International Process and Performance Institute

Customer Interactions - How important are they?

Every time - and I do mean EVERY TIME - a customer interacts with a business that interaction plays a significant role in the business's profitable revenue (growth or shrinkage). Every customer interaction is an opporunity for us as a business to differeniate ourselves because the hard reality is that most of us aren't very good at it at all.

The only thing our customers care about are the interactions they have with us. Each contact from a customer should be greeted as what it really is, an opportunity show our customers that we not only care, we care about what they care about and our there to make our customers' lives simpler, easier and more successful.

Things like how we are available, how quickly we respond, how good we are at understanding what the customer wants from us (precluded by our understanding of the customer's need), and (of course) how well we do at fulfilling that need are fast becoming the "make or break" points for customer loyalty.

At the end of the day the only thing that really matters to our customers are these interaction points, these customer-facing or customer-oriented processes. And the ONLY thing that matters is how the customer judges that interaction - and they (we) absolutely judge the businesses we interact with.

The overall game plan is to eliminate every possible reason that we can for our customers to need to contact us, then when they do (there will still be plenty of contacts I promise you) we need to make sure we respond when our customers expect us to, in the way they expect us to, and to help them achieve their goal (why they contacted us!) as quickly and easily as possible.

This stuff should be on every CXO's agenda... period.

The Institute has just approved a new Certification course - the Certified Process Manager program - and it's an important step in giving people the ability to drive new levels of success in their business. Considering the economic "challenges" we seem to be facing now it couldn't come at a better time.

What need does this program serve? For more indepth information on the course and its purpose you should visit https://ipapi.org/open_courses.php#CPM. Under Learn More there are several resources that should help you place this program into perspective.

In a "nutshell" though, this course addresses the high level view of the organization via a new perspective on Enterprise Architecture (no, I'm not talking about IT Enterprise Architecture I'm talking about Business Enterprise Architecture). The CPM program takes us to a "place" that enables us to understand, visualize, set goals for, and act upon those goals as an Enterprise - without getting snared in the complexity of details normally encountered when we try to build this kind of enterprise perspective. Once again we are taking people to a new place characterized by simplicity striving to reach that ultimate state of sophistication as denoted by Leonardo da Vinci.

The course also covers Process Strategy to increase customer value propositions, improve customer satisifaction and achieve internal buy-in. No matter what we do the need to get the right goals in place along with building internal support for our goals. Building internal support of those goals is a critical part of making postive change happen quickly. The Process Strategy component of the CPM course does just that.

Lastly, the program includes a section called Process Management - where we show how to develop process "Health" measures that make all the difference in evaluating the performance of our improvement activities and protecting process gains as we achieve them. Left unprotected, most process gains are subject to a slow but steady slippage away from the original value enhancement - and that's something we want to make sure NEVER happens. This section also addresses key auditing techniques and ways to expand organizational behaviors supporting customer-centricity, quality, and process efficiency.

Implied within the program is something very important, perhaps more so now then at other times though I think that is more a perception than a reality. When economic challenges exist, the ability to achieve changes that dramatically increase customer satisfaction - quickly - means we can improve our customer retention. When the economy is "down," retaining our customer base is a really big deal. Having the means to do so quickly, with gains often seen within 30 days, is the kind of help many of us are looking for. The CPM program is now here to address that need.

In the longer view though this kind of approach is a different value. The more successful we are at retaining our existing customers, at building very strong customer loyalty, at delivering on customer value propositions that are seen as a real differentiator by our customers; the better we are positioned for strong business growth and market expansion when economies are stronger - or booming.

I think that is the most interesting dynamic of the current world market. Call it a market reset, recession, depression, slow-down, melt-down or whatever else you like - we are in a economically challenged environment. Guess what is waiting for us on the other side of this "down-turn?" That's right, a market boom.

Have you any guess as to which organizations are going to reap the benefits of the boom to follow? How do you think those organizations that improve their customer experiences, increase customer satisifaction, build customer loyalty, and develop enhanced customer value propositions NOW are going to do when the "boom" comes?

