Digital Transformation has been taking the world by storm. Two-thirds of the CEOs of Global 2000 companies will have digital transformation in the center of their company strategy by the end of 2017. Business process...
Whatever your organization does, there’s a pretty good chance that your business processes aren’t as efficient as they could be. Most companies are very passive about their processes, holding a “why fix something that isn’t...
In an increasingly globalized economy, businesses that handle money – especially banks – are considered more vulnerable to illicit activities. Know Your Customer (KYC) laws are designed to secure banks against potential fraud, money laundering,...
What’s the best way to solve product and process-related problems? According to Ford Motor Company’s Team Orientated Problem Solving program (TOPS), you need to take an 8-D perspective. It’s not as complicated as it may...
While you could probably sum up what your business does in just a few sentences, you know that it’s much more complicated than that. To achieve your business’ outputs, your staff completes a series of...
Whatever your business is about, you probably use a lot of different business processes. A process is something a company is built on – it’s the day-to-day repeatable tasks that keep everything running. If you...
It’s not a secret that managing change is hard. There are countless unexpected obstacles you might encounter, anything from your own team rebelling against you to failing at enforcing new business processes. Even if you,...
Until recent years, BPM software has only been available for enterprise organizations. The tools were hard to set up, clunky and extremely expensive, making it inaccessible for companies that don’t have a 6-figure budget. The...
The PDCA (Plan-Do-Check-Act), also known as the Deming cycle, is an essential technique for process improvement. It’s a framework that helps you change and improve your processes. What’s the PDCA? PDCA is a methodology for...
You use your brain differently when you brainstorm, whether independently or with a group of people. You’re imagining new possibilities, thinking of the big picture, spotting gaps to turn into opportunities, and generating good and...
More heads are better than one, right? For many teams, group conversation seems to be the prevailing brainstorming technique. Get everyone on the team into a conference room, introduce the question or challenge at hand,...
If you’re getting into process management, the as-is and to-be process states are a must-know. Before you can make any adjustments to a process, you should have a clear idea of how it operates now,...
The “to-be business process” is the future state of an as-is process. If, after document and analyzing an as-is process, you realize that there are potential improvements to be made, you create a to-be process...
When carrying out business process improvement, it’s essential to start by documenting and analyzing the As-Is business process. This helps you gain the insight you need on the inner workings of a process, allowing you...
A UML diagram is a diagram based on the UML (Unified Modeling Language) with the purpose of visually representing a system along with its main actors, roles, actions, artifacts or classes, in order to better...
Every company is built on business processes. They’re the repeatable tasks you have to carry out on a regular basis – anything from shipping out a product to onboarding a new employee. How well these...
With so many functions to perform, businesses often find themselves working outside their areas of core competency. This is true of both small and large firms, and even the biggest businesses often find that they...
In the competitive world of business, quality isn’t a luxury – it’s a necessity. Quality failures can ruin a business’ reputation quickly and comprehensively – and that makes the introduction of new products or any...
In any line of business, change is inevitable. If we fail to move with the times, if we don’t continuously strive for improvement and growth, our businesses will stagnate – and they may even die....
The Statement of Work (SOW) is an important tool used internally or externally to govern project activities performed by vendors or by departments within the organization. It is also legally binding and must be approved...
More often than not, things don’t really go your way. Your proven processes go awry, the machinery breaks, leading to a metaphorical fire in the company offices. Every other department is running around panicking, trying...
If you’re already working with a remote team, you’ve already gained a significant advantage over your competition. Remote employees come with all sorts of benefits, such as reducing employee stress or increasing overall company productivity....
Process (or workflow) management and automation is something that can benefit just about any business, considering the countless benefits it offers. The hard part, though, is figuring out which of your business processes can be...
The difference between processes and procedure is quite substantial – a process is more surface-level. It’s used by management to analyze the efficiency of their business. A procedure, on the other hand, is a lot more...
No matter what your project, getting big things done means taking little steps towards the desired endpoint. And just as you can’t begin a journey at the end, your team must complete the first steps...
Is your company wasting its potential profits? Chances are, you’ll say “No!” but it might be time to take a step back and look for the hidden wastes that could be eating into your bottom...
Total Quality Management is an approach that covers everything your business does, whether it’s for an external client or an internal one. Since that sounds pretty vague, we’re going to dive in and explaining how...
Visualization can be a very useful tool for getting a deeper understanding of how your business works. It helps make your processes more transparent, as well as easier to understand and analyze. The workflow diagram...
One of the hardest parts of writing software is documenting it. In order to write good software documentation, you need to use the right software documentation tools. Trying to open a gate with a chainsaw...
When you start working with new suppliers, supplier onboarding is an essential first step. The alternative is a stressful, ad-hoc process that could result in a breakdown of relations, loss of productivity, and lost income....