Process-Centred Management - Essay Example

Process Centred Management Introduction. Process Centred Management model can be best defined as engineering a work process from the outside invs. the inside out. Process Centred Management looks at the whole process of production rather than the skills specific or actions specific to production. This is a qualitative process and involves looking at the whole process from beginning to end. The team approach is encouraged with everyone focused on qualitative production and the end product. Michael Hammer coined the term "reengineering1" as the process of changing how an organization looks at its production or work process. Reengineering changes production from a skill specific departmental process to a product centred approach that looks at the end product and the team effort required to create it. 2. The Building Blocks. The organizational structure may need to change or adjust to cross-departmental communications to support the process centred management approach. The change will require organization around outcomes rather than organization by tasks. In some cases customers may be able to complete part of the process thus eliminating a cost of or required personnel (not too popular among staff because it could cause lay-offs). This could take the form of automated ordering processes via the internet verses a call centre based ordering system. The organization must be prepared for flexibility and change and can do this by devising a strategy to support the change while supporting the workforce who will implement the change. 3. Impact on the organization. Change rarely comes easy and change to a process centred management system is no exception. Change impacts production, employees, management, and the organizational structure. Change is most often designed to cut costs and to increase profits. Employees are the ones that seem to be affected the most by change in management systems. Change from a skills or department approach to a process centred outcome approach may not come easily if it means a reduction in force (lay offs). Ownership of the change makes the change a whole lot easier. The employees will need to adjust to working toward an outcome (process) instead of a single task. This requires adopting a team approach and requires the employees to learn a whole process rather than a step in the process. Job design, job enlargement, and job enrichment all impact the worker. In short, the job gets harder and the employee needs to know and learn more. The employee transitions from worker to professional. Information sharing is a very important part of process centred management. Information can be shared by different team members instead of one department gathering information to pass on to another department for processing. Jobs and job descriptions will need to be reengineered to support the process centred approach. The decision point may need to shift in the organization from higher management down to where the decisions are implemented. Performance measurement is vital to successful process centred management because "measurement is the foundation of improvement2". Quality Assurance (QA) provides the opportunity to correct or confirm product quality and marketability. "What isn't measured doesn't happen because there is no incentive, knowledge, or ownership"(PPT06, Provided with Course). Quality assurance makes sure that the end product meets or exceeds customer satisfaction (demand). "QA in a process centred organization is measure by results, growth, and performance"3. A QA method that organizations can use is Plan, Do, Check, Act (PDCA)4 to ensure that organizational activities support the process centred management approach and thus support production and marketing activities. 4. Changes required in organizational structure. Of all the changes necessary when a switch to process centred management is adopted the change in organization structure will effect the organization the most. The "whose in charge" idea needs to change. Decision making power is moved to the production component and team. Management becomes a "coordination of complex actions through networks of actors and organizations5" to include teams. Information and decision making is no longer a top to bottom practice but a team effort. 5. Simulation prior to adoption. Before putting new policy into practice a simulation of the process centred management approach to planning, production, marketing, sale, and delivery must take place. Prior to the simulation, training of all workers and management involved needs to take place. This gives the organization an opportunity to try out the new process, fix any glitches that come up, and gain employee ownership of the plan. In addition, simulation offers a chance for the organization to sell the process centred management approach to its employees and gives the opportunity for practice and feedback. 