My Reflection – Visualization

Challenge

I work as a Management Consultant and I’m part of a team of five people of different ages and  experience, in charge for project management. We’ve been assigned to a project for an Engineering  company, with the aim of improving the processes management and control across the organization.  The client’s goals can be summarized as follow:

o Documents management system re organization: lot of documents and company procedures are

old, need to be reviewed and deleted as needed if not used anymore

o Processes re organization: organization’s processes can be divided into two groups (business and

staff), but they do not represent end-to-end processes: they just reflect the activities done by each  department. This leads to siloing and makes hard to read end-to-end processes and measure them  accordingly

The project scope covered documents system mapping and re organization through IT support system,  as well as business process mapping. We had the chance to work closely with different departments  owners, and the end of the project we wanted to be able to suggest the better IT  support system and  an effective process map.

The whole project lasted two months.

Selection

We started with workshops designed for department owner and open questions interviews, in order to  gain as much information as possible regarding the usage of the documents and the company’s  processes. We asked them to leverage whiteboards to help us understand how they view company’s  processes: we were confident that since there was some confusion around processes due to the  separation between different departments, the best way to approach the problem was to visualize it.

We already had some insights coming from a benchmark analysis for IT support for document  management system.

Application

Starting from the answers from the interview and the drawings elaborated by all department owners,  we leveraged the “spaghetti diagram” (i.e. a continuous flow line tracing the path of different activities)  to draft a continuous flow, with the aim of identifying redundancies (If any) and overlaps. We also  defined input and out put activities for each sub process and shared with department owners. We  received all the inputs and comments and then redesign the flow again, supported by the organization  members, using company colors to enhance the look and feel of the organization.

Then, we merged this work with the one of documents re organization: we propose a re work of  documents organization in order to reflect the newly defined processes and brought this into within the  chosen IT support system. The latter has also been chosen because of the capacity of work flows and

processes visualization. The system included a lot of space for visual customization that helped all the  end user to quickly learn how to manage it.

Insight

We were really satisfied of the output: we make the client reach his goal of re organization and clarity of  business processes. At the beginning, some departments owners were skeptical around the use of  workshops and whiteboards as they thought it was too much of an “academic/high school” approach,  but in the end when they really started seeing the drawings, they recognized how complex their  situation was.

Spaghetti diagram helped us first seeing the whole picture and the subsequentially inputs and outputs  and then the client to see all the inputs coming from colleagues merged all together, providing a clear  picture and valuable insights. At the beginning it was hard for us to approach the processes as they are  quite complex and there were tons of documents describing them at different level of details:  brainstorming and drawings have been essential for our understanding and made us capable of helping  the client.

Approach

Given the fact that the visualization tool have worked really good, we could have integrate it with the  learning lunch approach, releasing a first demo of the IT support system for documents internally for a  selected but representative group of department owners in order to receive some feedback before  proceeding with the implementation.


My Reflection – Visualization Challenge I work as a Management Consultant and I ’m part of a team of five people of different ages and experience , in charge for project management . We ’ve been assigned to a project for an Engineering company , with the aim of improving the processes management and control across the organization . The client ’s goals can be summarized as follow : o Documents management system re organization : lot of documents and company procedures are old , need to be reviewed and deleted as needed if not used anymore o Processes re organization : organization ’s processes can be divided into two groups ( business and staff ) , but they do not represent end - to - end processes : they just reflect the activities done by each department . This leads to siloing and makes hard to read end - to - end processes and measure them accordingly The project scope covered documents system mapping and re organization through IT support system , as well as business process mapping . We had the chance to work closely with different departments owners , and the end of the project we wanted to be able to suggest the better IT support system and an effective process map . The whole project lasted two months . Selection We started with workshops designed for department owner and open questions interviews , in order to gain as much information as possible regarding the usage of the documents and the company ’s processes . We asked them to leverage whiteboards to help us understand how they view company ’s processes : we were confident that since there was some confusion around processes due to the separation between different departments , the best way to approach the problem was to visualize it . We already had some insights coming from a benchmark analysis for IT support for document management system . Application Starting from the answers from the interview and the drawings elaborated by all department owners , we leveraged the “ spaghetti diagram ” ( i.e. a continuous flow line tracing the path of different activities ) to draft a continuous flow , with the aim of identifying redundancies ( If any ) and overlaps . We also defined input and out put activities for each sub process and shared with department owners . We received all the inputs and comments and then redesign the flow again , supported by the organization members , using company colors to enhance the look and feel of the organization . Then , we merged this work with the one of documents re organization : we propose a re work of documents organization in order to reflect the newly defined processes and brought this into within the chosen IT support system . The latter has also been chosen because of the capacity of work flows and processes visualization . The system included a lot of space for visual customization that helped all the end user to quickly learn how to manage it . Insight We were really satisfied of the output : we make the client reach his goal of re organization and clarity of business processes . At the beginning , some departments owners were skeptical around the use of workshops and whiteboards as they thought it was too much of an “ academic / high school ” approach , but in the end when they really started seeing the drawings , they recognized how complex their situation was . Spaghetti diagram helped us first seeing the whole picture and the subsequentially inputs and outputs and then the client to see all the inputs coming from colleagues merged all together , providing a clear picture and valuable insights . At the beginning it was hard for us to approach the processes as they are quite complex and there were tons of documents describing them at different level of details : brainstorming and drawings have been essential for our understanding and made us capable of helping the client . Approach Given the fact that the visualization tool have worked really good , we could have integrate it with the learning lunch approach , releasing a first demo of the IT support system for documents internally for a selected but representative group of department owners in order to receive some feedback before proceeding with the implementation .