Resources in Operational Excellence (OPEX)

Our focus on Operational Excellence (OE) is on the alignment of strategies, processes, performers, measures, technologies and management to achieve and sustain outstanding levels of performance of the entire enterprise.

Our belief is that Operational Excellence is achievable only when an organization has defined the major elements that affect performance and aligned them (which often means redesigning them) to support strategies and goals.

Just as often the task of alignment also means ridding the organization of things (practices, policies, organization structures) that impede Operational Excellence.

Displaying 31 - 40 of 263 resources matching your criteria.

Starting and Advancing a BPM Measurement System

Contributed by:Shelley Sweet, Faculty Member, BPMInstitute.org and President, i4 Process

Do you know how each process is performing right now in your organization? And if you’ve improved a particular process do you know if you achieved the level of improvement you wanted? It’s necessary to quantify data to be able to answer these two questions and provide objective ways to measure process and level of change.

So if you’re working on a single business process improvement project or many processes across the enterprise, you need a measurement system. But how do you build one that is comprehensive, efficient and effective?

Where do you start? You have to start from where you are, so the Process Maturity Framework can help identify where on the continuum your organization is. The first graphic below shows the five levels of the CMMI Process Maturity Framework, with descriptors at each level.

How Can a Project Manager Add Value to a BPM Project?

Contributed by:Shelley Sweet, Faculty Member, BPMInstitute.org and President, i4 Process

Project Manager is a common term in business these days. On the simplest level, a Project Manager can be an individual in charge of a plan that was developed on a ‘cocktail napkin’ or simple spreadsheet. For a more complex project, the Project Manager can be an employee in the Project (or Program) Management Office, be certified in Project Management by passing the rigorous PMI test, create sophisticated work breakdown schedules using software and manage enterprise projects from beginning to end for the organization. The kind of Project Manager I am talking about has responsibilities like the second type above, but may not always work on enterprise projects; instead he might work on medium or large projects as well.

BPM versus OpX

Contributed by:Andrew Spanyi, Faculty Member, DBizInstitute.org and Managing Director, Spanyi International

The proliferation of process improvement methods over the past decade has become problematic. The range of process improvement methods now includes BPM, Lean, Six Sigma, Lean Six Sigma, Operational Excellence (OpX), Process Excellence (PEX), Reengineering (BPR) and several older techniques such as the theory of constraints (TOC) which are still in use in some organizations.

As process improvement professionals develop increasing skill in a selected improvement method, they are inclined to think and communicate that their method is better than alternative approaches to process improvement. Executives seeking to improve operational performance are sometimes confused about the similarities and differences between various methods and feel that they “have to choose a side.”

What Skills are Needed for BPM Success?

Contributed by:Gregg Rock, Editor & Founder, DBizInstitute.org, BPMInstitute.org & BAInstitute.org

One of the most frequently asked questions (FAQs) on BPM involves the skills needed for BPM success. While most people understand the importance of modeling skills, there’s a lot more involved in succeeding with BPM and it goes beyond skills or aptitude to mental models or attitude.

Earlier this year, Gartner identified 15 skills critical to the success of any BPM project. As depicted in Figure 1, they elected to group these skills into three types of critical competency: transformational, operational and technical.

Figure 1. Top 15 Business Process Management Skills[i]

Design with the End (User) In Mind

Contributed by:Karen Tricomi, Consultant, The Process Geek

Introduction

Stephen Covey advised us to “begin with the end in mind.” That would seem an obvious place to start whether we are designing a process, a product, or a software application. However, it’s surprising how many designs seem to have anyone but the end user in mind. In this piece we’ll take a look at several examples of where designs fall short, and suggest how good requirements practices can help produce sound designs.

Can You Build and Measure an Improvement Culture?

Contributed by:Shelley Sweet, Faculty Member, BPMInstitute.org and President, i4 Process

This is such a simple but such a critical question. And it has several critical elements:

Build – meaning this is going to take some time and it will start at one level and grow to another level.

Improvement – in other words we want to have an organization that wants to keep improving itself, which is necessary for any organization to succeed. If it doesn’t grow, it dies. But here the word is improvement – keep getting better, probably in several arenas.

Culture - the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an institution or organization--a corporate culture could be focused on the bottom line

Let’s define success first. How would you know that you had an improvement culture? What would you measure and what would your score be?

Here are four determinants you could use:

NIEM - A Model for Sharing Government Information

Contributed by:Ken Mullins, Senior Principal, MITRE Corporation

“Information is a source of learning. But unless it is organized, processed, and available to the right people in a format for decision making, it is . . . not a benefit.”– William Pollard

Lean Six Sigma Roles in BPM? Don’t Fight - Join or Complement

Contributed by:Shelley Sweet, Faculty Member, BPMInstitute.org and President, i4 Process

BPM and Lean Six Sigma are not the same, but should they be enemies or partners?

BPM is defined by BPMInstitute.org as:

Business Process Management is the definition, improvement and management of a firm’s end-to-end enterprise business processes in order to achieve three outcomes crucial to a performance-based, customer-driven firm:

Difficult People in the Virtual World - (part 2 of The Virtual Team Facilitator)

Contributed by:Shelley Sweet, Faculty Member, BPMInstitute.org and President, i4 Process

Difficult people can disrupt any meeting, and we all know their frequent styles and behaviors from face-to-face meetings. These are people such as the Heavy Talker, the Technical Expert, and the Know It All. Below are some more difficult people that apply in the virtual meeting. (Of course many of these roles apply in the face-to-face meeting as well.)

The Late Comer. You need to have the virtual tool set up at least 15 minutes ahead for a long meeting (over 2 hours) and 10 minutes before for a shorter meeting. Welcome people as they come on. Then at the start time, tell everyone you will start now or wait for 2 more minutes, and then start. When new people come in, welcome them and move along.