A detailed process map can help reduce everything from cycle time to defects to process steps.

One of the great contributions that manufacturing management has made to the management of services are the techniques associated to mapping processes. Process mapping is helpful both for the design and reengineering of manufacturing and service processes. This month, we consider process mapping from that perspective. In doing so, helpful techniques are introduced and reviewed. The differences associated with designing and redesigning of manufacturing and service processes are also made more apparent.

What is a process map? A process map breaks a manufacturing or service process into a series of basic  indivisible steps. Each step is described not only by a name or label, but also in terms of the type of equipment, personnel, time and resources required. If an error is likely or possible, commonly referred to as a fail point, it is also noted on the process map along with other relevant information. By laying out all this information in one place and in sequential order, it becomes much easier to identify likely points of failure, required time to complete a process, and the resources required by the process. With all this information, improving the process is much easier. Activity-based Costing (ABC) uses similar information to determine the cost of a good or service.¹

Process Mapping in Manufacturing

Process maps are usually offered in either tabular form or as a flowchart. (For the purpose of this discussion, a tabular form is used for consideration of manufacturing and a flowchart is used for assessing service processes.) Process maps describe each step of a process and characterize the steps for each of the dimensions considered critical. These dimensions often include time, measures of variation in time, distance traveled by product, presence of fail points, equipment used or needed, skill types and levels used or needed. For the purpose of illustration, only two of these dimensions are considered in Figure 1: time and distance. In addition to these two quantitative characteristics, each step is characterized as being part of one of the following categories: operation, transport, inspection, delay or storage. If a step in the existing or planned process involves two of the categories, the step under consideration needs to be broken down into two or more steps. In Figure 1, step 9 – Machine 2 and Pack – is an example of a step that may need to be broken down into smaller steps. The question to ask is, Does step 9 actually consist of: 1) machine 2 operation, 2) move from machine 2 to packing station and 3) pack product?


Breaking a process into a series of steps and recording them in a tabular form provides a useful process summary. By adding the times for each step, we find that the overall cycle time of the example (Figure 1) is 820 min. If there is a feeling that the cycle time seems incorrect, the process map should be revisited to see why the map and reality appear to differ. Either one or more mistakes have been made in the process map, or substantial opportunities exist to improve the existing process. Once any inconsistencies between process map and local perceptions of the process are resolved, it is worthwhile considering how many of the steps and how much of the time in the process actually add value to the product. The categories delay and storage offer no value added to the final product. Every effort should be made to reduce or eliminate such steps. In our example, storage occurs in steps 5 and 8 and consists of 725 of the 820 min. time to process product.

The next question usually raised is, How much transportation is actually necessary? In our example, steps 2, 4, 6 and 10 involve transporting materials a total of 950' to produce a product. If one can modify the process so that the exit of one processing step is the entrance of the next, four of 11 processing steps can be eliminated. These modifications may be possible or, at the very least, one should try to organize the process so that work-in-process travels as short a distance as possible.² Finally, the need for inspection steps should be carefully scrutinized. While inspection steps might be cost-effective for preventing processing of defective product, inspection involves additional time and cost. If a firm purchases only from vendors that can be relied on to provide supplies and components of satisfactory quality, and if firm personnel take responsibility for quality assurance associated with their work tasks, inspection steps often can be eliminated.³ In our example, eliminating inspection as well as the other items discussed could⁴ lead to a process with as few as three steps, involving no transportation and only 40 minutes of operation time. Such a process would constitute a reduction of about 70% of the processing steps, all the transportation, and about 95% of the processing time. While these numbers may seem high, they are in line with case studies involving just-in-time total quality management and elimination of waste. Having briefly considered process mapping in a manufacturing environment, services are now considered.

Process Mapping in Services

Because services can be intangible and invisible, mapping service processes is much more difficult. Many failures of business process reengineering or ERP are not fundamental problems with those concepts, but involve implementation problems often associated with incorrect or incomplete process maps. It is easy to see that if it is difficult to accurately detail a process for a visible thing like manufacturing an automobile,⁵ then it is much more difficult to accurately map less-visible services such as retail interaction or professional services.⁶ Figure 2 illustrates part of an online auction process; for more details, see the source in reference ⁸. As noted, a flowchart is used to depict the service. A flowchart could also have been used in the manufacturing example (Figure 1). The value of a flowchart over a table is clearly demonstrated when a process is nonlinear – i.e., there are decision points with multiple options (such as step SH4 in Figure 2), or it is recursive (such as the sequence of steps B7-B9-B3)?