It's not hard to figure that one out, is it?

There is a certain amount of gloom and doom surrounding us right now. We are in a time of change, one that is pressing us with financial and economic impacts. I know some people see a bleak picture ahead. Not me. I see nothing but opportunity that is waiting for each and every one of us!

Am I an optimist? I don't think so. I believe I am more of a realist, and the reality is that right now there are opportunities all around us!

NOW is the time to focus on value creation, doing those things that create customer value. There is plenty of purchasing money still flowing, the opportunity is to make sure you have as much flowing to you (your business) as possible. How do you do that? By making your customers' lives simpler, easier and more successful!

It's a GREAT TIME to build market share. What happens if you do that? You will "weather the storm" in good shape and be perfectly positioned to reap the benefits of the boom that will follow (and it will follow).

If you DO THAT while decreasing costs (efficiency) then you are going to be in a really sweet place. The world will become your "oyster," and the business success you will achieve will make your Thanksgivings in the future ones of great bounty. And you can do that, for a lot less (time, cost) than you are spending trying to hunker down and survive until things get "better."

For me, I see this time of change as a great opportunity to challenge the "status quo." With the approach we take to process (the CPP and CPM programs) we KNOW that identifying the right actions to take WILL increase customer value WHILE decreasing costs. That's what I'm talking about folks. While we can't "afford" to sink costs into expensive and complicated "initiatives" we CAN identify low-cost opportunities to improve the experience we provide to our customers while reducing OUR COSTS for delivering that.

Can you imagine a better time to do just that?

(if that sounds good drop us a line through our contact form, subject: Building Market Share)

http://ipapi.org/pg/contact

Process Efficiency

Process efficiency is the measure of a process's ability to be performed without activities that are non value-add or unintentional.

Process efficiency - The ratio of value-added work to non value-added work plus unintentional work created by a process.

A process that is completely efficient (100% efficiency) creates no unintentional work, nor does it have any non value-added work within it.

Every process represents a certain amount of work performed by people, machines and sometimes systems. When determining the efficiency of a process, we need to identify the causes of work in a process and then try to place those causes into perspective in respect to value-add, non value-add and unintentional work (which is always non value-add).

Process Quality

There are three measures of process quality.

Statistical Process Quality is a measure of the likelihood that the process will deviate from the intended “process flow” in such a way that the consumer of the process outcome will not get what they expect – at least not in the way (what, where, when, how) they expected it. In a perfect process (Quality of 100%) no deviations would ever occur.

SPQ is a direct measure of process quality. The higher the percentage, the higher the quality of the process.

Obviously what we are looking for in process quality is the ability of a process to produce its intended outcome exactly as it is intended, including the underlying process it went through to get there. In a perfected process, there would be no deviation - ever.

The Points of Failure factor is the second quality measure we can use to assess process quality. It applies to customer-facing processes and processes where we have identified the internal consumer (customer) of the process outcome.

The POF factor is a key measure of customer satisfaction, assessing the impact of Moments of Truth and their exponential affect on the customer of the process (each “process deviation” experienced at a Moment of Truth exponentially increases the process customer’s dissatisfaction level). Obviously when contrasting Current State versus Future State we should see a decrease in the POF factor in the Future State if we are expecting the quality of the process to be improved.

The POF factor is a relative process quality measure. The lower the value, the higher the quality of the process.

Finally, there is the issue of Fitness of Use – the quality definition made so famous by Dr. Juran in the 1940’s. Juran defined quality as “Fitness of Use as determined by the User”. This brings into question our intended outcome of the process (and there better be an intended outcome that is clearly articulated or things are in a real mess).

The question of Fitness of Use can only be answered by the User, or at least by developing the perspective of the user from their Point of View (for customers of the business this is termed the “Outside-in” perspective).

So the third process quality measure deals with how well the process is aligned to its “customer.” That requires a clearly articulated Intended Outcome that can be tested against what the customer (User) desires from the process, within their personal context and even in respect to any higher-level process they are actually engaged in.

This is a highly subjective quality assessment although in many ways it is the most important assessment we have on process quality.

