BACS 300 Business Process Improvement

BACS 300 Business Process Improvement- Problem Definition

I.                   Written Project Problem Definition, Benefits and BPMN diagram

1. Problem Definition (1 page maximum) summarize thebusiness and business problem, explain why the selected process needs attention.
2. Discuss possible business benefits that might occur with process improvements (e.g., reduced cost, improved service etc.) (1 page maximum)
3. Create an “As Is” Visio diagram that documents the current steps of yourselected process and uses annotations to highlight “broken” process steps.

 

Note: This proposal concerns identifying and documenting a “broken” business process.  In the next several assignments you will propose a solution, however this assignment concerns only identifying the problem and discussing business benefits of fixing the problem.   Remember there may be many alternative solutions and selecting asolution must wait until the problem is clearly defined and understood.

utside groups you are working with.

Hints:

Your paper is a sales document – you are trying to sell a process improvement project to someone (boss, customer, investor, etc.). You have to be convincing. Remember that you are trying to convince your reader that they have a problem that needs attention, and your reader is likely to be looking for evidence that you are wrong.

• The problem definitionshould include details about the business problem and why it needs attention. You will need some introductory materialfor the problem definition to make sense, but use as little as possible. (This is part of the art of writing summaries.)
• The discussion of possible business benefits should explain to the readerwhy the problem is important and worthy of a process improvement project.
• Give sufficient detail for the reader to be able to evaluate the reliability of your proposal and the thoughtfulness of your reasoning. Remember, the reader is your adversary, looking for holes in your arguments.
• Learn to be your own editor. Be tough. Unnecessary words are usually confusing. Remember that behind every great novelist, there is a great editor who reduced the book length by two- thirds! (Okay, I made that up, but it is close.)
• Use white space – bullets and lists, tables etc.Being professional strengthens your credibility.
• Be careful of how you use words. Avoid colloquial and picturesque language. It is likely to mean different things to different people.
• Please Resist solving the problem– the focus should be on the problem definition.
• Please create a BPMN Visio diagram of the process. Make sure your diagram conforms to business process modeling notation and assure that it has a start, finish, several process activity nodes, a sub process, repository(s) and at least two decision nodes (each with at least two labeled branches). Use Swim lanes to capture roles. Make sure you include some annotations representing questions that are unclear and need clarification and that shows where in the process problems currently occur.