Compared to manufacturing, in services there is a much greater focus on the range of time that a step may take. While a machine may conduct its required operations within a clearly defined period of time, if a service is carried out in a like manner, the service will be perceived to be of low quality because too much or too little time will often be spent on each of the processing steps.⁷ The presence of fail points should also be carefully considered; the identification of fail points is critical and central to success in process mapping services. Figure 3 shows Failure Mode Effect Analysis (FMEA) for identifying and responding to failure points. The other area often different from manufacturing and critical to service processes is the determination of the skill set required for each step. Many businesses have saved on production costs with improved customer satisfaction and quality levels by better matching employee skills levels to the process step(s) requirements. If the employee lacks skills associated with a process step, the outcome is often customer dissatisfaction or higher cost due to the need to redo process steps or repair mistakes. Alternatively, if personnel have too high a skill set, the cost of production is usually higher, and other problems such as absenteeism from unhappy employees or mistakes from bored employees may result. 


Conclusions

Either, or both, a table or flowchart can be used for mapping a process regardless of whether the process is manufacturing or service-based. The choice to use a table for manufacturing and a flowchart for a service has been made based on the depictions most commonly found in textbooks and other sources. Information provided in both the manufacturing and service sections is valid for both types of processes. For brevity, an attempt has been made not to cover the same ground twice.

Process mapping is a powerful tool whether the intent is to design a process or redesign it. Much of the benefits from the process reengineering movement are based on the development of excellent process maps. The business process reengineering literature leans heavily on the value of information technology to automate service processes.⁹ However, processes can only be automated if they are understood in great detail.¹⁰ A detailed process map can help identify opportunities for reductions in cycle time, defects, product variation, cycle time variation, number of process steps and required skill base. It is not clear how frequently a process should be mapped or an already mapped process be revisited. However, it is clear that process mapping offers a good way to benchmark a process and ascertain if any opportunities for improvement have been overlooked.

References

1. The accounting profession has moved away from use of ABC. It is mentioned because process mapping and ABC link quite well. Of course, one does not require the other.
   
   
2. Benefits of reducing or eliminating travel include savings in personnel costs, equipment used to transport material, cycle time (although this is not apparent from our example), inventory, and the amount of space required for producing the product.
   
   
3. If inspection is required for problems that cannot be detected by internal or external suppliers, cost-benefit analysis should be conducted to determine the number and location of inspections.
   
   
4. “Could” is used here because this is the obvious long-term goal. Over the shorter term, it is possible that eliminating some of these steps is either impractical or impossible.
   
   
5. Anonymous, “Management Brief: When GM’s Robots Ran Amok,” The Economist, Aug. 10, 1991. This brief tale regards the terrible problems that occur when a process that is not well understood is automated.
   
   
6. An excellent reference on this subject is L. Shostack, “Designing Services That Deliver,” Harvard Business Review, vol. 62, no. 1, 1984.
   
   
7. Consider, for example, if call center personnel were told they must spend exactly three minutes on the telephone (no more, no less). The result would be either comical (call center personnel trying to prevent customers from hanging up before the required time expired) or unacceptable (call center personnel requiring customers to hang up and call in later, to prevent the interaction being longer than the allotted time).
   
   
8. J.D. Linton, “Facing the Challenges of Service Automation: An Enabler for E-Commerce and Productivity Gain in Traditional Services,” IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, vol. 50, no. 4, pp. 478-484, 2003. For a copy, email the author.
   
   
9. For an in-depth discussion of process redesign, a popular book is M. Hammer and J. Champy, Reengineering the Corporation, Harper Collins, 1993.
   
   
10. Anonymous, “Management Brief: When GM’s Robots Ran Amok,” The Economist, Aug. 10, 1991.

Jonathan Linton is the Paul Desmarais Professor of the Management of Technological Enterprises at the School of Management at the University of Ottawa and editor of Technovation: the International Journal of Technological Innovation, Entrepreneurship, and Technology Management; linton@management.uottawa.ca.