How often do we know these impacts when we take on business process management and improvement initiatives? Very rarely to be frank and honest. Far too often we fail in our role as process stewards, to hold ourselves accountable to the fundamentals of process improvement. It's a choice that we don't often realize we have or that we are making by our very actions.

The choice is whether or not we are going to be true professional professionals. What choice have you made?

 

So you think you know process, right? Perhaps you work with process regularly. Maybe you are even a process professional, working with process all of the time. But have you ever seen a REAL PROCESS? Chances are you haven't.

Now wait a minute Terry! What do you mean, "I haven't seen a real process!" I work with process all of the time, I live and breathe it. I see processes every single day...

Maybe you do, and maybe you don't.

One of the dicussion points that comes up over and over is how do we bridge the gap between our technology and business perspectives? Why does there seem to be such an insurmountable gulf between us? Oh, and while we're at it, what about bridging the gap between expected benefits and realized benefits? Both technology and business perspectives share in that frustration.

And yet the answer to these questions is so obvious. While the questions may differ, they are variations of the same issue and the answer we seek is the answer to both.

All right, come on! If you know the answer then just say it, already!

Okay, OKAY :)

The answer is that REAL PROCESS is much like a theatrical production. It has a script. It has actors. It has sequence. It has props and it has a lot of different people involved in the overall production of the show.

We can break down a theatrical production in many ways, like the timing chart and all of the activities the supporting people must do at certain times to make the show "work" right. You know... lights, props, sound and so forth. That actually is very similar to the kind of process models many of us work with in IT.

We also have the script, which includes the actors, when they enter and exit, what they are supposed to say and do, and in what order. That is also very similar to the kind of process models we often create in "human-centric" BPM products and business analysis.

But the SHOW itself is the actual process! The process only becomes "real" when we put on the show. The real interactions of Process Actors (people, systems, machines) - with all of the nuance, contextual character, and "in the moment" relevance that really exists in our organizations - is what makes up a real process. Anything else is at best a lifeless caricature of a real process and at worst a travesty...

Think about it. What makes anyone actually THINK that a process model or something in a software product is really "the process?" It's not something we should ever need to discuss. It's not something we should ever consider and it's really a sad reflection on us that most of us are willing to do just that.

Of course there are many reasons why we do what we do. But if you want to become a real process expert. If you want to improve real process. If you want to make a real difference then understanding that the only expression of a process that is truly real is the STAGE SHOW that happens when work in the process actually gets done must be part of your process perspective.

It's an easy concept to visualize but it's not so easy to act on. Process "experts" rarely find themselves experiencing real process first hand. But understanding what real process is gives us that one needed ingredient for us to find new ways to create value in the work we do. Without this ingredient you are doing nothing but wasting your time, your company's money, frustrating your fellow workers (especially those that must live with the affects you have on their work), and driving away your customers.

And while some people may point to cases where discrete "process initiatives" produced stellar results, I suggest you look under the covers a bit deeper to see how much real benefit is there. But of course sometimes even without the magic ingredient something will work... as my Grandpapa used to say "Even a blind hog finds an acorn every now and again."

A week from today I will be presenting the latest material in the IPAPI CPP™ program at the open course in Dallas. I think this is going to be an "AHA" moment, as this mateiral makes the program even more actionable, managable and beneficial.

Some of the interesting points wovern into this revised program include historical influences from people like Drs. Deming and Juran as well as Richard Normann - the person who first gave us an operational perspective on the use of Moments of Truth (which influenced Jan Carlzson's use of same at SAS and subsequent book on the subject).

So would it surprise you to know that Break Points have been a key part of management thinking from Deming's early work? That "outside in" thinking and "successful customer outcomes" were a core part of Juran's quality philosophy in the 1940's? A lot of people don't know that. The influence of leaders like these are the true foundation of the CPP program and we gratefully acknowledge these important works where they have influenced our program.

I will also be introducing the concept of "Process Actors" into the mix, along with process baselining and linkage of Action Plans to SCO statements.

I think its going to fun and I am looking forward to giving this seminal class in Dallas!

