceived by the stakeholders?

Question 9

Strategy

Answer 9

How the organization differentiate itself from competitors and why customers should choose this organization?

Question 10

Strategic options

Answer 10

Low-cost leadership
Product differentiation
Focus on market niche
Strengthen customer and supplier intimacy.

Question 11

Goals

Answer 11

The direction of improvements – the state you are aiming for.

Question 12

objectives

Answer 12

Performance targets that must be accomplished.

Question 13

What is the business process

Answer 13

Swimlane diagram

Question 14

Enablers

Answer 14

Enablers: Factors that, when adjusted, can change the performance of the process.

Which enablers has a negative impact or an un-exploited potential?
Improved according to goals and objectives:

must be aligned with each other and overall goals and objectives

Non-IS investments: Workflow design, motivation and measurement, Human Resources, Policies and Rules, Facilities.

IS investments: Information systems

Co-Specialization of enablers

Question 15

Where can you use technochange prototyping

Answer 15

The enablers

Question 16

Activities of Scope

Answer 16

Discover business processes

• participants should be able to recognize the processes
• focus on processes and how to improve them
• not define what the problem is too fast

Establish process scope and content

Conduct initial as-is process assessment

Question 17

How to discover business processes

Answer 17

Prepare and manage the process (read about it)

Understand the organization:
Collect background information, meet the sponsor and learn about: strategies, business model, problems, goals and participants? and process area

Understand processes: Understand processes from the perspective of the various functional departments: Responsibilities, problems, process activities, key concepts (e.g. bank - accounts, customers, loans)?

Define processes:
Connect activities, identify processes by analyzing the links (1:1, 1:M, etc). Validate and name the processes.

Choose process to be improved: 
Using experience (divine intervention) or a systematic approach (systematic analysis).

through a combination of interview and workshops

Question 18

Which process should be improved ?

Answer 18

Difficulties: How difficult would it be to improve the process?
Customer value: Is the process closely related to our customers?
Easy wins: Is the process complicated – or are there easy wins?
Management commitment: Is management committed to improving the process?
Sequence: Are there any dependencies that implies that we should improve this process first?
Other issues: Are there any other issues that makes it attractive to improve this process first?

Question 19

The vision

Answer 19

In which direction should we improve?
Consider each problem for each stakeholder
Describe how this problem is solved in the future
If possible, describe objective performance measures and goals

Question 20

Vision strategy

Answer 20

Operational excellence, Product leadership, Customer intimacy

Question 21

Example for a assessment

Answer 21

The process, Assessment, Goals, Participants, Mechanisms, Measures

Question 22

Process workflow models: The essentials

Answer 22

Swimlane diagrams show the flow between steps (activities) in a process
The diagram illustrates:
What is done – the steps in a process
By who – the actors in a process
The sequence of the steps

Question 23

What are you using swinlanes diagrams for?

Answer 23

Make a process visible

To make an assessment of the process

To design IT systems that supports the process

Question 24

Example of a workflow (Description)

Answer 24

From left to right
Use simple symbols
Show all actors

Steps can:
Involve more than one actor (e.g. conversations, meetings, one actor helping another)These steps are called collaborative steps

Steps can be parallel
These steps are called concurrent steps

Naming:
Action verb (assign, validate, sort, …)

Optional qualifier (initial, replacement, …)

Noun(s) (service request, payment, …)

Optionally, information on how (on Form MS-17, by fax, …)
When interviewing an actor: Not all the tasks performed by an actor might be relevant for this particular process.

Question 25

What is a Flow

Answer 25

A flow illustrates how work flows between steps

A handoff is a flow where work changes from one actor to another – from one swim lane to another

Question 26

What is a conditional flow

Answer 26

A conditional flow comes after a step where a decision is made.

Question 27

Diagram in three levels of details

Answer 27

Hand-off – the level we are using here
Service level – more detail. Each step at the hand-off level is broken down to smaller and more detailed steps
Task level – even more detailed

Hand-off will be sufficient for our purpose in most cases

Question 28

What is the starting point for a AS-IS process workflow model?

Answer 28

The result from the initial assessment and the initial process scope (from the scope)

Question 29

How to model the AS-IS process workflow

Answer 29

Prepare and manage the process
Develop the first version of as-is hand-off level workflow model
Validate the model and develop a new version

Question 30

What do you do after you model the AS-IS process workflow

Answer 30

Make an assessment of the AS-IS process and Design a new Process

Confirm initial assessment and goals

Capture first impressions

Identify leverage points

Question 31

What is a leverage point

Answer 31

A leverage point is a point where a relatively small change can have major impact
Leverage point typically is in the beginning of a process

How can one or more enablers fix a leverage point?

Question 32

Assessment by Enablers: Workflow design

Answer 32

Are there too many actors?

Do exceptions or “tough stuff” get in the way of the other 80 or 90 percent? Process redesign often involves “triage” at the front end to direct an instance of the process into a flow that is designed for that particular case.

Are roles undefined, leading to confusion about who is responsible for what?

Question 33

Consolidate improvement ideas

Answer 33

Document problems and possible solutions…

Table consists of:
Enabler -> Problem -> Solution -> Notes

Question 34

Decide on what approach

Answer 34

Kill the process: simply kill the process – it does not create any value.

Outsource the process: get another organization, the customer or citizen, or the crowd to do the job.

Keep the process: keep the process as it is.

Optimize the process: keep the structure of the process and optimize it.

Re-engineer the process: change the process radically.

Question 35

Pit falls with designing new processes

Answer 35

Tunnel vision — focusing exclusively on workflow and IT: Use a holistic view

Paving the cow paths — simply automating or re-automating the as-is instead of rethinking it:
challenge underlying assumptions.

Unanticipated consequences — Implementing “improvements” without understanding what it will take to make them work and what the consequences will be:
Assess each potential improvement enabler by enabler to ensure that process requirements (and consequences) are understood.

Question 36

How to design new process

Answer 36

Describe major characteristics of the to-be process –this is the specification for the new process

Make swimlanes for the to-be process

Evaluate with stakeholders

Question 37

How to use business process

Answer 37

Tayloring !

This should be tailored to the specific situation

Question 38

Reflection

Answer 38

Be aware: The method is most appropriate for optimization projects – not for radical innovation.

Question 39

Relations

Answer 39

While many of the previous theories has emphasized that IT only creates value if it is used to change the organization – primarily the business processes – this text provides descriptions about how this might be accomplished.
Schryen (lecture1) described how IS and non-IS investments (complementary investments) should ne combined to improve business process performance.
Fitzgerald et al (lecture 2) described that developers needs to understand the context to develop proper information systems, that changes the context.
Markus (lecture 4) described the technochange approach where IT development and organizational change was integrated, and emphasized the need for complete solutions – not just IT solutions.
Peppard et al (lecture 4) described how organizational changes are aligned with IT systems in their benefits-dependency network.