6. Examples. An example of an organisation/industry that has changed to a process centred management style are those in the medical/health care field. Process centred management has been applied by using one software program to handle the data used by many departments rather than many programs used by different departments. The patient at any part of the revenue cycle will be asked questions only once verses many times in the revenue cycle. Instead of the process being fragmented it is seamless with positive outcomes. Less staff are needed and less input from the patient is required. The process of gathering information and access to information has been simplified making the process both user friendly and cost effective. Process centred management is applied in maintenance organisations to manage activities as a process. Although maintenance is not a tangible product itself the process of maintaining equipment is. Outcomes are measured by monitoring components and their condition over time, replacing components prone to failure or at the end of their life-cycle, and completing required maintenance on equipment. QA is again used in the form of PDCA. Process centred maintenance requires job design, job enlargement, and job enrichment that increase the knowledge base an employee needs to be successful. Again, the process turns the worker (with limited skills) into a professional (with a broad skill base). The process centred approach to management can also be applied to knowledge management. Knowledge management is much like the previous example in the health care industry except that the process centred approach is used to gather knowledge and the program helps decide what else is required. The previous example required input in set data fields and the process was complete when all the data fields had been filled in. Again, one program is used throughout the organisation. The process centred program provides access to knowledge needed during specific tasks in the production cycle. The program is designed to provide the specific information at the right time rather than overloading the process centred team with all the data and having the team sort through it all for data they require. This is not a move back to the skill specific model but a fine tuning of the process centred model. The employees in this case are also professionalized by creating jobs that require a larger knowledge base. Again, the employee is expected to know the whole process rather than one skill in the process. The program reduces the amount of employees needed as well as the time required to complete the production task because information is inputted into the system once and used throughout production rather than each department repeating parts of the process to complete their assigned task. The program manages the knowledge and assists with project management, coordination, and planning. The goal of this approach is lowering the cost of production and reducing the manpower required as well. The process centred approach has been accepted in larger organisations and is gaining acceptance in smaller organisations. In smaller companies often the management approach is employee centred and job skill specific. The change in management style has more effect on the employee because small businesses have few employees and job enlargement for one employee might often mean unemployment for another. In some instances small business management may already be process centred and the company need not make changes. Often the small businesses are not aware of the management style they are using until they attend a seminar or briefing and find that: "hey, we already do that!". Pro-forma A Purpose of Promotional Activity Name of Company The Food Commission, United Kingdom Name/ description of promoted Product/ Service Campaigns for safer healthier food in the UK. Campaigns against obesity and misleading advertising within the food industry. Campaigns for support of the organisation through donations. Is this a new or existing product/ service Existing and expanding public service organisation. What are the key product and or service attributes Actively promotes the right to safe and wholesome food as well as campaigns against childhood obesity and misleading advertising. Type of Marketing communications tool used (may be more than one) Press releases to coincide with publication of Food Magazine, Posters, other publications, and several websites geared to different audiences. www.chewonthis.org.uk, www.childrensfoodbill.org.uk and www.foodcomm.org.uk Key message of promotion Evidence "The Food Commission cares about the food we eat and is committed to ensuring good quality food for all. The Food Commission is a national non-profit organisation campaigning for the right to safe, wholesome food."( www.foodcomm.org.uk) Media Chosen (may be more than one) Press releases to newspapers, magazines, and television. Internet presence with several targeted consumer websites. Assumed Customer segment(s) addressed Evidence Parents, Children, Educators, and non-profit supporters (unpaid experts and friends) "If you can help us to continue our campaigns please send a donation, or subscribe to the Food Magazine. Your generous support can make a real difference to our work, allowing us to improve the nutritional health of millions of children and adults across the UK, and encourage change within the food industry."( www.foodcomm.org.uk) Assumed required Marketing Communications outcome Evidence Organisation intends to educate the public about wholesome foods, obesity, and nutritional health. Assumed required Marketing outcome Evidence Required marketing outcome is hard to measure but would be an increase in consumer knowledge about wholesome foods, obesity, and nutritional health as well as an increase in understanding about misleading advertising. Outcome would also consist of measurable increase in donors, unpaid professional support, and friends of the organisation. All material advertising from this organisation is designed to influence people's beliefs, attitudes, and behaviours relating to food. Pro-forma B Effectiveness of promotional activity Assumed required Marcoms outcome (summary from form A) Required marketing communications outcomes include public awareness about obesity, misleading advertising, and wholesome foods.Outcomes also include widening donor base as well as unpaid professional help and friends. Assumed required Marketing outcome (summary from form A) Required marketing outcome would include public awareness about obesity, misleading advertising, and wholesome foods.Outcomes also include widening