Members of IPAPI can join me in developing the foundational work for the next certification on our agenda - the IPAPI CPM™ program (Certified Process Manager). This course, which is starting with my whitepaper describing the Process Maturity Model, will focus on a flexible and adaptable way to manage process on an organization al basis up to (and including) the Enterprise - along with giving us a way to measure and assess our process maturity over time.

If all goes well we hope to launch that program on late Q1 2009 or early Q2.

While our Board of Directors is set for now (myself, Alex Morse, Don Smith) our next action is to establish our Advisory Board. We have a few people already identified for this important volunteer role (currently all roles in IPAPI are volunteer) in IPAPI and are looking forward to establsih a world-class group of Advisors who are willing to spend a regular portion of their valuable time helping us to grow IPAPI into what we see as a very bright future.

That's about as far as we have taken things so far. The Board has decided to take things a step at a time, rather than build out a comprehensive roadmap that we have to change over and over again. Although I will tell you that there are several other key initiatives we will be acting on early next year that will enable us to embrace a much larger audience in respect to building our reach in the process community.

 

How often do process-based initiatives (BPM) fail to achieve their intended goal? Not a popular question with an even less popular answer. Far too often process-based initiatives fail to accomplish what we believe they will.

I’ve been living and breathing process for some time now and I can tell you that the approaches to process initiatives very widely – so widely that the extremes bear virtually no resemblance other than the common use of a few words.

One process perspective sees improvement as a 4 year investment with the first 2 years spend building the foundation from which value can be realized (that means no return on investment for at least 2 years).

Another sees it as workflow automation of existing processes, with automation itself being the “value creator.”

Still another sees it as the re-articulation of the architecture of the business in the form of flexible and reusable components.... services you know.

Yet there are companies that are leveraging process for quick wins that produce tangible results.

Take MidlandHR (http://www.midlandhr.com) for example, a human resource management company in the UK that combines their people talents in process improvement with their software. Ask them how long it takes to show results from a process improvement activity. I’m willing to bet you’ll get an answer in weeks to months, not months to years.

Ask their customers about value creation while you’re at it (I dare you too if you are in one of those “camps” alluded to early in this article). The answers you get will challenge your beliefs to their very foundations.

The problem we are faced in improving process comes from two places: our perspective of the problem and our predisposition to the solution. The simple fact is you can’t solve a problem if you don’t have it in the right perspective and you can’t implement a solution if you don’t understand why the solution actually addresses the root cause of the problem.

That’s what we experience in the IPAPI Certified Process Professional program. We find people with the wrong perspective and an engrained disposition to a solution mindset. We reset those limitations by giving people new perspectives and a solution mindset that addresses the very causes of the problems we face.

And it doesn’t take years. It doesn’t demand automation. It doesn’t require a new architecture. These may all be part of the “solution matrix” over time as we improve our processes on an organizational scale but it is characterized by short-term success stories one after another.

Isn’t that what we all want?

 

 Today is a good day for me, a very good day actually. I am finally part of the vision that has been brewing for some time – to found a nonprofit community organization around the CEM concepts I have pioneered.

It’s a very good day because today I will share part of a vision with you, a vision that will take us to a new place, the place we want to be – and the International Process and Performance Institute is already making great strides in taking us there.

For some time now I’ve had a pestering, festering feeling that we’re somehow missing the real prize. That we were heading for the stadium but somehow we got stuck in the parking lot with the gate closed…

...and we just can’t figure out how to get it open.

Well I’ve figured it out, and I’m going to share it with you.

It’s Like an Iceberg

It’s like the iceberg thing. We work like devils on the stuff we can see but the other part (and that’s where it starts getting interesting) we can’t touch. So what if our understanding of optimization opportunities is like the iceberg? What if we can only “see” the smallest part of the real optimization opportunity?

That would mean (if it were true) that the lion’s share of what we can do to improve our processes, our organizations, our customers experiences - even the quality of our working experiences - sits “out there,” out of sight and out of mind.

Ok, that’s a possibility but it doesn’t change anything until we find a way to get our hands around it. If optimization is like an iceberg then before we can tap into this vast reservoir of unleashed potential beyond the tip, we must find a way to bring the rest of the iceberg into our “world view.” Until then it’s just a fanciful thought or a mildly interesting mental exercise.

But guess what? We are going there now and IPAPI is leading the way.

I always liked reading stories about famous pioneers, the scouts and explorers that were ever willing – no, that had a burning need – to ford the next river, climb the next mountain, and even cross an endless sea to discover new lands and new people; to expand our world as we know it.

In our own way, IPAPI is also living the legacy of the pioneer and the explorer.

The vision (or insight) alluded to earlier is what I will start sharing with you today. It goes something like this:

A New Vision for Process Improvement

Let’s reflect a moment on the difference between machines and tools. It’s an analogy that will help us incorporate this insight into our world view.

Machines do work. Machines in there extremis can operate as independent automata. Many machines operate this way with little more than oversight and maintenance by people.

Other machines have controls by which people can “tell” machines when and what to do, and in what order things should be done. Yet to qualify as a machine, the machine must still be the thing that does the majority of work.

Tools on the other hand are the things people use to make the work people do more efficient, of higher quality and even in some cases possible. Without tools there are many things people would not be able to do.

The contrast between machines and tools is extreme. Machines are essentially self-contained in respect to doing work while tools can do nothing in and of themselves. Tools only have value when they are used by people.

This is why in manufacturing machines experience continuous development, advancement and innovation. In the physical work aspect of manufacturing machines do most of the work.

Everything else that businesses and organizations do (including in the manufacturing industry) is done by people. Certainly people rely heavily on both tools and specific use machines (telephones, fax machines, copiers, trucks, cars, planes, pens, paper, etc, etc, etc) but people are the primary work component, not the machines. If people do their job well, then the work in the organization gets done right and all is well.

But here is where things get disconnected. Think about the implications of tools and enabling machines (machines that do a specific-use task in support of the work done by people) in comparison to machines that do most of the work. Machines require very hardened “command and control” structures to be in place. Everything is engineered into the machine that is needed for it to perform its task(s). There can be no subjectivity or ability to adapt to changing conditions “on the scene.” Machines cannot function in a work environment laced with nuance, innuendo and subjective decision making. Their world is one of absolutes.

People on the other hand are fraught with adaptability, subjectivity, nuance and innuendo. People continuously flow within current context to decide what should be done, when and how. People are the ultimate decision-making entity for which no machine can achieve even a remote semblance of mimicry. People do exactly what machines cannot do, while machines do rote tasks that people could do, tasks that do not need the unique abilities of people to do them. That’s why we make machines to do these things.

Does this make sense to you?

Now, what is the ONE BEST WAY to reduce the ability of a machine to do its work?

Make to many controls for it, requiring people to “baby-sit” the machine.

What is the ONE BEST WAY to reduce the ability of people to do work?

Place too many controls on them forcing them to focus on the controls rather than the work.

So for machines, the answer is to build the control into the machine so that it can work as close to autonomously as possible.

For people, the answer is to create processes and tools that impose the least amount of control on them so that people can focus on doing the work that only people can do.

The Current Practice Creates Work

In our current process practices more often than not we create work for people to do, work that (oh my, this is where things start getting nitty-gritty) is non value-add to the organization.

I think it helps us to understand this when we realize that our predominant view of “process” and “management” behaves as if we think our organizations fit the definition of a machine. If they did then we would best be served by creating robust process models that are highly prescriptive in nature. People would then provide oversight and maintenance while the “processes” did the majority of any real work.

That mindset produces large, complicated process models – whether they are embedded in software or not. Great effort is expended to cover all manner of issues of concern to the organization in this approach. These issues include cost, profit, risk, compliance, control, quality, etc.

These process models are “locked down,” meaning they are infused with rules and mandates that tightly control any “work” moving through the process. Does this sound familiar?

It sounds like a machine to me.

Yet people need tools, not machines. A tool is something that makes the work people do simpler, easier and more successful – but the person is still the primary work actor.

