This is Dr. Nancy Zeliff. Let’s look at Business Process Modeling and Re-engineering. You will complete a project in Visio that models an existing business process and then modify that process with improvements.
A business process is simply a set of steps to complete a business task. For example, when you purchase an item at a store, reserve a room on campus, request new cable service, or order a product online, you are using a business process. As organizations seek to become more efficient, they usually examine their business processes to look for ways to improve them.
Customer facing processes include the organization’s external customer. Customer billing, new products or services, distribution, order processing, and customer service are all examples of customer facing processes. A business facing process is not obvious to the external customer but is still a vital part of an organization’s operation. Strategic planning, employee performance feedback and rewards, and internal budgeting are a few examples of business facing processes. Organizations are only as effective as their business processes.
If customers are unhappy with a business’s process, it is often easy to switch to a competitor, leading businesses to try to improve their processes. Recent business process improvements include eliminating redundancies, improving efficiency or effectiveness, and streamlining processes.
A perfect organization that does not require any improvement does not exist. Instead process improvement should be seen as a continuous process. This method for improving business processes is effective to gain gradual incremental improvement and consists of these steps: Document the “as is” process. Establish measures, Follow the process, Measure performance, and identify and implement improvements.
When there’s a need to radically improve business processes, reengineering can be used. Companies often follow the same indirect path for doing business, not realizing there might be a different, faster, and more direct way of doing a process. Business process reengineering relies on a different school of thought than continuous process improvement. In the extreme, BPR assumes the current process is irrelevant, does not work, or is broken and must be overhauled from scratch. This fresh start enables business process designers to disassociate themselves from today’s process and focus on a new process. Questions to answer include: What should the process look like? What do customers want it to look like? What do other employees want it to look like? How do best-in-class companies do it? How can new technology facilitate the process?
Business process reengineering enabled Progressive Insurance to slash the claims settlement from 31 days to four hours. Typically, car insurance companies follow this standard claims resolution process: The customer gets into an accident, has the car towed, and finds a ride home. The customer then calls the insurance company to begin the claims process, which usually takes over a month. Progressive Insurance improved service to its customers by offering a mobile claims process. When a customer has a car accident he or she calls in the claim on the spot. The Progressive claims adjustor comes to the accident and performs a mobile claims process, surveying the scene and taking digital photographs. The adjustor then offers the customer on-site payment, towing services, and a ride home.
Business process modeling should start with a diagram of the As-Is process to understand the entire process from beginning to end before determining how to fix the process. The As-Is process model represents the current state of the operation that has been mapped, without any specific improvements or changes to existing processes. The To-Be process model shows the results of applying change improvement opportunities to the current (As-Is) process model.
Here’s an example of a customer service business process model.
From looking at the models on these slides, you can see the value in visual models. In this model, you can see steps that could be used to improve a business process.
This concludes the discussion of business processes. Now proceed to the specific instructions given for the Visio project. Refer to this presentation during your Visio project. You will identify a business process that needs to be changed and improved. Map through Visio the “as is” or existing process. Then re-engineer the process with improvements and map through Visio that “To be” process. There should be distinct differences in each of the two processes, so select a business process that appropriately needs improvements.