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What Is a Process Improvement Methodology Anyway?

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Michael Wood

October 26, 2000

	Process Improvement

Believe it or not, there are several PI methods out there, each primarily the proprietary property of the consulting companies that use them. So, it is somewhat hard to select one without engaging those who own it. But not all methods are alike. Some were born from the quality movement. Some evolved out of Structured Systems Development Life Cycle methods. To make things worse, they all use nonstandard terminologies to describe their tools, processes and procedures. Like every other discipline in its early stages of evolution, PI has many evangelists and gurus, each with his or her own style. Yet, if they are truly to be considered a PI methodologies, they must contain some fundamental tools and techniques. At a minimum these tools and techniques must facilitate the project team’s ability to:

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Define the gap between stakeholder needs, organizational objectives and operational outcomes.

Conceptualize, with knowledge workers, the operational changes that need to take place in how work is done and how value is delivered in order to resolve the gaps defined.

Quantify the value-added to the organization and its stakeholders that will be realized once the new processes have been implemented.

Design new work processes and procedures that embrace the changes identified.

Quantify the time, cost and plan for implementing the improvements.

Typically these tools take the form of group facilitation techniques and process modeling tools. Ideally they would also include process diagnostic and organizational alignment assessment techniques as well.

So, let’s explore how these tools and techniques help to facilitate the project team’s ability to deliver the PI goods.

Define the gap between stakeholder needs, organizational objectives and operational outcomes
Before you review a single process, before you interview a single knowledge worker, you should always define the intended outcomes your process improvement project. This is done by defining and quantifying the gaps in the value propositions that exist between the organization and its stakeholders. Defining and quantifying these gaps will help you target the processes that need to be improved and set a context for those improvements. A quality PI methodology should provide tools and techniques that allow you to define these gaps in at least two areas.

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