Change Management and Organizations
February 12, 2025
Empowering Individuals through Knowledge at the Click of a Mouse In the current information age, knowledge is power and whoever has the most knowledge about the world succeeds in the cutthroat world of business and life. Knowledge can be about anything starting with information about pricing and arbitrage and including contracting terms and conditions and […]
In any Organization, the BPI initiative to be a success would need to be first understood and owned as well as sponsored by the leadership. The leadership here includes mainly the business unit leaders who become the main sponsors of the BPI program. It is important for the Leaders to understand why BPI is required […]
Measurement Systems Analysis is a complicated exercise. However, Six Sigma provides a step by step procedure to conduct it. Also, as usual, the focus of the executives should be to understand the focus of the exercise and interpretation of the results. The complex calculations can be performed by software. Here is the 4 step procedure. […]
According to the PMBOK 3rd edition, A project is defined as a “temporary endeavour with a beginning and an end and it must be used to create a unique product, service or result”. Further, it is progressively elaborated. What this definition of a project means is that projects are those activities that cannot go on […]
Introduction In the modern global and competitive business world, it is very important to the companies to enjoy financial success. This financial success can be achieved through financial discipline, goal setting and periodic reviews. Companies which have enjoyed financial success are likely to see that trust among employees have increased; profit has improved, and employee […]
Business Process Improvement exercise is undertaken by organizations to improve their operational efficiencies, to remove redundant processes, eliminate wastage as well as to adapt to customer expectations and thus augments its operations to meet with the expectations.
BPI programs aim to bring about permanent changes to the processes through a sustained and planned implementation program.
Business operations consist of a maze of processes that are intertwined, overlap ping, extensions and combinations of functions and departments. All departments and functions have got to work in tandem with seamless integration to ensure that the business objectives are met within the stipulated time frame and with utmost efficiency.
Business Process Improvement can be successful only when it is spearheaded by the management and the concerned business unit heads. The management forms an Executive Implementation Team which in turn chooses the important and business critical process which needs to be addressed in the BPI program besides of course drawing up, approving and enabling budgetary sanctions and resource allocations required for the program. Thus the management becomes the sponsor of the BPI program and owns the responsibility of communicating the same all through the organization.
In the second stage, the EIT appoints a BPI Champion or a Process Owner is selected for the chosen process. Along with the Process Owner, a Process Improvement Team is also formed. This team consists of the Departmental Managers and facilitators of the process. The PIT team headed by the Process Owner undergoes BPI training to equip themselves with the concept, the methodology and the tools to be used for the BPI program.
Once the initial training has been completed, the next step that follows is to build a initial PIT Plan. The PIT plan consists of:
As explained above, any business operations will consist of several business processes. It is important to identify and determine that particular business process that is to be taken up for improvement. Each process will need to be identified with the boundaries explaining at which point the process begins and the point at which the process ends. Besides the process will also involve inputs and outputs to several other processes, departments or functions too. These will need to be identified in detail and the clear boundaries of the process on hand will need to be identified.
Example Fig. 1: Parts Management Warehousing Process
Example Fig.2: Part Picking Process in the Warehouse
Take the case of the above example. The Fig. 1 represents an overview of the Warehousing Process. The second Fig. 2 shows a detailed process flow of one of the activities that forms a part of the Warehousing Process. (Highlighted in Fig.1). As such in a proposed BPI program, several such processes can be taken up for improvement if they are found to yield efficiencies and make business impact.
In each of the processes identified, the Process owner draws up the starting point and ending point of the process that is being taken up for improvement and walks through the process with the process leaders in detail.
The PIT plan drawn up will contain information on the selected process, the boundaries, the start time and end time of the project, the details of process owners, the resources required and the action plan for the process improvement.
The initial PIT plan serves as a guide post for the entire program. As the PIT team gets involved in review of the process in detail, the operating assumptions and the entire process itself can undergo changes in line with the customer expectations or the set goals.
Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *