Now I want to walk you through the process we used to document our value stream, and what we were interested in measuring.

Generally it’s good to start your process mapping by looking at the job function level.  Depending on the complexity of your business, you may want to do this by individual department.  You will know if you need to break it down.  Map the current state first.

Use post-its to define each discrete job function in order.  You can use swimming lanes if there are concurrent processes you’d like to map.  Ideally, you’d also be gathering accurate information on the following metrics – to start you may just want to use your best estimates:

• Cycle Time – this is the average time it takes to do the task.
• Process Time – this is the average time it takes including any waiting before or after the task.
• Percent Complete & Accurate - an estimate of what % of the time the task is received complete & accurate.
• Percent Exceptions – this is a measure of how frequently there are exceptions which require special handling.
• Number of Hand-offs – how many times does the work change hands (don’t forget figuratively, if information is emailed around the company).

Now you can start to see how much time is spent on activities other than doing the necessary work.  Be sure to include documents or reports that are built into certain job functions.  For those who are more detailed oriented, you may continue to break job functions down into discrete tasks.

I would start broad until you get a feel for how this works.  If possible, remember to include people from every job function and department.

Now you can add up each type of time.  The total Cycle Time is the actual time spent doing the work to produce your product or service.  The total Process Time is how long it takes you to get the product or service out the door and into the hands of the customer.  Usually the Cycle to Process ratio is VERY low.  But now you should start to see where there’s opportunity to take waste out.

Tags: Alignment, Customer Value

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