The really amazing thing is that these “machine like” processes cause a big part of the work that people do in every business and organization – and it’s primarily non value-added work... It’s waste.

The New Frontier

The new process frontier has an entirely different sense to it. The best processes will be those that have the fewest constraints built into them. Processes will be subjected to ongoing evolution that makes them lean with Causes of Work and Points of Failure stripped out of them on a regular basis.

The ideal process is one step. That’s right, one step.

Now we won’t jump to having our processes suddenly all become one step processes. Not all processes (in our current understanding) can evolve to one step - and we are virtually at the other end of the spectrum right now.

What we will see is a dramatic and ongoing effort to bring our processes back from the “quasi-machine” brink to the useful and beneficial tool state. That will occur through the application of CEM.

We have already placed many of the techniques into play that are required to achieve this shift back to the “natural” state processes should be in from the “unnatural” state we have imposed on them.

Specific use techniques have been created to start applying the basic “machine to tool” transformation techniques on processes by identifying and removing Moments of Truth, Break Points and Business Rules from existing processes (IPAPI CPP™ - Optimize).

The techniques required to do the same to processes that are not currently aligned to our customers are now available, again achieving the transformation that empowers people and taps into the 70% to 90% underwater portion of the process optimization iceberg we previously didn’t know was there... while aligning the process to the wants and need of the customer (IPAPI CPP™ - Align).

Pushing out towards the “one step” ideal process state, we can even challenge the basic premise of a process within the larger context of what role it plays in our customers’ lives and how it could be recast into a new form – even a one step form (Best Buy Instant Rebates for example). We have the technique for that now as well (IPAPI CPP™ - Innovate). In some cases this even leads us to eliminating the current product/service process entirely as we move UP the customer value chain.

We’ve Only Just Begun...

We are forging forward into the new frontier, but we have further to go and more discoveries to make. IPAPI has already initiated a Special Interest Group using my Process Maturity Model whitepaper to develop an enterprise model for planning, managing and measuring our journey into this new frontier for example, and there are a number of other areas we need to explore that have already been identified.

It’s an exciting time, a worthy cause, a great mission, and more than anything else – a worthy endeavor.

I hope you have the chance to join us in this journey of process and performance discovery that we have begun...

The Five Man Electrical Band was far more clairvoyant then they probably knew when they wrote their song “Signs” in 1970. But what they were talking about was Freedom and there is one freedom that has been purged from the annals of Business, Government and Technology – the freedom for our lives to be simpler, easier and more successful.

It doesn’t matter where you go or what you do, that freedom is being stripped away faster and faster. Governments are making more laws, rules, and interpretations of the same (SIGNS) that try to dictate our lives into a nice, neat package devoid of anything remotely human.

Businesses are organizing around perceived risk and short-term financials to assuage their fears and satisfy disgruntled shareholders. But what about customers and employees? You guessed it, more SIGNS going into place all the time, “blocking out the scenery, breakin’ our minds.”

Where’s technology fitting in to the big biz and government picture? It’s being slapped down religiously to directly support the making and managing of SIGNS... as a means to try and control the one variant in this sorry mess – people. Do you think so or not? If not, think again. That’s all it takes is a brief bit of introspection and we see the SIGNS everywhere, and their stealing the joy from our lives.

But change a couple of things – actually just change one. What if Businesses, Governments and Technologists focused on only one thing – the group of people they serve – and that focus was based on the question “what would be do if we wanted to make our [target group’s] lives simpler, easier and more successful?

Can you see getting that one question right changes everything?

Some people don’t. They can’t really see what the possibilities are because they’re too deeply enmeshed in the muck. Yet if we see what this one simple question does, then the affects are revolutionary... evolutionary... man, they’re really, really COOL.

Think about. If you really get it then you can probably glimpse the affects. Suddenly we begin to challenge things. Why are we doing that? What is the point of this? How does that make any sense? Who would treat a customer like that?

Water Cooler questions, right? The scuttle and the butt. The grapevine’s been humming with this stuff for years and years and years. It’s the subversive underflow of the real world that the higher we go in authority the more we make sure we don’t acknowledge its existence.