donor base as well as unpaid professional help and friends Type of research undertaken (brief description) Research undertaken would include a count of website usage/traffic from associated Food Commission websites (quantitative). Also, donor base and unpaid professional base should be examined to measure possible increase. Purpose of research Purpose of research is to determine whether marketing activities undertaken by the Food Commission have been effective in increasing knowledge about obesity, wholesome foods, and misleading advertising. Conclusions drawn from research Conclusions from research: Observing website traffic counts can give an estimate of how much of the intended message got out. For example: no traffic on a particular Food Commission website would indicate that the message intended on the website did not get out. Post research review Conclusions drawn are based on only one measurement (web traffic) and could include other data collection methods such as a survey of school children or a voluntary survey of grocery market traffic. Online survey would also be effective in determining change in attitudes, behaviours, and beliefs. Pro-forma C The impact on the Organisations Operations as a result of the promotional activity Sales activities Promotional activities increase sales of Food Magazine and posters. Sales activities increase donor base and unpaid professional help. Accounts, billing and receivables This is a non-profit and no billing is done. Receivables are donations only and directly applied to the activities of the Food Commission. Customer/materials/information processing operation Materials and information are limited to the Food Magazine purchase and donations. Procurement of goods/services and distribution of the same Not Applicable Retail stock and stores management Not Applicable Recruitment of additional/temporary resources This is ongoing and consists of magazine purchase, unpaid professional services by donors, and donations. Design (for example; new product, new service, new process, new job) Advertising and promotion of websites is ongoing and continuously changes to appeal to desired audiences. Order fulfilment Not Applicable Customer service support Not Applicable 7. A two-part conclusion. a. Process Centred Management serves to increase profits by changing the way an organisation operates. It moves away from the traditional skills based model to a process and outcome based model. It identifies tasks that may have been repeated through production and consolidates them so that a task is done once rather than repeated at different levels in the organization. Process centred management can be applied to different types of organisations (service vs. production) and have a similar positive outcome. Process centred management can increase profits by eliminating redundancy in an organisation. Eliminating redundancy may result in a reduction of the workforce required to produce a product or service. Although not popular with the workforce (because of potential lay-offs) process centred management is popular with organisations because of the potential to streamline its processes (production or services), reduce costs, and increase profits. b. Marketing strategies and promotional activities are not limited to for-profit organisations. These strategies can be applied to non-profits with good results. The objective is the same: successfully market a product and obtain results such as an increase in sales or an increase in donations (or other objectives) for the non profit. Strategies to market and measure results need prior planning. Market research can be conducted in many different ways such as surveys, website traffic counters, and by measuring an increase (or decrease) is sales or profits. Works Cited and References Used 1. Hammer, Michael. Beyond Reengineering: How the Process Centered Organisation is Changing Our Work and Our Lives. Harper Business (September 1997) 2. Hooks, Ivy and Kristin Farry. Faster and cheaper products that are better.(Brief Article) IIE Solutions, March, 2001 Retrieved February 4, 2007 3. Hammer, Michael. Beyond Reengineering: How the Process Centered Organisation is Changing Our Work and Our Lives. Harper Business (September 1997) 4. Lewis, Jeffrey. QMS Consulting, Inc. Retrieved February 3, 2007 from www.plant-maintenance.com/articles/maintenance_quality.shtml 5. Pollitt, Chris. Shared Accountibility.Horizontal and Team Management. Erasmus University. Roterdam School of Policy Studies Queens University, Canada. PPT presentation. Schneider, Robert. Process-Centered Revenue Cycle Management Optimizes Payment Process. Healthcare Financial Management Jan 2001. (Journal Article) Mahoney, Ann I. CAE. Reengineering for Results. Association Management August 1997 (Journal Article) Maurer, Frank. Process-Centred Knowledge Management and Case Based Reasoning. University of Calgary Department of Computer Science. Calgary, Alberta, Canada T2N 14N BPM Enterprises. Creating a Process-Centred Organisation: Implementing Dashboards. BPMEnterprises Insights Newsletter February 13, 2006 Vol 1#6 Floss, Peter. Requirements for Transitioning Business Process Simulation Models to Real-time Operational Systems. Gensym Corporation. 125 Cambridge Park Drive, Cambridge, MA 02140 USA Bonfim, Walace Satori. Edson Pinheiro de Lima. Sergio E. Gouvea da Costa. Process Approach to Strategic and Operational Integration. 2004 Society for Design and Process Science. Journal Article September 2004 Vol. 8 No. 3 pp. 37-47. Holz, Harold. Arne Konnecker. Frank Maurer. Task Specific Knowledge Management in a Process-Centred SEE. University of Kaiserslauten Germany. Kaiserslauten Germany. D-67653. Retrieved 02/04/2007 http://sern.ucalgary.ca/courses/seng/693/F00/readings/Holz.pdf Read More