But not everyone is lending a deaf ear. Virgin did the unthinkable with no-contract, simple, easy, fun cellular service with Virgin Mobile USA, and is still revamping the world’s airline businesses and a couple hundred more examples.

While lots of insurers are spending a lot of money telling you WHY they are great, State Farm has been quietly chugging away on their customer focus making people’s live simpler, easier and more successful – and dominating their industry.

Best Buy broke the mold with their Instant Rebate on everything in the store (no asterisks allowed thank you) obliterating this horrid inconvenience placed on customers (a part of the US retailers SOP - Standard Operating Procedures). Zara is delivering high street fashion lines from trend-spotting to stores in days rather than months and years.

CEM is about creating organizations that are constantly recreating customer value in the customer’s image. It’s a non-stop ride that employees thrive on doing and the customers recognize with loyalty and viral marketing. Apple is completely unraveling the vested technology mess and complexity of personal computing devices with the new Macs, Macbooks, iPods, iphones and iTunes.

These are the new signs of our times, the signs of companies optimizing, aligning and innovating on their customers. No financial gloom and doom signs here either, they are doing the right thing and their future is bright indeed.

Isn’t it about time you starting paying attention to the signs?

 

In my last blog I described the Optimize activity of the IPAPI CEM Method™ as the removal of unintentional work and non value-added work. Let's look at this in a bit more detail.

Every process has intentional work within it. Intentional work is anything (and everything) that must be DONE based on the current state design of the process. Every process has intentional work within it. Intentional work is done by people and machines.

Untentional work is anything (and EVERYTHING) that must be done that is not intentionally designed into the process. This includes process exceptions and deviations. It also includes all those things we do because something went wrong some where. This includes all mistakes, failed hand-offs, misunderstandings, work arounds (that big bucket of stuff we do when we feel we can't get work done the way our organization describes us doing the work), technical issues, training issues, absence of certain employees, lack of visibility into what is happening, and so on and so forth.

Every process has unintentional work. Some processes even have MORE unintentional work than intentional work within them. It may come as a suprise to many, but there are a lot more processes that create more unintentional work than the other way around.

In the IPAPI CEM METHOD (and Certified Process Professional program) we learn to identify the sources of unintentional work (Moments of Truth, Break Points, Business Rules) - helping us to size the process in respect to inefficiency and to establish an efficiency baseline. This gives us a very understandable and useable process perspective into the degree of unintentional work the process is likely to create.

Ideally our processes would never create unintentional work. Like "perfect quality," that is an unattainable goal. Instead we focus on the journey in working ever closer and closer to the "perfect state." We do this by eliminating as many sources of unintentional work as possible. It's easy for us to "see" that unintentional work is something we strongly desire to minimize.

Does that mean that intentional work is good? That depends. The second perspective in optimizing a process is to determine whether work is value-add or not.

What is value-add work you may ask? Well it's not a lot of the work we are doing in our current state process designs, that's for sure. Value-add work explicitly contributes to the intended outcome of the process. Oh, and if we don't know the intended outcome of the process then we have a process that is completely out of control. If we don't have a clear definition of what we want the process to produce how can we possibly think the process is under any form of control?

So assessing intentional work in a process requries that we assess the value of the work in respect to the intended outcome of the process. Guess what? If work in a process is NOT DIRECTLY contributing to the achievement of the intended outcome then it is intentional but NON VALUE-ADDED work.

Optimizing a process comes down to this:

1) Optimization is the identification, quantification, and reduction of the unintentional work potential of a process.

2) And the identification and elimination of non value-added work in the process in respect to its intended outcome.

Process diagnostics give us the means to identify both the unintentional work potential of a process and non value-added work. The Causes of Work factor gives us a quantification method as well as a reduction measure.

It is this approach to process optimization that truly optimizes process for the good of the organization, its customers and the people it employs. Why wouldn't we want to eliminate (or at least reduce) unintentional work and non value-added work? Of course we do, we've just not had the proper tools to do this until now...